Transport in Ukraine


Transport in Ukraine includes ground transportation, water, air transportation, and pipelines. The transportation sector accounts for roughly 11% of the country's gross domestic product and 7% of total employment.

Economy

Transport Infrastructure

Today the transport sector in Ukraine generally meets only the basic needs of the economy and population. The level of safety, quality and efficiency of passenger and freight transport, as well as the infrastructure's amount of energy usage, and the technological burden it places on the environment do not meet modern-day requirements.
Due to the low level of demand, the country's existing transit potential and advantageous geographical position is not fully utilised. There is thus a lag in the development of transport infrastructure, transport and logistics technologies and multimodal transport. All this has made Ukraine uncompetitive as the high costs of transport across the country make the cost of production in the country uncommonly high.

International Transport Corridors

The advantageous geographical position of Ukraine allows for the location of a number of International Transport Corridors on its territory, in particular :
The share of the transport sector in Ukraine's gross domestic product as of 2009 was 11.3%. The number of workers employed in the sector is almost 7% of total employment. The transportation infrastructure of Ukraine is adequately developed overall, however it is obsolete and in need of major modernization. A remarkable boost in the recent development of the country's transportation infrastructure was noticed after winning the right to host a major continental sport event the UEFA Euro 2012.
In 2009, Ukrainian infrastructure provided for the transportation of 1.5 billion tons of cargo and 7.3 billion passengers. As the global financial crisis took hold and demand for major export commodities in 2009 fell, the volume of freight traffic decreased by 17,6% when compared with figures from 2008; passenger transport fell by 12,7%.

Rail

The public railways in Ukraine are managed by the state railway company Ukrzaliznytsia

Network length (2010)

The length of the railway network Ukraine ranks third in Europe.
Ukrainian trains and rail infrastructure are incapable of speeds more than 160 kilometres per hour. However, the number of railway passengers and freight is increasing. The government had made large investments in rail transportation in preparation for Euro 2012. There are intercity trains between Euro 2012 cities.

Maps

Roads and Auto

The development of public roads in Ukraine is currently lagging behind the pace of motorisation in the country. During 1990-2010 the length of the highways network hardly increased at all. The density of highways in Ukraine is 6.6 times lower than in France. The length of express roads in Ukraine is 0.28 thousand km, and the level of funding for each kilometre of road in Ukraine is around 5,5 - 6 times less than in those locations.
This is due to a number of objective reasons, including that the burden of maintaining the transport network per capita is significantly higher than in European countries because of Ukraine's relatively low population density, low purchasing power of citizens, relatively low car ownership and the nation's large territory.
The operational condition of roads is very poor; around 51.1% of roads do not meet minimum standards, and 39.2% require major rebuilds. The average speed on roads in Ukraine 2 - 3 times lower than in Western countries.
As of 2016, many of Ukraine's major provincial highways are in very poor condition, with an Ukravtodor official stating that 97% of roads are in need of repair. The road repair budget was set at about 20 billion hryvnias, but corruption causes the budget to be poorly spent and overweight trucks are common place rapidly causing more road damage.
Motorways in Ukraine, :
Kiev - Boryspil | Kharkiv - Dnipro
State Highways, :
M01 | M02 | M03 | M04 |
M05 | M06 | M07 | M08 | M09 | M10 | M11 | M12 | M13 | M14 | M15 | M16 | M17 | M18 | M19 | M20 | M21 | M22 | M23
Note: State highways are important national routes and are not necessarily high-speed roads

Aviation

Outlook

The aviation section in Ukraine is developing very quickly, having recently established a visa-free program for EU nationals and citizens of a number of other 'Western' nations, the nation's aviation sector is handling a significantly increased number of travellers. Additionally, the granting of the Euro 2012 football tournament to Poland and Ukraine as joint hosts has prompted the government to invest huge amounts of money into transport infrastructure, and in particular airports.
Currently there are three major new airport terminals under construction in Donetsk, Lviv and Kiev, a new terminal has already opened in Kharkiv and Kiev's Boryspil International Airport has recently begun operations at Terminal F, the first of its two new international terminals. Ukraine has a number of airlines, the largest of which is the nation's flag carrier, UIA. Antonov Airlines, a subsidiary of the Antonov Aerospace Design Bureau is the only operator of the world's largest fixed wing aircraft, the An-225.
Donetsk Airport destroyed due to War in Donbass.
New terminal at Odessa International Airport has been opened for arrival flights on April 14, 2017.

Airports

Major airports are: Kiev Boryspil Airport, Dnipropetrovsk Airport, Kharkiv Airport, Lviv Airport, Donetsk Airport, Odessa Airport, and Simferopol Airport.

Airports with unpaved runways

River transport

waterways on 7 rivers, most of them are on Danube, Dnieper and Pripyat rivers. All Ukraine's rivers freeze over in winter, limiting navigation. However, river icebreakers are available on the Dnieper, at least in vicinity of Kiev.

Danube

The most important waterway of Ukraine.
Dnipro within Ukraine is a regulated system of reservoirs separated by dams with shiplocks. The river is navigable through all its Ukrainian length.
Notable riverport Chernobyl is now abandoned due to the Chernobyl disaster, but the waterway retains its importance as part of the Dnieper-Baltic Sea route.

Southern Bug

Plans are announced to revitalize commercial freight navigation on the Southern Bug as part of the increasing grain export from Ukraine.

Sea transport

Merchant marine

As of July 2013, Ukraine had 18 "marine trade ports" available for foreign ships' entry. Some of these "marine trade ports" are actually port conglomerates comprising several non-adjacent ports and tenant private terminals. Major river ports are also considered "marine" international ports.
The natural gas transport-system can take in a maximum of 288 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year. Its annual output capacity is 178.5 billion cubic meters, including 142.2 billion to be forwarded to European countries.
pipeline, running from the TogliattiAzot plant in Russia to Odessa in Ukraine.

Unofficial databases