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| (832134) | |
Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by WillD on Fri Sep 11 15:23:26 2009 In the course of locating the other two (IMO) entertaining concept drawings for California and Virginia I came across a relatively large amount of work by Hal Cooper. Turns out he's a big supporter of LaRouche, and a proponent of a rail tunnel between Alaska and Siberia under the Bering Strait. Regardless of his political convictions or the viability of the project he's endorsing I find these drawings to be entertaining as hell. I'm not quite sure why LaRouche's faux-scientific magazine calls him a 'railroad expert' when every one of his drawings contains the same fairly questionable elements. But here's one of his drawings of the proposed tunnel, US rolling stock alongside Russian, with three tunnels and no dual gauge track in sight. I'm not sure why we'd want to run the Alaskan tour dome cars through the tunnel, but hey, I guess its his fantasy. But even in his fantasy it'd have to be an undoubtedly shallow tunnel for the first few miles under the Bering Strait what with the portal being spitting distance from the shoreline. At least the name sounds kinda cool: "Interhemispheric Railway Tunnel Authority". Most of the images appear on a website from LaRouche's Schiller Institute, except the one above, which only appears printed in a photo. Still, if you ignore the laughable justification for their plans, or the vast oversimplification of the difficulties they'd have in bringing the plan to fruition the purdy pichures are at least entertaining. It is worth noting that they reference the break of gauge between the US and Russia just once, and then brush it aside by saying this: There is a technical issue in going through the Bering Strait railroad tunnel to Russia, because of the difference in gauges between standard (4 ft., 8.5 in.) and Russian (5.0 ft.) railways. It is suggested that there be temporarily two parallel tracks built in Russia, with one in each gauge, until a longer-term conversion to a single gauge occurs by the Russian rail system, to standard gauges.According to the CIA World Fact Book Russia has more than 53,000 miles of broad gauge track within its borders, so dismissing the break of gauge problems as awaiting a long-term conversion plan will likely entail a very long term. Still the characteristic intermodal Ro-Ro with Traxx or Eurosprinter based locomotives, the High Speed Train with maglev in the background and yet more intermodal Ro-Ros, along with the Rhor Turbo/X2000/LRC-like HSTs are all prominently displayed in the article. If you don't feel like wading through the article, then I just linked to the remaining color Hal Cooper drawings I've been able to find. There is another B&W drawing of a bridge in Russia, but its far less entertaining. It's certainly an interesting thought experiment, but it's by no means the economic panacea they make it out to be, especially when they gloss over crucial physical, systems integration, political, and economic barriers. |
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Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by Hank Eisenstein on Fri Sep 11 16:02:19 2009, in response to Bering Strait Rail Tunnel, posted by WillD on Fri Sep 11 15:23:26 2009. It's pointless in this day and age of containerized freight. |
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Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by vfrt on Fri Sep 11 16:52:41 2009, in response to Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel, posted by Hank Eisenstein on Fri Sep 11 16:02:19 2009. And LaRouche is crazy. |
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| (832159) | |
Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by Chris R16/R2730 on Fri Sep 11 16:53:53 2009, in response to Bering Strait Rail Tunnel, posted by WillD on Fri Sep 11 15:23:26 2009. Now that's just crazy. |
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Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by Chris R16/R2730 on Fri Sep 11 16:58:08 2009, in response to Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel, posted by vfrt on Fri Sep 11 16:52:41 2009. Remember, it's his supporters who are going around and calling Obama a Nazi. |
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Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by Orange Blossom Special on Fri Sep 11 19:57:39 2009, in response to Bering Strait Rail Tunnel, posted by WillD on Fri Sep 11 15:23:26 2009. They have a connection to el paso, but they didn't even bother to revive the US-Cuba link!What a flaw. |
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| (832264) | |
Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by WillD on Fri Sep 11 22:52:22 2009, in response to Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel, posted by Chris R16/R2730 on Fri Sep 11 16:53:53 2009. It makes more sense, and is considerably more economically feasible than the Transatlantic Tunnel Discovery flogged a few years back. It'd really just require building a few bits of rail line and a tunnel of what is now fairly modest proportions. Certainly it makes more sense than the bridge proposal that was being floated for a while. It's not like there's a severe engineering problem with it, it simply doesn't make quite as much economic sense as the Schiller institute claims. As megaprojects go the Bering Strait tunnel is probably one of the more easily achievable. |
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Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by WillD on Fri Sep 11 23:42:58 2009, in response to Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel, posted by Hank Eisenstein on Fri Sep 11 16:02:19 2009. But that containerized freight is entirely dependent upon oil. Thus if oil prices rise it may reach a point where the investment in the tunnel makes economic sense relative to continuing to operate container ships. A rail line could of course use electric trains from nuclear or coal powerplants. Admittedly the ships could also convert to the same power sources, but as mobile sources they'd be much harder to regulate.IMHO the major problem would be the break of gauge. It is virtually impossible to expect the Russians to fully convert to standard gauge, but I would not rule out the potential for building one or two standard gauge lines from the tunnel to China so as to eliminate the gauge change. Yakutsk may make a good location for a central marshalling point, perhaps with just standard gauge tracks running east to the tunnel and Alaska, standard and broad gauge tracks running south to China and Vladivostok, and broad gauge tracks running southwest to the Trans Siberian Railway. Transloading would not make much sense since it'd create the same labor and in-shipment downtime that is present in containerized shipping. Similarly some rolling stock, such as the double stack cars that are used in the US, Canada, and Mexico would prove extremely difficult to change gauges due to the lack of space for trucks to be removed. |
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Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by Think twice on Sat Sep 12 07:28:18 2009, in response to Bering Strait Rail Tunnel, posted by WillD on Fri Sep 11 15:23:26 2009. "...the purdy pichures are at least entertaining."What a lovely Summer's day in the Artic. Must be the ice-free world of the not too distant future. |
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| (832326) | |
Re: Bering Strait Rail Tunnel |
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Posted by Fred G on Sat Sep 12 07:37:24 2009, in response to Bering Strait Rail Tunnel, posted by WillD on Fri Sep 11 15:23:26 2009. Oh nice! A one seat ride to Tynda. It is a dream of mine.your pal, Fred |
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