China mulls over High-Speed Train to US

[Monroe]

This  is thought provoking ... what a train ride that would be.

 

China Mulls High-Speed Train to US

 

2014-05-08

 

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2014-05/08/content_17493399.htm

 

 

China is considering building a high-speed railway across the Siberia and Bering Strait to Alaska, across Canada to the US. In not so distant future, people can take the train from China to the US, according to Beijing Times Thursday citing Wang Mengshu, a railway expert and academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

 

The proposed journey will start from China's northeast region, cross Siberia to Bering Strait, and run across the Pacific Ocean by undersea tunnel to reach Alaska, from Alaska to Canada, then on to its final destination, the US. To cross Bering Strait will require approximately 200km undersea tunnel, the technology, which is already in place will also be used on Fujian to Taiwan high-speed railway tunnel. The project will be funded and constructed by China. The details of this project are yet to be finalized.

...

[ZortMcGort11]

That might take about 200 years to build. Good luck.

Right now in Seattle they got "Bertha" digging an underground tunnel at a snail's pace and unforseen problems have caused huge delays. And they want to build a tunnel which is, what, nearly half the diameter of the Earth?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertha_(tunnel_boring_machine).

[Flasche]

That might take about 200 years to build. Good luck.

Right now in Seattle they got "Bertha" digging an underground tunnel at a snail's pace and unforseen problems have caused huge delays. And they want to build a tunnel which is, what, nearly half the diameter of the Earth?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertha_(tunnel_boring_machine).

 

Would the Us even allow china to build it in the first place?!?

[bphlpt]

... And they want to build a tunnel which is, what, nearly half the diameter of the Earth?

 

????

The diameter of the earth is ~12,742 km, and according to monroe's quote:

 

... To cross Bering Strait will require approximately 200km undersea tunnel, ...

so that seems to be "only" 1.57% of the diameter of the earth, and nowhere near 50%, unless my math is waaay off.

Cheers and Regards

[jaclaz]

so that seems to be "only" 1.57% of the diameter of the earth, and nowhere near 50%, unless my math is waaay off.

 

Sure, but the good things about numbers are that they can be expressed in so many ways.

 

I would define 200 km as "more than 5 times the length of the longer undersea tunnel ever built" :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channel_Tunnel

 

The diameter of the Earth implies that it is roughly spherical, something that is still debated :

http://www.alaska.net/~clund/e_djublonskopf/Flatearthsociety.htm

http://theflatearthsociety.org/

 

jaclaz

[Ponch]

If they could dig a 50km tunnel under the channel in 1988, why not a 200km tunnel today? Just technically speaking, of course. I guess security would have been high in the agenda in 88. Not sure about China. Take the money and run.

[jaclaz]

If they could dig a 50km tunnel under the channel in 1988, why not a 200km tunnel today? Just technically speaking, of course. I guess security would have been high in the agenda in 88. Not sure about China. Take the money and run.

The channel tunnel was made possible by a number of "coincidences".

 

Among others, the geology of the area (which is mainly a constant layer of chalk marl) and the low depth of the actual channel.

Length is an issue, and it depends also on the difference of levels, the "chunnel" is only around 75 m deep.

The actual underwater part of the tunnel is around 38 km, but the overall length is around 50.

A train (and particularly high speed ones) cannot deal very well with slopes.

The normal slope of railway is 1%, high speed one tend to have 0.5%. This means that to go down or up 1m you need a 100 to 200 m of length ramp.

 

However (among the many) issues with length of a tunnel is the time it takes to go through it, as there are speed limits that you simply cannot break,  as the train itself acts like a piston inside a bore,and there are are "relief valves" to stabilize air pressure in the two train tunnels.

In "normal" tunnels there are usually (vertical) wells/shafts that connect the tunnels to the surface to allow for air intake and exhaust. 

The current max speed in the Channel tunnel is 160 Km/h and though this can be increased a bit, to actually make it sensibly higher one would need to make a much bigger tunnel in diameter.

 

However, the idea is not entirely new, JFYI:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bering_Strait_crossing

and:

http://www.interbering.com/index.html

 

The studied tunnel in the above would be  around 120 Km, which is a little more than twice the chunnel length, much better than four times , and, since it will "cross" two small islands:

http://www.interbering.com/Bering-Tunnel-Cross-Section.html

it allows for the ventilation shafts, and each "completely" underwater stretches are each not much longer than the current channel tunnel.

 

Luckily enough there are also no real issues connected with depth, though the different geological situation may cause some problems.

