For the first time, Lengiprotrans began to consider the development of railway approaches to the port of Ust-Luga in 1992, when it took part in the development of the General Scheme for the development of seaports on the shores of the Gulf of Finland of the Baltic Sea.
The impetus for large-scale construction was the active development of the port to increase the cargo turnover to 180 million tons, of which 118 million tons were planned to be delivered by rail.
In this regard, significant adjustments have been made to the General Scheme many times, primarily in the development of the Ust-Luga railway hub. It provides for the construction of six railway stations, five of which are port stations Luzhskaya-Yuzhnaya , Luzhskaya-Severnaya , Luzhskaya-Vostochnaya, Luzhskaya-General and Luzhskaya-Neftyanaya — serving terminals and access railway lines directly adjacent to to them. The sixth station is Luzhskaya-Sortirovochnaya , it provides the formation of trains to the port stations and to the external network according to the appointments of the formation plan.
At present, the Ust-Luga railway hub is one of the largest transport hub in the North-West of Russia. The total building area of the Ust-Luga railway hub is 930 hectares; of these, 300 hectares are occupied by the sorting system of the Luzhskaya station. The total length of the tracks of the Ust-Luga railway hub for full development will be more than 300 km.
The Luzhskaya-Severnaya station was commissioned in 2006. Later, according to the Lengiprotrans project, its reconstruction was also carried out. The station is designed to organize maintenance of a coal terminal, a complex for transshipment of sulfur and mineral fertilizers. The unloading of wagons at the Luzhskaya-Severnaya station for an average day in 2018 amounted to 1,548 wagons.
In 2002–2016, the Luzhskaya-Yuzhnaya station was designed and built. The main goal of the project was the development of technical solutions for the organization of servicing the terminals of JSC Ust-Luga Container Terminal (JSC ULCT), Automobile and Railroad Transshipment Complex (AZHPK), Multipurpose transshipment complex YUG-2 (MTC YUG- 2) and a warehouse logistics center. Unloading of wagons at the Luzhskaya-Yuzhnaya station for an average day in 2018 amounted to 209 wagons, and loading — 40 wagons.
In 2002–2016, the Luzhskaya-Neftyanaya station was designed, which is intended to organize servicing of the oil cargo complex and pass the transit flow in the direction of the Luzhskaya-Generalnaya station and for the further development of the Luzhskaya-Vostochnaya station. The unloading of wagons at the Luzhskaya-Neftyanaya station for an average day in 2018 amounted to 1,194 wagons.
Current projects include the stations Luzhskaya-General, Luzhskaya-Vostochnaya and Luzhskaya-Sortirovochnaya.
Station Luzhskaya-Sortirovochnaya is the main station of the railway hub, intended for the passage of transit trains, reception of trains for disbandment, the formation of transfer trains at the station of the hub and trains to the external network. It was commissioned in 2015. The station consists of several parks and a fully automated hump. The processing capacity is up to 5,000 wagons per day. The hill and the arrival park at the station are served by a minimum number of workers, which has a significant impact on reducing operating costs. The entire hump cycle, which includes the arrival of the hump locomotive under the train, thrusting and breaking up, is carried out fully automatically without human intervention. The hump station of automatic centralization is designed as a “smart house” with fully automated climate, lighting and access control systems.
The stations Luzhskaya-Generalnaya and Luzhskaya-Vostochnaya are designed to service the promising cargo terminals in the northern part of the Ust-Luga Commercial Sea Port.
Cargo turnover of the terminal of Eurochem Terminal Ust-Luga LLC at the station Luzhskaya-General by 2030 (full development) will reach 6.7 million tons per year. Eurochem Terminal Ust-Luga LLC plans to export and import chemical and mineral fertilizers. Freight turnover of the non-public track of Universal trading terminal Ust-Luga, related to the station Luzhskaya-General, will amount to 24.26 million tons per year. Commissioning is scheduled for development stages in 2023–2026.
Inside the Ust-Luga railway hub, to link all its stations, connecting main tracks are provided.
When the port of Ust-Luga reaches its full capacity, the volume of cargo transshipment from rail to sea will amount to at least 140 million tons per year.
During the period from 2003 to 2018, the volume of railway traffic in communication with the port of Ust-Luga increased from 0.3 million tons to 69.97 million tons per year, including arrivals — 69.56 million tons per year, departure — 0.41 million tons per year. The measures implemented to date for the reconstruction project of the Ust-Luga railway hub make it possible to process 80 million tons. At the same time, a constant increase in volumes is expected, including through the redistribution of cargo flows to the Russian ports of the Baltic basin. By 2017, at least every fifth wagon unloaded in Russian ports was a wagon at the Ust-Luga railway hub.
