Today’s episode is all about Vivian’s engineering specialty: Railroads. We examine the unbelievable process of constructing Russia’s Trans-Siberian Railroad, which is not just an engineering monument, but a monument to making do without appropriate resources and the challenges that follow corner-cutting.

The construction of the first phase of the railroad began in 1891 under the direction of Emperor Alexander III, and the 9,289km long line from Moscow to Vladivostok crosses at least 7 timezones, 12 regions, 5 territories, 2 republics and 1 autonomous region of Russia, and cost 1.5 billion gold rubles at the time, roughly the equivalent of $20 billion USD in 2015. The railroad was built almost entirely by soldiers and prisoners, and the 90,000 men employed in the construction did so through sheer willpower, without having the appropriate resources available to themselves.

In 1974 a portion of the railroad was rebuilt to reroute further away from China. The new leg of the railroad would be built much farther north on ground that was almost entirely made up of permafrost. With only 90 frost free days each year and winter temperatures of -60C this would present unique challenges, including the unexpected consequence of building on top of permafrost: thawing. To date this section of the railroad has cost more to maintain than the entirety of it’s construction, roughly $14 billion, and the construction would not be completed until 2003, nearly 30 years after construction began.

Despite the enormous challenges in constructing and maintaining the railroad, it continues to handle 50% of Russia’s imports and exports, and the 15 day long end to end journey can also be taken by passengers, and the Circum-Baikal line is especially popular with tourists. While today it is considered the most scenic portion of the railroad hugging the coastline of a beautiful lake, this lake created enormous challenges during the original construction of the line. Originally without a plan for how to safely go around the lake, they would use a system of ferries to move train cars across the lake, and for 5 years using icebreakers to carry the train when the lake froze. In the winter of 1903-1904 the freezing was so extensive they simply laid tracks on the ice and hauled the train cars by horse. Their solution today is much more elegant and includes 14km of retaining wall, 200 bridges, 6 stone viaducts, and 39 tunnels that together total roughly 9km.

Image Gallery: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Learn more at: MeasuredInMetric.com

Edited by: Astronomic Audio

Contact us: Facebook | Twitter | Instagram