Currently, no live AIS or other type of real-time shipping traffic information is available for the Caspian Sea.
The Caspian Sea is endorheic, i.e. it is a closed drainage basin that retains water and allows no outflow to other bodies of water such as rivers or oceans. Its main tributary is the Volga River, which is connected by important shipping canals with the Don River (and therefore the Black Sea), and also with the Baltic Sea, with branch canals to Northern Dvina and to the White Sea. Another Caspian tributary, the Kuma River, is also connected to the Don Basin by an irrigation canal.
Furthermore, in June 2007, in order to boost his oil-rich country's access to markets, President Nursultan Nazarbaev of Kazakhstan proposed a 700 km link between the Caspian and Black seas. It is hoped that the "Eurasia Canal" (a.k.a. the Manych Ship Canal) has the potential to transform landlocked Kazakhstan and other Central Asian countries into maritime states, thereby enabling them to significantly increase trade volume. The most likely route for the canal would follow the Kuma-Manych Depression, where currently a chain of rivers and lakes is already connected by an irrigation canal (Kuma-Manych Canal). However, another possible route option would be an upgrade of the existing Volga-Don Canal.
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