Coming Soon – Kyiv’s New Metro Line!

Kyiv’s long-awaited fourth metro line, which will link the Troyeshchina district on the left bank with the Central Train Station and Zhuliany Airport, got a boost last month when Stepan Kubiy, the First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economic Development and Trade announced that Chinese investors had agreed to cover 85% of the cost of the two billion USD project. “Now from the Kyiv International Airport (Zhuliany), you’ll be able to take the subway to almost anywhere in the city,” he told reporters.

The 18-kilometre, 13-station track will cross the Dnipro River at Trukhaniv Island and pass through the Podil district on its way to the city’s main transit hubs. More importantly, the line will feature transfer points to Kyiv’s other three metro lines, providing respite to the busy downtown transport hubs. While the final agreement with Pacific Construction has yet to be signed, Kubiy assured it would happen in the near future: “After signing, we will be able to begin construction.”

Attracting Chinese investment is something Ukraine’s former President, Viktor Yanukovych, seemed rather keen on prior to his escape in 2014. The then agreement was to turn Crimea into a huge transit hub, potentially the New Silk Road. Of course, this plan was thwarted following Russian military aggression after Yanukovych ran. Nonetheless, where pundits see China as more of a Russian ally, most especially following the Asian country’s lack of ambition to help Ukraine politically in recent years, China is looking westward, and that means Ukraine may have found a new partner for investment. And for Kyivites this is only a good thing, bringing the capital’s “sleeping district” a little closer to neighbourhoods which have not had track access for decades.