The meeting between Presidents Putin and Trump in Alaska have relit the fire under the idea of connecting these nations with a physical bridge. But how realistic is building a road or railway from Alaska to Chukotka? What are the challenges involved? And, is this expensive sounding idea worth it?
Image above: The HZMB in China is an impressive bridge project going over deep water.
Good feelings aside, can we even build this bridge?
Let’s take a look at one of the biggest over-sea bridge projects in the world to see how viable this peace project could be.
“The Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macau Bridge (China), also abbreviated as HZMB, is one of the most complex and ambitious engineering projects of the 21st century. While the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway (USA) holds the record for the longest continuous bridge over water, the HZMB is the longest sea-crossing bridge system in the world.”
The HZMB in length and more importantly depth is a real equivalent to the problem of building a bridge across the Bering Strait. It covers waters 30-40 meters deep which is comparable to the gap between America and Alaska. This is a good sign, but the HZMB is located in much warmer and less exposed waters. That is to say, it was build under much more gentle climate conditions. Open northern waters tend to thrash about much more severely and for more than half the year the temperature is below freezing in Alaska.
The “Chunnel” between the UK and France is quite an engineering marvel. It being underground avoids the unpleasant weather conditions above it. But this tunnel is only 50km, and if we exclude making a stop on either of the Diomede Islands in the middle, then our peace project would need to be more like 110km+ of tunneling. This would be the largest one-stage single tunnel project in human history, which is bound to cost an insane amount of money. Perhaps Elon Musk’s Boring Company and the folks who bore out Russia’s ever-growing subway systems could collaborate, but this is still a massive challenge.
It looks like building either a bridge or tunnel would be possible. Comparable projects do exist. But, it would be an engineering task that would set world records, especially in terms of cost.
Image above: Crossing the Bering Strait is only the beginning. To connect the USA and Russia there must be a route from Seattle to Blagoveshchensk!
Is it a bridge to nowhere?
Both sides of the narrowest part of the Bering Strait are unpopulated. Anchorage, Alaska with a population of 200,000+ is over 1000km away. Anadyr, Chukotka with a population of 50,000 is over 600km away. This means that building a truly epic bridge, tunnel or combination of the two would only be the start of the project. There are hundreds of kilometers on both sides that would need to be covered by road or rail. Much of this terrain is not flat either and would require combating local mountains. This is where the cost for such a project would really explode!
But things here get worse. At present both Anadyr (no trains) and Anchorage (only connected to the Alaska line) are not connected to the greater rail networks of their respective countries. This means that this project, if it were to be functional, would require thousands of kilometers worth of railroad to actually connect it to the rest of Russia and the USA.
Trucking in the ‘great white north’ can be very dangerous, and the weather conditions in Northern Alaska are brutal. Furthermore, with thousands of miles worth of journey ahead, the cost of sending truckers on this dangerous route would surely add massive cost. Furthermore, unlike a train which can have a crew, truckers work solo, meaning that along the way they would need to eat, sleep, use the restroom and so on. In the continental USA this isn’t a problem, but way up in ultra-isolated regions of Alaska, this might not work out so well. There are currently no locations along the Bering Strait to grab pelmeni and a hotdog then take a nice shower.
Image above: Map showing rail gauges and driving direction by country. Russia and the USA do not share rail standards.
One way the USA and Russia are truly incompatible
The rail gauges used in the USA and Russia are sadly different. That means, that for a train to go from Washington to Moscow it would need to either ‘change wheels’ midway or be built to use ‘variable gauge axles’. In the latter case this would demand that both sides build an entire fleet of trains just for this purpose. That’s even more money on top of already insane costs!
Perhaps this problem is not fatal for the project. Both countries have customs inspections and the Russian border is particularly well guarded meaning that trains trucks might have to stop and unload ‘at the border’ regardless. Obviously sending a train from one continent to another with zoro stops is cooler, but both powerful nations are unlikely to have this bridge behave as an ‘open border’. Thus, if the trains and trucks have to stop at the border
In the use of trucks for shipping, thankfully both Russians and Americans drive on the right hand side of the road. Furthermore, Russia is one of the few countries where titanic American semi-trucks are both legal and popular for those who can afford them. For example, in the EU this is not the case.
Image above: If russophobic politicians win elections, then the peace bridge to Chukotka is dead.
Changing political moods
The process of building a physical connection between the USA and Russia will take a lot of time. There is no way to do this overnight. If we started this process tomorrow, President Putin could be comfortably retired by the time serious work got underway. Then again the political establishment in Moscow is very stable. So it is possible, but unlikely, that his successor would just throw this project in the dumpster unexpectedly. The Russophobic democrats are another story entirely. If Mr. Vance fails to get elected after Trump steps down a horde of liberals could take over. THis people would surely cancel this project. In short, this is a big expensive project that requires a lot of long term political will. If that vanishes, then so does the project.
If you build it they will come!
One major problem between the USA and Russia is that their economies are very separate. Having good trade relations motivates both sides to avoid conflict. The deep integration between China and the U.S. are often sited as reasons why the globalist neocon types trash talk Beijing but never actually do much against it. Creating an amazing trade route between the USA and Russia is a powerful idea for peace. Being able to send passenger trains flying at over 200km/h between the nations is a notion that warms our hearts. But can the USA and Russia at present invest in what could be the most expensive trade interconnectivity project in the history of mankind? Probably not.
The current “isolation” of the region would change if a massive trade route was established. This is only natural. But at present the ‘route to Russia’ is pretty much empty as the population centers of both nations are vastly farther than the gap between the Diomede Islands. The cost of this project would be insane and its fate would be in the hands of potentially Russophobic Washington politicians. But then again, sometimes you have to think big.