Russian authorities built secret network of railroad lines and train stations for Putin’s exclusive use, according to new report

Over the last decade, Russian authorities have built multiple railroad lines that lead to Vladimir Putin’s various residences, as well as several secret train stations near those residences, the investigative news outlet Proekt reported on Tuesday.

According to Proekt, a train station with a helipad was built near Putin’s Valdai residence in Russia’s Novgorod region in 2019, as was a track leading to the station. Three local residents told the outlet that the track is used exclusively to transport the president.

Another secret station was built near Putin’s Novo-Ogaryovo residence in the Moscow region in 2015, according to satellite imagery that Proekt’s journalists examined. The station reportedly sits on land that was seized by Russia’s federal government at the direction of then-Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, and is covered by a tall fence.

And in 2017, according to Proekt’s reporting, a railway platform and a terminal track line that’s hidden by a fence from the lines used by suburban passenger trains were built near Bocharov Ruchey, Putin’s summer residence in Sochi.

On Monday, the investigative outlet Dossier Center reported that in the latter half of 2021, Vladimir Putin began using a customized armored train to get around Russia.