ALONG THE ROADS OF LIFE

Uniting Continents-A Global Task

Vadim Popov,
Candidate of Technical Sciences

         Foreign investments in the Russian economy are discussed at both federal and regional levels. Meanwhile, the great potential right on the surface remains untapped. Many years ago, in the 1940's when I was still at school, my late father, Dmitrii Alekseevich Popov, professor of the Academy of Forestry and Head of the Ground Transportation and Forest Department, told me about his dream to connect Asia to America via the Bering Strait and build a railroad along the Northern Arctic Circle which would connect timber producing areas located in the estuaries of the great Siberian rivers. The Siberian forest, Russia's inexhaustible wealth, would drift down the Lena, Ob and Enisey Rivers, be processed in their estuaries and would be transported to Europe and America by the railroad.
        This eminently logical idea remained in my mind for almost fifty years. Early in 1992, not long before B. N. Yeltsin's visit to the USA when our relations with America warmed up a bit, I wrote the Russian President about this project. Not long thereafter, I received an answer. A letter from Railways Ministry No TsEUKI -43, dated March 17, 1992, stated that "according to expert evaluation, building such a railroad in the Far North would require billions in investments, as well as decades of construction and a great amount of scarce material resources. In the current financial and economic situation, construction of such a railroad in the area of the northern Arctic Circle would be highly inexpedient".
        I was puzzled. Did the transcontinental railroad really have to be built at the expense of the state budget? Of course not. It could be built by foreign investments provided by interested countries or by the world community. Two years later I brought the same issue to the attention of the Albert Gore--Vladimir Chernomyrdin Commission on Russian-American Scientific and Technological Cooperation. After a detailed phone conversation with a Railway Ministry official, I received a reply from Ministry No TsUEP-4 dated August 18, 1995, fully supporting my proposal. The reply was so rich in content that it's worth quoting in full.

        "Your inquiry regarding the construction of an intercontinental railroad across the Bering Strait has been referred to me by the administration of the President of the Russian Federation as of March 9, 1995, No. A 13-01-108120. The prospect of uniting the Eurasian mainland with North America proposed at the beginning of the 20th century by joining the Trans-Siberian Railroad to Alaska has been considered and rejected by the Russian government as totally unfeasible.
        In the 1940's and 1950's on the order of I. V. Stalin, research of the Arctic Ocean shoreline was conducted for the purpose of evaluating the possibility of constructing a railroad aimed at improving the supply and defense of the northwest territories of the USSR. As a result, the construction of the Salekhard-Igarka railroad, begun after World War II, was discontinued in 1953.
        Of late, the interest in construction of this railroad has been revived due to the improvement of international relations and the undoubted interest in business circles of developing the Russian northwest's natural resources. It is though that in the foreseeable future, it might become a primary raw materials base for the world community.
        In 1991, in the American international corporation Intercontinental Railroad and Tunnel Across the Bering Strait (Transcontinental), was founded for the purpose of researching of all aspects of the problem. The Ministry of Finance Committee registered the Russian office of the Corporation for Foreign Investments in Russia on October 19, 1992. In accordance with the general concept of the project, all aspects of railroad construction to connect North America to southeast regions of Asia via Russian territory are to be researched--economical, political, legal, technical, technological, ecological and other.
        Notwithstanding this, possibly the most interesting proposal is the one which would construct the railroad in the area of the North Pole arch, which you discuss in your letter, since this version includes both transport communications and the possibility of more complete development of nearby territories using river, sea and automobile transport. Russian Railways Ministry experts participating in the research also support this proposal.
        In 1993, the Russian Ministry of Railways reported to V.S. Chernomyrdin, Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, on the expediency of constructing a transcontinental railroad across the Bering Strait and of their readiness to represent Russia's state interests within the framework of this international program. If this does not answer all your questions and you need more detailed information, you should contact the chairman of the Russian division of Transcontinental Corporation."

        Shortly after the first negative answer to my proposal, the Russian Railways Ministry revised its attitude to the construction of the intercontinental railroad across the Bering Strait and regarded it expedient to look into the issue, even expressing a readiness to represent the interests of the state within the framework of the corresponding international program.
        Three years passed. In 1998, again I appealed, this time to the Russian government, with the same cover letter and proposal. However, the reply of the Russian Railway Ministry No TsEUI-32 dated September 1, 1998 remained the same. "The extremely difficult economic and financial situation in Russia, as well as a great decrease in railroad transportation including freight and timber will not allow us to consider the promotion of this large scale project in the nearest future."
        In November of the same year, I appealed to Vladimir Yakovlev, the Governor of St Petersburg, with a proposal to change the name of the project from "St Petersburg Is the European Gateway to Russia" to "St Petersburg Is the Gateway From Europe to America", adding to it a piece on the construction of the Transcontinental, considering the fact that a major part of this railroad already exists (St Petersburg-Vorkuta). In answer, I received an invitation to take part in an international conference called "Development of the Arctic Transportation System in the 21st Century". At the conference I learned for the first time just how immense the mineral resources of the Russian north are and that they were prospected long ago but have not been fully developed only because of the absence of transportation. I was amazed by the fact that not a single report even mentioned the Transcontinental.
        Roughly at the same time, I came across a newspaper article entitled, " Maybe We Should Buy Siberia from Russia". The article quoted John Ellis, political observer for the American newspaper, The Boston Globe, as saying that the United States should, without further ado, buy Siberia from Russia just as it bought Alaska many years ago. Even a price was named-- 1-2 trillion dollars.
        Needless to say there will be great possibilities for foreign investment in the construction of the Transcontinental for many years to come. The project is undoubtedly grand, but the purpose is also global--to connect continents. That's why the time has come to make a supreme effort to develop and begin implementing a project that is very important to Russia, which will ensure its economic prosperity, power and geopolitical position--the Transcontinental, a railroad along the North Arctic Circle with access across the Bering Strait to the American continent.