Trans-Siberian Railway
The main route of the Trans-Siberian Railway was planned to start from Moscow and pass through Yaroslavl Voxal to Yaroslavl, ‚ Chelyabinsk, Omsk, Novosibirsk, Jirkuts, Ulan-Ude Chita, and Khabarovsk through Vladivostok to Southern Siberia.
From 1891 to 1916, the primary supervisors of the construction of this railway line were Tsar Alexander III and his son Nicholas II. In addition, China Eastern Railway Service contributed to Russia for the Trans-Siberian Railway. This railway created a short route to Vladivostok and was operated by the Russian authorities.
The Trans-Siberian Railway connects hundreds of big and small cities to Europe and Asia. The train journey covers a distance of 9259 km and takes eight days for the trip. The second route here is Trans-Manchurian, which passes 1000 kilometres from the east of Lake Baikal and connects with Usuriasac through Harbin in the eastern province of China.
The third stage, known as the Trans-Mongolian Route, connects Ulan Ude to Ulaanbaatar in the south of Mongolia. In 1991, this railway line was extended to Taishet.
This is called the Baikal Amur Mainline (BAM) route. At this stage, it crosses the Amur River in the Kamsomolskna-Amure area. It reaches the Pacific in the Sovetskaya Gavan area. On October 13, 2011, the train inaugurated its journey to the King of North Korea in Kashan.
The Trans-Siberian Railway played a significant role in World War II. When Western nations rejected German ships, railroads provided an essential link between Japan and Germany. The trade material Germany needed was natural rubber, and Japan supplied the raw materials. In 1941, 300 tons of rubber were delivered to Germany on the Trans-Siberian Railway in one day.
During this period, German Jews and anti-Nazis fled to Europe along the Trans-Siberian Railway.
When Siberia was developed in the 19th century, transportation was very poor. This zone was best suited for wheeled vehicles. These vehicles were also a limited number of cars for short distances. The main roads of transportation have been covered with this snow for about six months. Ride on these roads is done with the help of horse-drawn sledges.
In 1844, the first steamship began to be transported along the Gobi. By 1863, steamships were spread to the Lina River; by 1870, steamships were leaked to the Amur River. The first railway project in Siberia started in 1851 from Moscow to Saint Petersburg. One of these projects was proposed by American businessman Perry Collins. The task of extending the railway line from Moscow to the Amur River also received the support of the Minister of Transport, Konstanz Post. The Siberian leader, Nikolay Muravyov-Amursky, was concerned about opening Russian settlements to the Far East but not about the plan to import grain from countries such as China and Korea.
Before 1880, there were several reasons why the central government did not care about this railway project; the interest in this decreased due to the weakness of Siberian business people and the financial crisis. Because of this, the proposals for the railway connecting Siberia and the Pacific region were rejected. But this situation was not seen in Eastern Russia. Thus the planning for the railway was completed in ten years. Accordingly, the southern route connected Kazakhstan via Barnal Abakan and Mongolia, and the northern route via Tyumen Tobolsk, Tomsk, and Yeniseyik.
The income was earned from boats transported along the rivers to get money for the bridge’s construction. However, the Trans-Siberian Railway never gained priority. While solving the land disputes, the struggle for funding also had to be engaged. Because of this, it was intended to build the railway line outside some cities. Tomsk was the most unfortunate city among them. The banks of the river Obi were silty, so the bridge was not strong enough to cross the river. Due to this, it was decided that the construction across the river was inappropriate. These were built across the Obiganga railway line.
Instead of Nu, it was connected 43 kilometres south to Noveskbrisk. By joining the destination to the city of Tomsk, it was protected from obstruction by roads and trade.
The capacity of the railway was limited entirely to regional transport. Among them, Whit was the main one. Due to the slowness and light weight of the trains, this railway line did not facilitate transportation for Europe and East Asia.
The construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway began in 1891, and the supervision and responsibility for this were held by the then Minister of Finance, Sergii Vitti. The construction of this railway from the end to the middle of the continent was carried out by Russian engineers. The Vladivostok railway line was diverted from the south bank of the Mary River to the north of the Amur River to Khabarovsk. In 1890, a bridge was built across the Ural River to Asia. The bridge built across the Ob River connected the city of Novonikolavesk.
This small town was developed by 1883, and the first train in 1898 connected Baikalvila and Irkutsk and travelled 60 kilometres. In the eastern direction, along the Shaykh and Amur rivers, Kabovsk was reached. In the city of Shaykh, the labour of soldiers and prisoners was used for the construction. The section from Vladivostok to Kabavosk had already been completed in 1897.
The construction in the area around Lake Baikal was 640 kilometres long and 1,600 meters deep. The Trans-Siberian Railway has positively impacted Russia’s agricultural production and sustainable exports. From 1869, agricultural materials were exported from Siberia to the Western world. Due to this, railways were connected instead of the transportation that took place along the rivers.
About two million packages of goods are currently transported to Europe through the Trans-Siberian railway line. Since 2010, the Russian Railways has been preparing plans to reduce the road obstructions during the transportation of these goods by twofold. Meanwhile, the transportation capacity of sixty million tons between China and Russia alone is 15 days. Still, it takes twenty-five days to transport these packages from Japan to Europe and Russia. According to a 2009 report, it would take twelve days to reach ports on the western border by ship but three days by a train travelling at a speed of 300 km/h.