How to Get to Yekaterinburg: Koltsovo Airport (SVX) & Trans-Siberian Trains

Positioned at the lowest mountain pass across the Middle Urals between European Russia and Siberia, Yekaterinburg has served since the eighteenth-century Siberian Route as the principal transport gateway between west and east. Today travellers reach the city through Koltsovo International Airport (SVX), along the main line of the Trans-Siberian Railway, or by intercity coach from neighbouring Ural cities.

By Air: Koltsovo International Airport (SVX)

Koltsovo International Airport (IATA: SVX, officially named after Ural industrialist Akinfiy Demidov) lies 16 kilometres southeast of central Yekaterinburg in the Koltsovo microdistrict. Originally founded between 1928 and 1930 as a military airbase (where the Soviet liquid-fuel rocket aircraft Bereznyak-Isayev BI-1 made its maiden flight on 15 May 1942 under test pilot Grigory Bakhchivadzhi), Koltsovo opened to civil passenger aviation on 10 July 1943 and gained international status in October 1993. The rebuilt complex includes domestic Terminal A, international Terminal B, and a 90-metre air traffic control tower, handling flights from Moscow, Saint Petersburg, Sochi, Kazan, and Kaliningrad alongside international connections.

Two public transport links connect Koltsovo Airport with the city centre:

• City Buses 65 and 01: Municipal buses run along the straight Koltsovsky Trakt motorway from the terminal forecourt to Yekaterinburg-Passazhirsky Railway Station and the central Metro stations; check the official Koltsovo Airport website for current schedules.
• Suburban Commuter Train (Aeroport Koltsovo Halt): Commuter electric trains connect the railway platform outside the terminal directly with Yekaterinburg-Passazhirsky Station in the northern centre, passing through Shartash railway station on the eastern side of the city.

By Rail: Yekaterinburg-Passazhirsky Station

Located at 22 Vokzalnaya Street in Zheleznodorozhny District, Yekaterinburg-Passazhirsky Railway Station (known as Sverdlovsk-Passazhirsky until 30 March 2010) is a major seven-way rail junction at kilometre 1,816 of the classic northern branch of the Trans-Siberian Railway (1,667 kilometres from Moscow via Kazan on the southern chord). The complex preserves the original 1878 stone station designed by Pyotr Shreyber alongside the 1914 Art Nouveau building by Konstantin Babykin (now a railway museum) and the monumental 1939 colonnaded main terminal reconstructed in 1997 to 2001.

Fast long-distance trains link Yekaterinburg with Moscow's Kazansky and Yaroslavsky terminals, Nizhny Novgorod, Kazan, Tyumen, Novosibirsk, and Vladivostok, while regional Lastochka electric trains run north to Nevyansk and Nizhny Tagil. Immediately outside the station forecourt sits Uralskaya Metro Station and the North Bus Terminal, while the South Bus Terminal sits beside Chkalovskaya Metro Station for coaches toward Chelyabinsk, Perm, and Ufa.