Mongolia
Country Details
See Wikipedia
Railway System
- The Trans-Mongolian Railway connects Ulan-Ude on the Trans-Siberian Railway in Buryatia, Russia, with Ulanqab in Inner Mongolia, China, via Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia. It runs from northwest to southeast with major stations at Naushki/Sükhbaatar on the Russian border, Darkhan, Züünkharaa, Choir, Sainshand, and Zamyn-Üüd/Erenhot on the Chinese border, where the railway changes from single-track to double-track. The railway also has branch lines with passenger services to Erdenet, Sharyn Gol and Bor Undur.
- A separate railway line exists in the east of the country between Choibalsan and the Trans-Siberian railway at Borzya. The line is closed to passengers across the Mongolia-Russia border with passenger trains terminating at Chuluunkhoroot (Ereentsav)
National Railway Operator
The national operator is UBTZ (Ulaanbataar Railway, traditionally also known as Mongolian Railway
Maps
- Online: web archive copy of Mongolia map from the Railways Through Europe site, dated April 2009
- Online: Schienennetz der Mongolei 29 December 2022
- Printed: Quail Map Company: China Railway Atlas, 3rd edition (ISBN: 978 1 898319 82 8) was published in 2008. See Printed Maps.
Holidays
Holiday periods may see reduced passenger services, or even no passenger services at all, whereas heritage railways may have increased services. If visiting a country check [https://www.timeanddate.com/holidays/ here for holiday dates.
Timetable
- Printed: summary timetables are available in some editions of the European Rail Timetable.
- Timetables are on display in some stations and trains, although not always accurate.
Journey Planner
None
Engineering Information
None known
Ticketing
Information from a trip report
Tickets can be bought at stations, either at a booking office window or at ticket machines. In all cases you need to provide a passport number, although in reality there is no proper ID check as such, the Provodnitsa on each coach checking your details off on their list before you board. Note if you do travel in platskartny the guard inspects tickets and can issue tickets.
As you'd expect, trains can and do sell out in advance, especially at busy times. Apparently there is a policy that even if the trains are fully booked, the railway won't leave anybody behind specifically because the extremes of weather could prove fatal if they did do so.
A company called Tapatrip is often recommended, but there have been problems using the mobile app, which would not open the payment window for foreign card payments. Using a laptop did work.
Opening for bookings may be at short notice if a timetable change is imminent.
The official Mongolian Railway website is eticket.ubtz.mn but does not work for foreign IP addresses. Downloading and installing an app called Urban VPN allows a Mongolian VPN to be used and with this running on a mobile it is possible to register and purchase tickets. For payment it has been suggested that if you select the "Golomt Bank" option on the drop down menu when you go to pay then overseas card payments will be accepted. The payment page is in Cyrillic. Once payment was completed, an e-ticket gets generated in pdf format, and if you log into your account you can see and print out all the bookings you have made. Staff seem happy to accept the pdf on a mobile device without a hard copy.
Infrastructure
Infrastructure Authority
MTZ is a company established in 2008 to maintain UBTZ infrastructure
Network Statement
May not exist
Gauge
1520 mm Russian gauge
Electrification
None
Rule of the road
Not known, but almost all the countries railways are single track.
Distances
No information
Other Railways
None
Tourist Lines
- Darkhan Children's Railway - Built in 2021 in the My Mongolia park in Darkhan it is a 2km circuit. The railway runs hourly 11:00-18:00, closed on Monday and Tuesdays.
Metro and light rail systems
None
Recent and Future Changes
Recent Changes
A new 230 km freight rail line, between the Tavan Tolgoi coal field and Gashuun Sukhait on the Chinese border, opened in September 2022. It was built primarily to boost coal exports to China. Despite an initial intention to build it to standard gauge [1435 mm], it is constructed to Broad [Russian] gauge [1520 mm]. Hence transhipment of coal is required to standard gauge wagons at the Chinese border.
Future Changes
In February 2025 agreement was reached to build a 20 km dual [1435 mm/1520 mm] gauge cross border railway between Gashuun Sukhait and Gantsmod to speed freight transfer at the border. Construction should take about two and a half years with opening in 2028.
Updated May 2025
Special Notes
Mongolia takes border security very seriously and foreign nationals are not routinely allowed access to border areas. The authorities can regard zones of up to 100km inside the border as a border area. If you wish to travel in these areas, you must get permission from the State Frontier Guard Authority. Only a few specified land border crossings are open to foreigners. These include the international rail crossings into Russia and China.
Lines with Obscure or Sparse passenger services
None known.
