The Caspian Sea Is Now A Rail Corridor

History was quietly made on August 3, when the first test container train, the "Nomad Express" arrived from Kazakhstan's Aktau seaport via ferry to Baku International Sea Port in Alat, 40 miles south of Baku on Azerbaijan's Caspian coast. The Nomad Express started from China's Shikhezi and crossed the border into Kazakhstan via Dostik. The container train took five days to journey cover the 2,200 miles to Kazakhstan Caspian port of Aktau, where it was loaded onto a ferry for the final voyage to Alat.

 

The genesis of Nomad Express's journey began last January, when the first meeting of the working group of Coordination Committee of Trans-Caspian international transport route was held in Baku, where participants reached agreement on adopting measures to organizing container service on the China-Kazakhstan-Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey route by using Kazakhstan's new Zhezkazgan-Beineu railway line, the facilities of Aktau port, as well as the Georgia-Turkey Akhalkalaki-Kars railway line then nearing completion as a segment of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway.

http://www.silkroadreporters.com/2015/10/21/how-the-caspian-sea-is-becoming-a-rail-corridor/