Georgia: Prime minister Irakli Kobakhidze presented the plans at a government session on 8 April. According to him, Georgian Railway (GR) intends to acquire 50 locomotives, 1,500 wagons and 10 passenger trains, though Kobakhidze did not specify whether the passenger trains would be EMUs or locomotive-hauled trains.
Deputy economy minister Tamar Ioseliani said GR had drawn up a development plan for 2026-2028. The government plans to invest up to GEL 1 bln ($373.7 mln) in railway infrastructure, including locomotive procurement. The spending should improve line speeds and service reliability, and GR expects it to roughly double network capacity.
Late last year, GR general director Lasha Abashidze said the operator intended to renew its entire locomotive fleet, ending overhauls of life-expired machines in favour of new purchases. All 91 locomotives currently in the fleet were built more than 30 years ago. GR had been planning to buy 10 class 3ES6 freight electric locomotives from Ural Locomotives (part of Sinara Transport Machines) through intermediary Georgia Ltd, but terminated the contract over concerns about secondary sanctions.
The freight wagon fleet stood at 8,100 vehicles at the end of 2025, with 7,600 in the inventory fleet. Some 86% were built more than 30 years ago, a figure GR itself drew attention to in 2024. Two tenders for 120 gondola cars were issued in November 2025 and February 2026. The February contract went to Inspiration, which offered model 12-9766-01 wagons produced by the Roslavl Wagon Repair Plant in Russia.
According to OSJD data, GR ran 38 EMU cars in daily passenger service during 2024, with 42 cars of various types in the inventory fleet. The EMU roster includes Stadler Kiss double-deck trains (class GRS, also designated ESh2), delivered in the 2010s, alongside GRT and VMK series trains from Chinese manufacturer CSR (merged into CRRC in 2015). Older stock still in service includes ER2 series trains built by the Riga Carriage Works in the 1960s, plus their mid-2000s modernised variant, designated ES.
