Languages

Increase in border-crossings flattens

2013 saw a all-time high in number of people crossing the borders between Finnish Lapland and Russia's Kola Peninsula. Here from Ivalo.

5 percent increase in traffic over Lotta - Raja-Jooseppi check-point between Finnish Lapland and Russia’s Kola Peninsula in 2013.

Location

The sharp increase in Murmanskers driving to northern Finland for shopping and leisure seems to slow down. From 2011 to 2012 the increase at Finland’s northernmost border check-point to Russia, Raja-Jooseppi, was 36 percent, while the increase over the last year was only 5 percent, reads the statistics from the Finnish Border Guard.

By year-end 2013, a total of 133,256 border-crossings were counted on the main road between Murmansk and Ivalo. 

At Salla, the border check-point most frequently used by travelers from Murmansk going to Rovaniemi, 253,686 border-crossings were counted, up 15 percent compared with 2012. 

The slow-downed increase in border traffic in the north mirrors the general statistics in cross-border traffic between Russia and Finland further south. In total, nearly 13 million border-crossings were counted in 2013, up 8 percent compared with the year before.