What does the forum think of this idea, or its sister idea of tunnelling under the Bering Straits to siberia, in order to connect with the Trans-Siberian Railway?

[This message has been edited by CG96 (edited 02-11-2004).]
 

A few comments about the Bering Strait tunnel:

A few years ago, well maybe 10, there was a presentation to the AREA (American Railway Engineering Association) on this. I do not remember much of the details, but there was a mining engineer (I think that's what he was) from the western US who presented it. The tunnel itself is probably the easier part. As he noted, the Bering Strait is fairly shallow, with a pair of islands about mid way, so it worked out to be essentially a pair of English Channel tunnels end to end. Supposedly the rock conditions were fairly good for tunneling, but here the question is, does anyone really know? The rock conditions in the English Channel were a tunneler's dream. If the rock conditions are bad, it cound turn into being more like the Seikan Tunnel between Hokkaido and Honshu. If you ever go to Japan, there is a tour into it available, taking a train out of Hakodate on Hokkaido. Our guide did not speak English, but it was still very worthwhile. On the basis of engineering and construction difficulty, it makes the English Channel project look like a walk in the park.

But, the real problem is that there is nothing on either end. Both the Channel Tunnel and the Seikan Tunnel effectively closed gaps in existing high traffic raiways.

I do not recall with any precision, but you would have to built about 2000 miles or more of railroad through mountainous terrain in the high arctic to connect it up to the existing railways in Russia and North America, and of course, unless you connect Alaska to the Canadian system, it still does not tie in the world.

A tentative cost projection for the connections was given, but it seemed to be unrealistically low.

Did we mention that the Russian system has a different track gauge? one more small problem.

The huge volume of shipping from Asia to the US, and even on to Europe was mentioned as a source of traffic, but I would seriously doubt that any traffic would be attracted at a rate that had any hope of amortizing the cost of the project.
 

See link: http://www.arctic.net/~snnr/tunnel/intro.html

See also: http://www.theglobalrailway.com/pressbureau/features/TheBeringStraitProjectColle ctedPapers.htm

See also: http://home.att.net/~Berliner-Ultrasonics/strunnel.html

Those are just a few links that I found via Google. Agin I pose the question to my fellow forum members: What's the feasibility of this project? What's the realistic chance of success for this?

[This message has been edited by CG96 (edited 02-10-2004).]

[This message has been edited by CG96 (edited 02-11-2004).]

[This message has been edited by CG96 (edited 02-11-2004).]
 

quote:

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Originally posted by boyishcolt:
what is the track gauge of the Russian railroad?

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The Russian track guage is "broad" guage, that is, 5 feet or so.

Some nations have a guage of 5 feet 6 inches, but I don't think that's Russian.

 

Russian, Ukraine, other former Soviet republics, but not Hungary, Slovakia, etc. are 1524 mm = 5 ft 0 inches. Finland is also 1524 mm becase it was part of Russia pre world war I. Poland I do not know, but I think they are standard.

The Russian clearance diagram is as wide as US/Canada, but not as high. Their load limits are also higher than western Europe (I think - maybe?), but not as high as US. I believe there was some talk of modifying the Trans-Siberian to carry double stack containers. Have no idea what came of it.

Find a copy of Jane's World Railways in a good library, and it should give you more information.

The finding of significant mineral deposits in the area on one side with markets on the other could change the whole picture. It is a little bit expensive to be built for political reasons only, but at some point if economics get it part way the desire for connectivity could finish the job.

"Better" on track gauge is somewhat subjective. In the US most roads in the south were five foot gauge up until the 1880's. They were then regauged to the 4 ft 8 1/2 inches prevailing in the north to get rid of the need to offload / reload freight or change trucks under cars. Just one more reminder of which side won the War Between The States. I believe that originally the Erie was built to 7 foot track gauge.

These two gauges are so close together that there is really very little difference. We are certainly approaching the practical limit of height on "standard" gauge with double stack containers, but the small difference to 5 foot gauge would not make any siginificant difference there.

When you talk bigger gauge differences, some items of track can be cheaper with smaller gauges because you use shorter ties. However, if the loads are heavy, you will need to space them closer, so any savings may be more than lost by the need for more track fasteners. Turnouts are a little chaeper with smaller gauges. You can not increase the tie spacing if you go wider, but you would need, if using concrete, to increase its strength to prevent breaking.

