Who Built the Railways in Tsarist Russia?

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

According to the official history in tsarist Russia, men, with the help of a pick and a shovel, built railways faster than, with the help of modern technology, they built the BAM - the largest construction project in the USSR. Is this possible? …

The Russian government became concerned with the construction of the railway at the beginning of the 19th century. The basis for this direction was Department of Water Communications, established in 1798 … … in 1809 it expanded its powers and was renamed the Office of Water and Land Communications. In 1809, the Military Institute of the Corps of Railways was established.

In 1830an article by NP Shcheglov appeared, in which it was pointed out that the issue of creating a network of railways "is of paramount importance for the economic development of Russia."

In 1834at the invitation of the mining department arrived in Russia Austrian engineer Franz von Gerstner, who made a proposal to Emperor Nicholas I to build a railway line. In 1835relative of the emperor count Alexey Bobrinsky creates a joint stock company, the purpose of which is to finance the construction of railways. In 1836, the emperor promulgated a decree on the construction of the Tsarskoye Selo railway. Within a few months, a launch site was built from Bolshoy Kuzmin to Pavlovsk, on which traffic was launched by the end of the year, and the official opening of the road took place at the end of 1837.

The active formation of the railway network of the Russian Empire took place in the second half of the XIX century.; before that, the state-owned Warsaw-Vienna railway and the Nikolaev railway were built. The development of the road network was driven by both the needs of the economy and the military interests of the state.

In September 1854an order was issued to begin surveys on the Moscow - Kharkov - Kremenchug - Elizavetgrad - Olviopol - Odessa line. In October 1854, an order was issued to begin surveys on the Kharkov-Feodosia line, in February 1855 - on a branch from the Kharkov-Feodosia line to Donbass, in June 1855 - on the Genichesk - Simferopol - Bakhchisarai - Sevastopol line. January 26, 1857 the imperial decree was issued on the creation of the first railway network.

In addition to state and concession roads (Nikolaevskaya, Moscow-Nizhegorodskaya, Petersburg-Varshavskaya, Vologdo-Vyatskaya, Samara-Zlatoustovskaya, etc.), numerous private systems were also built (Ryazan-Uralskaya railway, Moscow-Yaroslavl, Kiev-Brest and etc.). Mostly at the same time, all the existing railway stations in large cities were created.

Construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway began in 1891 simultaneously from Chelyabinsk through Novonikolaevsk to Krasnoyarsk and Irkutsk and from Vladivostok to Khabarovsk. Traffic was opened entirely on the territory of the Russian Empire after the commissioning of a bridge across the Amur River in 1916. Another strategic road - the Chinese Eastern Railway - was built on the territory of neighboring China.

Well, somewhere this is the official version of the construction of railways. The Trans-Siberian Railway, from Miass (Chelyabinsk Region) to Vladivostok, is about 7 thousand km long. built in 25 years … Fantastic, and nothing more.

And today, Krasnoyarsk and Novosibirsk archaeologists, during excavations at the construction site of a bridge across the Yenisei, discovered a section of the railway laid under Nicholas II, more than 100 years ago. The find came as a surprise, and for several reasons at once. Firstly, because of its scale: scientists often find small fragments of old railway tracks - rails, sleepers, crutches, but this is the first time that a 100-meter road has been discovered.

Secondly, the railway line was hidden deep underground - under a one and a half meter layer of soil.

The railway was found by scientists quite by accident: they wanted to get to the bottom of the ancient cultural layer on Mount Afontova, at the same time they found the tracks. According to archaeologists, the find surprised them: it is clear that the work is being carried out near the Trans-Siberian Railway, so one could expect that they would come across separate parts - fragments of sleepers, crutches, but not a whole railway line! This, the members of the expedition admit, is the first time in their memory. And the road was preserved, in fact, by accident. We can say because of someone's negligence. In Soviet times, this site was used as an access road to the switch plant, then it was no longer needed, but they did not demolish it, but simply covered it with earth.

"Mainly during the excavations, Afontova Gora was and is of interest to us. And in order to get to the cultural layer, we needed to get rid of man-made debris. Whole deposits were found on this territory: an electric cable, pieces of old asphalt, some rusted through old equipment, etc. All this rested under a thick layer of earth - apparently, so many years ago they decided to remove all this disgrace out of sight. Actually, we found a section of the railway in the same place - it hid under a thick layer of soil. Everything, in Soviet times, they built new, modern paths, and the old ones, which were of no value from a technical point of view, decided not to demolish (why waste money and energy?), but simply to fill up. has increased significantly over the years."

