Train service between Finland and Sweden resumes after nearly four decades
From Monday, August 10, rail service between Finland and Sweden resumes, connecting Oulu and Haparanda. The route, suspended since 1988, gives Finland direct access to the European rail network.
Starting Monday, August 10, train service between Finland and Sweden will resume with a new route connecting Oulu and Haparanda, Yle reports. The train will run twice a day, with a journey time of about one hour and 40 minutes.
There will be no dining car, as Finland and Sweden have differing requirements for selling and serving food and alcohol. Passengers should also be aware of restrictions on bringing goods from Sweden — for example, snus may only be brought in for personal use.
A historic occasion
For the first time in decades, a train will cross the border river and travel into Sweden. Service between Tornio and Haparanda was discontinued in 1988. The revived route now gives residents of Finland direct access to the European rail network.
The route also has a link to Vladimir Lenin. It was through the Haparanda–Tornio border crossing that he returned from exile in 1917 to take part in the October Revolution. Since the railway bridge over the Tornionjoki river did not yet exist at the time, travelers crossed the border on horseback or on foot across the ice. Lenin crossed the border of the Russian Empire at Tornio on 15 April 1917, and from Tornio station he boarded train number 353 to continue his journey through Finland to Petrograd.
