Plan for Kutaisi Airport Rail Station Scrapped

The idea to build a railway station at the Kutaisi Airport was first floated in 2016, as the number of flights at that airport exploded, led by low-cost carrier Wizz Air. The initial idea was to connect the Tbilisi and Kutaisi airports via train. The existing train station at Tbilisi airport has a short link to Station Square, from which travelers can catch minibuses or buses to other destinations in the capital or go further by train, even to Armenia or Azerbaijan, while there is an existing railway station near Kutaisi airport, at Kopitnari, about one kilometer away.

In October 2016, Georgian Railways spokesperson Dachi Tsaguria told Kutaisi Post that “Georgian Railways is currently researching whether the new airport-to-airport link will be effective and profitable. At the Tbilisi end, a rail line was completed a few years ago, but is hardly noticed by travelers due to its rare, twice-daily departures,” reported Railway Pro.

In April 2017, then-Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili announced a one-year countdown to the completion of the new railway line and station. In a dramatic ceremony, Kvirikashvili announced that “The countdown has started - in 364 days it will be possible to get in the Kutaisi International Airport on the new railway.” He inaugurated a large digital countdown clock displaying the time until completion. By that time, the first three kilometers of foundation for the railway had already been laid. The estimated cost for the project was 10 million GEL ($3.6 mln).

“Together with this station, Kutaisi International Airport will become the most important center, allowing all our citizens to enjoy affordable visa-free travel to Europe,” said Kvirikashvili. All trains traveling between Tbilisi and Batumi would have stopped at the Kutaisi airport station.

The new railway was a part of the government’s Four-Point Reform Agenda and the country’s new Spatial Arrangement Plan, developed in 2016 to modernize Georgia’s infrastructure and improve the flow of goods and people.

In mid-2017, it was announced that the Kutaisi airport would be expanded to triple the passenger capacity. The expansion, which is budgeted to cost 26.4 million GEL ($9.5 mln), was initially scheduled for completion earlier this year, but the timeline has repeatedly been pushed back.

Late last week, the plans were all knocked on their head when Deputy Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development Akaki Saghirashvili came on Channel 1 news to announce that the new railway station will not be built at the Kutaisi airport. Instead, said Saghirashvili, the existing Kopitnari station will be renovated. “We will submit our plans to the government in the near future. German company ARGM has already finished exploration works and we will arrange railway communication with the airport. A shuttle will be provided for passengers by the airport [to connect the airport to the train station]. We have obtained promises from the Roads Department that the road will be repaired and all trains moving between east and west will stop at the existing railway station,” he explained.

The current infrastructure means that travelers generally travel by minibus or bus between the Kutaisi airport and Tbilisi or Batumi – the country’s main tourist destinations. If the transport schedules do not align, travelers may have to pay extra for a hotel room in Kutaisi, or take a taxi from the city center to the airport, which can cost as much as the trip between Tbilisi and Kutaisi.

By Samantha Guthrie