Issue Reporting Picture Story

A long train whistle blows in the distance and our freight train starts gradually speeding up. As soon as we leave the station, the guys saddle up the walls of the open wagon. I think about the four horsemen of the Apocalypse. If there were horsemen of Freedom, train hoppers would definitely be among them. Trainsurfing, train hopping, freight hopping - riding the outside of the train has a lot of names and a lot of different branches. Some people ride on suburban trains, some cling to inter-city trains and even high-speed ones, some are particularly interested in subway. Riders of Freedom is a project about freight train travelers. Through seven trips with them, I drove 3870 km, visited St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod, Vladimir, Bryansk, Orel, Pskov and even reached Murmansk.

Finalist

Riders of Freedom

Artem Puchkov
Independent
Russia

Born in 1994 in Ulan-Ude, Republic of Buryatia, Artem Puchkov has been living in Moscow since 2005. In 2020-2021 studied documentary photography at “Docdocdoc” school. Particularly interested in exploring the topics of low-budget travel, downshifting, and freeganism.

mongolenok

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