The explanations of archaeologists are very interesting. And in what years of the Soviet era did this site fall asleep? And how did archaeologists know that this road was laid precisely during the reign of Nicholas II, more than 100 years ago?

And here is a very rare photo of the 19th century, you can see how roads are being dug, removing a multi-meter layer of soil.

And these are photographs from an album of views of the West Siberian and Yekaterinburg-Chelyabinsk railways. 1892-1896

Further…

As you can see from these photos, it doesn't look like this road was built recently. The sleepers are covered with earth, maybe they were covered by dust storms, or maybe they just weren't dug any further.

And so they built the royal railways.

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It’s hard to believe that in 25 years the Trans-Siberian Railway was built with the help of shovels, if we compare the construction of large construction projects in the Soviet Union, Dneproges, Belomorkanal, BAM, and others.

Let's take a look at the construction of the BAM, 3819 km long

Let's read "Wikipedia".

In 1888 the project was discussed the construction of the Pacific railway through the northern tip of Lake Baikal, after which in July - September 1889 Colonel of the General Staff N. A. Voloshinov with a small detachment overcame the thousand-kilometer space from Ust-Kut to Muya, just in those places where the BAM route now lies. And I came to the conclusion: “… drawing a line in this direction turns out to be absolutely impossible due to some technical difficulties, not to mention other considerations. Voloshinov was not a pessimist, but he was soberly aware: at that time Russia had neither the equipment nor the means to carry out the grandiose work.

In 1926 A separate corps of the railway troops of the Red Army began to conduct topographic reconnaissance of the future BAM route. In 1932 (April 13) the USSR Council of People's Commissars issued a decree "On the construction of the Baikal-Amur railway", according to which design and survey work was launched and construction began. By the fall, it became clear that the main problem of construction was the lack of workers. With the officially established number of employees at 25 thousand people, it was possible to attract only 2.5 thousand people.

In 1938 construction began on the western section from Taishet to Bratsk, and in 1939 year preparatory work on the eastern section from Komsomolsk-on-Amur to Sovetskaya Gavan.

June 1947 the construction of the eastern section of Komsomolsk-on-Amur - Urgal continued (mainly by the forces of the prisoners of the Amur ITL (Amurlag)). First train on the full length of the Taishet - Bratsk - Ust-Kut (Lena) line passed in July 1951, and in 1958 the site was put into permanent operation.

In 1967 (March 24) a decree of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR was issued, design and survey work was resumed. By the decree of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR from July 8, 1974 "On the construction of the Baikal-Amur railway" the necessary funds were allocated for the construction of the railway the first category Ust-Kut (Lena) - Komsomolsk-on-Amur with a length of 3145 km, the second route Taishet - Ust-Kut (Lena) - 680 km, the Bam - Tynda and Tynda - Berkakit lines - 397 km.

In April 1974, BAM was declared an all-Union shock Komsomol construction site, and masses of young people came here

In 1977, the Bam - Tynda line was put into permanent operation, and in 1979, the Tynda - Berkakit line. The main part of the road has been under construction for over 12 years from April 5, 1972 to October 27, 1984. On November 1, 1989, the entire new three-thousand-kilometer section of the highway was put into permanent operation. in the volume of the start-up complex. The longest in Russia Severo-Muisky tunnel (15,343 meters), the construction of which began in May 1977, was pierced to the end only in March 2001 and put into permanent operation in December 2003.

In 1986 To the Ministry of Transport Construction of the USSR for the construction of a highway at a time more than 800 units of Japanese construction equipment were delivered.

The cost of building BAM in 1991 prices amounted to 17.7 billion rubles. thus, BAM became the most expensive infrastructure project in the history of the USSR.

Further, photographs of the construction of the BAM.

Let me remind you the main part of the road was built for over 12 years, using modern technology.

As anyone, but I personally do not believe in the construction of most of the railways by tsarist Russia. Restored, it is most likely. Even here, design and survey work can take up to ten years, if not more. And the banal "shortage of manpower" is a huge problem, which they faced during the construction of the BAM, which made it necessary to declare the BAM an all-Union construction site.

The whole country was building the BAM, and spent huge resources in doing so.

And finally, a few videos.