It really gets back to the general fact that the exact gauge chosen really does not make a lot of difference unless it is way out of normal either large or small, so long is it is not different from that prevailing in the area where the railroad is being built.
 

[This message has been edited by CG96 (edited 02-11-2004).]
 

See also: http://www.thecompanyofwriters.com/pressbureau/press10.htm

See also: http://www.thecompanyofwriters.com/pressbureau/press11.htm

See also: http://www.thecompanyofwriters.com/features/whateverhappenedtotheharrimanplan.htm

The last link is something that has more to do with an older idea to connect Alaska to the rest of the North American rail system. It mentions a price tag for the entire project being somewhere in the neighborhood of US $ 10 billion. Even then, there are doubts that such a project would generate any kind of return on the investment - which is why it probably hasn't been built.

[This message has been edited by CG96 (edited 02-11-2004).]
 

The railroads in China are standard gague, and my understanding is that their mechanincal standards are virtually identical to AAR. Their overhead clearance limits and axle loads are less. So, if a connection is made, it would be very reasonable, if anything about this project is, to build a standard gauge link from the Bering Strait to Manchuria so as to avoid two changes of gauge.

Korea is also standard gauge. However, there is the extreme political problem of North Korea being in between the prosperous and industrial South Korea and the railways of China. South Korea also appears to be very close to AAR in many ways.

While we are tunneling:

There has been discussion of connecting Shakalin Island to the Russian mainland, and if that happens, then the question is, how wide is the strait between Shakalin and Hokkaido? If you make those connections, then you have a through railway to Japan.

But, here we have another gauge problem. All the railways on Hokkaido and all the railways that move freight in Japan are 3 ft 6 inch gauge. The Shinkansen is standard gauge, but it is passenger only, and the Shinkansen trains are wider than the AAR equipment diagrams. American or Chinese standard gauge equipment can not operate on the Shinkansen tracks for three reasons: Lack of train paths, axle loads too heavy, and no way would the affected JR lines allow it.

Now, to head off in a different direction from the Russia China border:

Once you leave Russia and hook up with the Chinese system, you can go right through from the north boundary of China to near the border of Vietnam on standard gauge. Then the gauge is one meter (3 foot 3 and 3/8 inches) Regauge about 100 miles, andy you can have the through express to Hanoi! Regauge the next about 600 miles and you are through to Saigon. (600 miles is a total guess. I seem to remember seeing a highway kilometer post just out of Saigon that said Hanoi 1016 km, but that was 34 years ago.)

Build a line from Chna across Laos to Chiang Mai Thailand, whoops, another meter gauge system, but with a change of gauge, you can now get all the way to Singapore, as Malaysia is also a meter gauge system, and you can right now cross borders by trains between Singapore and Malaysia, and between Malaysia and Thailand. Of course we have serious political issues again with Laos.

The current system requires you to make at least three changes of trains, Kuala Lumpur, Hat Yai, Thailand and Bankok if you really want to get from Singapore to Chiang Mai by train.

There were at one time thoughts about a line from Saigon across Cambodia to Thailand. Now, once in Thailand you can go to Burma (Myamar or some spelling close) (political issues again) and on to India. Another gauge problem. Most of the main lines in India are broad gauge, 5 ft 6 inch, I believe.

Have I added sufficiently to the confusion?
 

------------------
--Anton
pillsbury09@excite.com
AIM: pillsburyMN
 

I've been unsuccessfull in finding links regarding the part of the project that would take place in Siberia, though. I'll keep looking.
 

A few years ago got a good look at the Siberian coast, along with central Alaska from a plane. We could see the Bering Strait as we went by! This was on a Nothwest flight from Minneapolis to Tokyo. There is still a lot of territory in Canada and Alaska that is empty of any sign of people, roads, towns, etc. There are also serious mountain ranges in Alaska and Western Canada. But Siberia: Most of what we saw was a coast with mountains dropping straight into the ocean. No sign of habitation.

US side mapping of all of Alaska is available from the Geological Survey and online at topozone. While not good enough for final design, it is certainly good enough to determine practical corridors.

I would think the best course would be to build this line, if it ever happens, at standard gauge all the way to the Chinese border and make a gauge conversion point for interchange with the Russian system at the point of crossing of the Trans-Siberian Railway.

