Financial Burden of Coronavirus Outbreak on Trains 400 Million TL

The financial burden on rail transport, caused by the coronavirus epidemic, began to emerge gradually. Within the scope of the measures against the epidemic, passengers are transported with 50 percent capacity on high-speed trains (YHT); Instead of 52, only 20 trips can be made per day. At least 225 passengers are transported at a time. Main line train services have not been carried out for the last 6 months. Therefore, the revenues of TCDD Tasimacilik decreased significantly. It is estimated that TCDD Tasimacilik, which closed 2019 with a loss of 1.1 billion TL, could make 300-400 million more losses this year.

According to the news of Olcay Aydilek from Habertürk; “The deadly coronavirus epidemic has deeply affected the transportation industry, especially aviation. On a global scale, the aviation industry is grappling with a major crisis as there is not enough demand in the passenger compared to the previous period despite the normalization steps. States support airlines in different ways to prevent possible bankruptcies in the industry. It is considered that such steps may come to the fore in the following period.

RAILWAY SECTOR IS CHALLENGING ALSO

The reduction of travels as much as possible also forces rail transport. Rail transport companies also faced a serious loss of revenue as the number of passengers fell dramatically.

DAMAGE WILL INCREASE

TCDD has recently been divided into two separate general directorates as infrastructure and management. TCDD Tasimacilik is responsible for passenger and freight transport.

TCDD Tasimacilik stopped YHT, main line and regional train services in March when the epidemic started.

With the normalization steps, YHT flights were restarted in the last week of May. Within the scope of the measures against the epidemic, passengers have been transported with 50 percent capacity since the end of May; Instead of 52, only 20 trips are made per day. At least 225 less passengers are transported each time.

Conventional or "customary" to do with the so-called main line trains (between different provinces of Turkey) is still not the time to start.

This situation will decrease the revenues of TCDD Tasimacilik and increase its losses. TCDD Tasimacilik closed the year 2019 with 1.1 million TL loss. It is estimated that the loss of 2020 may exceed 1.5 billion TL due to the decrease in the number of passengers and flights due to the coronavirus epidemic.

SIGNIFICANT INCREASE IN LOAD

Sources stated that a higher performance is demonstrated in freight transportation every day, and said, “We can say that freight transportation has exceeded the previous year's data. There are passengers as well, a part of this loss is covered by the advantage in the cargo ”.