[For the English abstract and full text of the article please see the attached PDF-File (English version follows Russian version)].ABSTRACT The name of the Russian economist, the statistician Alexander Chuprov occupies an honorable place in the history of science. And above all, he is known for his interest in the problems of railways, which in XIX century became the main engine of social progress. The contribution of the scientist to the theory of costs of railway transport is analyzed in the article. It is shown that he prepared the basis for all subsequent studies in this field, including such areas as classification of costs, an assessment of their dependence on traffic volumes (traffic sizes) and other factors, an estimate of the cost ratio with various meters of transport work. It was noted that as a result of development of the basic provisions of the railway economy laid down in those years, it was possible to create scientifically based tools for managing the efficiency of the industry. Keywords: railways, economy, Alexander Chuprov, production costs, traffic size, cost classification, history.