THE BLACK SEA-CASPIAN SEA REGION: FROM GEOPOLITICS TO GEOECONOMICS OF TRANSPORT SYSTEMS
Transport and geopolitical problems are under activeconsiderationin various aspects in numerous domestic and foreign scientific research, that includes the correlation of regional and global interests, geopolitical space security, status of individual states, transportation of hydrocarbon resources, etc. The Black Sea-Caspian Sea region is generally seen as a special segment of the global geopolitical space, located at the crossroads of the most important transit communications [32]. In the framework of modern Russia's economic policyand the formation of an international transport framework, this segment holds an important place in the geopolitical and geoeconomic strategy of the country's spatial development. The crossing of the “West-East” and “North-South” transport corridors that surroundthe most important routes of the Eurasian continent should be viewed as the most important factors of the Russian Federation “transport geopolitics” that have a direct impact on international transport systems development and global geoeconomic policy. On the other hand, in the framework of the adopted Convention on the Legal Status of the Caspian Sea [11] the Russian Caspian Sea basin transportation hub is becoming increasingly important in the organization of shipping routes, in the development of international freight transport and trade.At the same time, in the context of globalization and production processes integration, modern management systems should be distinguished by the presence of various combined and alternative options for freight forwarding services that increase goods exchange operations mobility.The variety of options for the promotion and transportation of goods is also accompanied by the formation of multimodal and intermodal transport that increases efficiency in the organization of logistics systems. The article considers the issues of the international transport corridor “North-South” status and infrastructure development on the basis of implementation of large-scale projects concerning maritime ports construction and creation of multimodal logistics centres on their basis, with the abovementioned logistics centres being the key nodes of the country and the Caspian region states' supporting transportation framework. Given the mutual influence of the abovementioned factors, the paper studies their causal relationships and individual directions of the transport systems formation, that take into account essential economic conditions and geographical peculiarities of the country's spatial development.