The lack of habitation brings in one more thing: Electric operation is about the only way practical for a long tunnel. There is no available power grid. A dedicated power plant will probably be needed. A set of diesel locomotives on one side or the other feeding an overhead wire would probably be the simplest method.
 

Mr. Harris, I have to agree with you regarding the electrification. There is no other feasible method right now. I've been looking at some topographic maps in the atlases at the local library, as well. There appear to be deveral mountain ranges that would have to be penetrated on the Siberian side. This is certain to drive the cost to astronomical levels.

If this gets built, however, it may be one of those things like the Panama Canal, where shippers will ask each other why it wasn't constructed earlier.

[This message has been edited by CG96 (edited 02-20-2004).]
 

One thing that would reduce costs of construction would be to enter AK at the lowest elevation possible. No sense crossing mountains when the cheaper, lower-elevation route is available. The Rocky Mountains could be crossed farther north, becasue the lowest-elevation pass between the MacKensie River watershed and the Pacific Ocean watershed is located in the Richardson Mountains, 67 degrees 45 minutes North by 136 degrees 30 minutes West (approximate location). The UTM grid location is something like Zone 8 W. The elevation is slightly less than 2000 feet above sea level, and is called McDougall Pass. If you need to get a hold of a topo map, the map to get is 116 P from the Canadian gov't. The Procupine River flows west into the Yukon River, and one could easily follow the MacKensie River going to the SE.

Sometimes canoeists take this route to cross from the MacKensie to the Yukon river watershed. The crossing that has garnered the most publicity occurred in 1971, when two men crossed the Rockies at this pass when taking a seven-month canoe trip from (I kid you not) Montreal, PQ, to the Bering Strait, via the old Fur Trade era canoe routes, the MacKensie, and the Yukon, Rivers. P.S. : they made it. Just do a web search on Verlen Kruger & "One Incredible Journey."

I don't have any data as to how much this route would cost in comparison to the route that was partially built in BC from Dease Lake in the late 1970s.
 

You said: "Why not use "three-rail track," like on some of our model train layouts. One outside rail primary, the other outside rail at broad gauge and the inside, third-rail, at standard (US/Europe) to one of the outside rails?"

Answer: It is not workable because the difference in the gauge is barely more than the width of the rail head. There is an explanation of this in
http://home.att.net/~Berliner-Ultrasonics/strunnel.html

referenced by CG96.

This is also a good discussion on the whole issue.

He is not altogether right in some of his details on the track, but the errors do not affect the conclusion. He references the old 152PS rail, but that section has not been produced since the 1940's. Current main line rail sections in US, Canada, Mexico are either 136RE or 141AB. The Russian section is called the 65P or P65, I forget which way, but it weighs about 65 kg/m and is very close to 132RE is size and shape. In any case, all these rails have head widths of 3 inches or slightly less, 2 15/16 for 136RE, and base widths of 6 inches or for the Russian section I believe it to be 150 mm. The Chinese use a section of their own design weighing about 61 kg/m called GB60 which is 176 mm tall, has a 150 mm wide base and a head width of 73 mm. It is not identical to or even very close to the European UIC60 section. The difference in gauge between Russian and "standard" used in North American, Western Europe, China, etc., is 3 1/2 inches. This is less than the base width of the rail and provides a slightly less than standard falangeway width opening between rail heads, so the rail sections would have to be modified, either by having a special rolling or by machining the rails full length, and they would have to be fastened to each other because they could not be clipped or spiked to the ties on both sides of each rail. It is not impossible, just difficult and complex, therefore it is not the practical solution. The practical solution is to use 4 rails. One pair would be 56.5 inches = 1435 mm apart, the other would be 60 inches = 1524 mm, or is it 1520 mm apart. The practical minimum spacing between the two closest rails would depend in part on the fastening system used, but I would say somewhere between 12 to 15 inches center to center.

At one point Australia had some three guage track, using 4 rails. The dual guage system described above would look something like that. The center two rails were 3 feet 6 inches apart. One inside to one outside rail spacing was 4 feet 8.5 inches, the other inside to outside spacing was 5 feet 3 inches.

Actually, in my humble opinion, if this system is ever built, the reasonable solution would be to have a standard gauge railway constructed all the way to China, which would also give a connection into Korea, assuming the North/South Korea issue is ever resolved. Gauge changing would then be at the point or points of intersection with the existing Russian system.