Kazakhstan has upgraded one of its most important rail border crossings. The investment helps to boost capacity on the Asia-Europe rail routes and reduce congestion.
As part of a broader capacity boosting programme, the Altynkol rail yard near China now has a 40% bigger capacity to handle trains. It is located next to the Khorgos border crossing, a key rail node not only for bilateral trade between Kazakhstan and China, but also for transit flows to Europe.
The Khorgos rail infrastructure is often overwhelmed by the large number of trains trying to cross the border. The addition of six new tracks at Altynkol could help in that regard. It boosts the daily train handling capacity from 20 to 28 trains.
Apart from the new tracks, Kazakhstan is working on 32 kilometres of double track infrastructure between Altynkol and Zhetygen. The latter is located just north of the country’s largest city, Almaty, on the way towards Europe. The upgrade also includes five new sidings and the development of eight existing ones. As a result, the throughput capacity of the railway should grow from 18 to 33 daily trains. Completion is scheduled for 2026.
Dostyk
At the same time, Kazakhstan’s other main rail border crossing with China, Dostyk-Alashankou, is on track for a good 2025 end result. In the first 11 months of the year, traffic was up by 6% and reached 17.8 million tonnes. An important side note is that the number of wagons grew by only 1%, to 450,200 units.
| Category | Wagons | Tonnes |
|---|---|---|
| Outgoing | 209,700 (same as last year) | 12.9 million (+4%) |
| Incoming | 241,000 (+1%) | 4.8 million (+12%) |
| Export shipments | 138,900 (+6%) | 9.2 million (+10%) |