On November 15^th, 2016 Emperor Alexander I St. Petersburg State Transport University saw opening of The IV International scientific conference «Locomotives. XXI century», announced by Rector Alexander Panychev. In his speech, Mr. Panychev pointed out that this Conference, which had been jointly organised with JSC «RZD», became traditional, and expressed his gratitude to Vice-President Oleg Valinsky for his great support of the event.

Mr. Rector said that this was no coincidence that the Conference devoted to the 140^th anniversary of Yuri Lomonosov — PGUPS’s alumnus and constructor of the first diesel locomotives in the world — the E el-2 and the Emh3 locomotives.

«It’s a good tradition to organise scientific conferences under the sign of historic, anniversary dates. Thanks to the scientists of the University we got the first Russian diesel locomotive. A high bar set by Agustin Betancourt’s followers for their descendants was raised for the glory of Russia», Rector said.

A welcome speech to the participants was also delivered by Vice-President of JSC «RZD», Head of the Central Directorate of traction Oleg Valinsky. He updated the participants on the work of the locomotive facilities whose staff estimates more than 220 thousand people.

«Today, thanks to the support of the Government of the Russian Federation and the Administration of «RZD», Russia’s locomotive engineering has been finally revived», Mr. Valinsky said.

Since 2008, the holding has got 4552 new locomotives, 398 of which have been handed over this year. This resulted in reducing wear of the locomotive park from 92% till 68%. At present, the locomotives mainly of «Yermak», «Vityaz» and «Granite» type are operated. Operation of new locomotives enables us to enhance the average weight of a train, operate longer and heavy-load trains. Polygon technologies give the opportunity of organising the work of the locomotive park in a new way.

«Renewal of the locomotive park and implementation of new technologies requires changes in qualification requirements and staff training programmes», Mr. Valinsky added.

He pointed out that there were potential clients at the Conference therefore the tasks put on the Conference were especially crucial.

During the plenary session, the Chairman of The Russian Railroad Amateurs’ Society (VOLZD) Mr. Alexey Vulfov delivered his speech on the role of Yuri Lomonosov in locomotive engineering. Chief Engineer of JSC «RZD» affiliate —  October Railways Valery Tanaev informed the participants about innovations in locomotive facilities. The participants also listened to the speeches of Director of the Department of Development of Technical State Monitoring System in «LocoTech» Igor Lakin, Head of the October Central Directorate of traction Alexey Lebedev, Deputy of the Legislative Assembly of Leningrad Oblast, PGUPS’s alumnus Vladimir Orlov.