Seatrain I belive runs servce from Canada to Alaska so service to Russia is possible. The problem is that of a Railroad Connection on the other side. I belive that a transload facility could be a temporay solution.
For much the same reason that a bridge is not a good idea. Weather. The Bearing Sea and Straits are about the roughest in the world and the average temperatures in the region are dangerous to be exposed to most of the time. And then there is the traffic volume. No traffic volume. Alaska Air used to fly twice a week into Siberia (don’t remember the name of the place) but the plane, when it could fly, seldom was every full. Then there is the guage problem. Russia is 5 foot. US is 4 foot 8.5 inch. Since you will either have to re-truck the cars or transload the cars, you might as well do the standard steamer thing and ship to Japan for forwarding on the (sometimes as often as) weekly run across the Sea of Japan to Russia.
If the business were there, so also would be a RR connection.
H’mm at one time Seatrain was the largest bankruptcy on the NYSE. They went out of biz in the early 80’s. You maybe thinking of Sealand who was acquired from the CSX by Maersk some years ago. Also I would say due to extreme weather conditions in the Behring Strait car ferries may not be to safe. Just ask the Russians when they were building the Siberian transcon they intended to car ferry trains across lake Baikal & check out there results of that venture. [:o)][:D][:p]
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Originally posted by Peterson6868
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Why on earth bother? Ship containers for any freight that offers (precious little – the only decent port in Siberia is Vladivostok, and that’s being generous)(at least it’s at the end of a rail line… and I do mean the end… of a very long rail line… !)
Hmmm…ever heard of iceburgs? how about this then…pack ice! Ever contemplated the phrase “zero visability” or seen a sea with waves higher than the ship…welcome to the Bearing Straights. Plus when the ship finally made it across, where the heck would it go? theres NO connecting land rail-line from Alaska to Canada or the lower 48? Not to mention 1000’s of miles of empty tundra on the Ruskie side.
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QUOTE: Originally posted by spbed
H’mm at one time Seatrain was the largest bankruptcy on the NYSE. They went out of biz in the early 80’s. You maybe thinking of Sealand who was acquired from the CSX by Maersk some years ago. Also I would say due to extreme weather conditions in the Behring Strait car ferries may not be to safe. Just ask the Russians when they were building the Siberian transcon they intended to car ferry trains across lake Baikal & check out there results of that venture. [:o)][:D][:p]
The train ferry is still there and connects the Lower 48 with Alaska. I don’t know who is running it now. I also think the ferry connection out of Prince Rupert is still operating. I pay almost no attention to this part of things so I can be out of date.
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QUOTE: Originally posted by kenneo
Yes, the Alaska(not sure which port) to Prince Rupert BC railroad ferry service is still in operation by the CN, billed as the CN’s “AquaTrain” ferry service [C):-)].
Transportation officials from the Alaska state government and Yukon povincial government are currently studying proposals for a direct rail connection from the Alaska Railroad to one of the Canadian rail systems.
Additionally, not all ports in Alaska and Siberia are ice-free on a year-round basis [:(]
Because a small RR ferry in the wintertime would turn into a huge SAR effort for the crew when it goes down.
There is a good reason why most of the freight traveling from Japan, Korea, and China to Europe takes the long way across the Pacific, the USA and the Atlantic instead of a shorter overland route through Siberia. Russia cannot presently prevent the rampant theft of any and all property within its borders. That plus the corruption, and organized crime makes it difficult to do business there at this time. When the Russian government brings these problems down to reasonable levels we will lose a lot of our double stack traffic.
That is the only rational argument against my January 1991 TRAINS Magazine editorial that I’ve ever heard.
That’s what intermodal is all about, why move a boxcar across the ocean on a train ferry when it can be shipping on a container ship.
Makes more sense to me, am I missing something here?