Baltic States – CIS, Latvia, Port, Railways, Transport

He indicated that freight shipments to Russia are declining, and there are no grounds to expect them to increase. For this reason, the economic justification of this project needs to be reviewed. Matiss also said that Russian business owners are re-orienting their cargoes to Russian ports. Furthermore, other neighbor countries have registered a decline in the amounts of freight transported by rail as well.

The council agreed that after the electrification project draft is drawn up, it would be useful to evaluate the project's infrastructure costs until the second quarter of 2015, and to find out whether the involved parties are ready to implement this project at all, taking into account that the final decision has not been made yet.

LDz representative Aija Poca said that the recent geopolitical trends need to be considered and risks evaluated in order to clarify which sections of the railroad are the first to be electrified.

Because the project will be co-funded using the European Union funds, it is already clear that there will be difficulties in justifying the project's economic aspects, Matiss said.

Meanwhile, Liepaja City Council Chairman Uldis Sesks objected to the current plan, saying that the electrification project omits electrification of the Liepaja railroad. With Liepaja omitted, the city's port will lose its competitive capacity, said Sesks.