 

Overall, the tunnel construction seems technically feasible.

 

The biggest problems as I see it will be the actual climate in the areas, that may limit severely the construction times (increasing construction times and costs) and also the maintenance costs to keep the railway operational that may reveal to be prohibitive, we are talking of -20° to -50° C, operating (particularly electrically powered and "high-speed") railways in these climates is not easy. 

 

jaclaz

[Monroe]

Again more thought provoking insight from jaclaz, who I believe has knowledge of building and construction requirements, from another post I had read ... the climate extremes, ventilation and exhaust requirements ... I was thinking earlier also just what would be the maintenance cost over short and long term ... also what would the actual ticket price have to be to show a profit unless there would be many passenger cars in tow.

 

I also was wondering about a possible under-sea earthquake with a train in that 200 KM tunnel and the tunnel cracking open.

 

It's mind-boggling !

Edited May 10, 2014 by monroe

[jaclaz]

Again more thought provoking insight from jaclaz, who I believe has knowledge of building and construction requirements, from another post I had read ...

Yep , this is actually my job in "real life" (constructions).

 

I will give you something more to ponder about.

 

In the last (very,very short by these metrics) tunnel construction I was involved in, during construction ventilation was assured by means of (BIG) electric fans, two for each bore, 160 Kw each (we are talking here of a tunnel less than 3 km in length).

The amount of airflow was enough to guarantee fresh air to people and machines working inside the gallery.

 

By using entirely electrically powered machinery, one can possibly reduce the amount of needed fresh air to 1/2 or 1/4 (the example tunnel I am talking about was excavated with "conventional" diesel machinery).

 

But the amount of power needed to provide fresh air at some 30 km (or 50 Km )  from the outside would be anyway impressive .

 

Everything gets very complex when these kind of lengths are involved.

 

To give you another simple example, in the "conventional" tunnel, cars/pickups traveled in the excavated part at no more than 30 km/h (for security reasons), which means that a shift of workers was carried from the outside to the actual excavation site on average in 2-3 minutes (and in case of any problem that was the time for the emergency squad to get there) and carried out at the end of the shift in the same time.

 

If the same speed limit applies (in these type of tunnels access is on rails) the train carrying personnel will take 1-2 hours to do the same.

 

This in practice means that you won' t be having anymore the "normal" 3 shifts/day, 8 hours each, but 4 by 6 hours each for a large part of the excavating process, and then possibly 5 shifts by 4:45 hours.

 

jaclaz

[ZortMcGort11]

^ the Bering straight is the smallest part of the proposed train line.

For some reason I thought the ENTIRE THING was going to be a tunnell... now that would take a heck of long time to make. And that's what I was thinking when I said it would be like half the diamter of the Earth LOL. Don't ask me why I thought that :-)

Anyway, it's a terrible idea. I live at the border between US and Canada (right where that dot on the map is). I really don't see this happening ever. Not in a great many years!

People around here don't even want coal trains to come through this neck of the woods. Even though it's supposed to add jobs to the economy. Train to China? Eh, no thanks.

There really wouldn't be much for Chinese or Russians to enjoy in this area. It's quite boring actually. Probably wouldn't be worth the money for the train ride. If you like to spend your time enjoying the gray skies, wet damp climate, and no culture (which is a culture in itself), sure why not?

*See, over here is our cultural heritage museum. You can learn the exciting history of logging in this area, and over in this section is our history of the brothels that used to exist.*

Edited May 10, 2014 by LostInSpace2012

[jaclaz]

No , the part under the bering strait is the WHOLE tunnel, the rest is a "normal" surface railroad.

 

From the same (already posted by me) site hosting that image:

http://www.interbering.com/index.html

 

DISTANCE OF THE FUTURE HIGH-SPEED RAILROAD:

Bering Strait Tunnel - 64 miles (103 km) plus a distance not less than 5 miles/8 kilometers inland on each coast) ;

High-Speed Railroad from Cape Prince of Wales (Alaska, USA) - Fairbanks (Alaska) - Whitehorse (Canada) - Vancouver (Canada) - 4,000 miles (6,437 km) , with connection to Pacific Northwest Corridor owned by BNSF Railway, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.;

High-Speed Railroad from Uelen (Chukotka, Russia) - Egvekinot - Bilibino - Zyryanka - Ust-Nera - Yakutsk - 2,392 miles (3,850 km) , with connection to Russian high-speed railroad Krasnoyarsk - Ekaterinburg - Kazan - Moscow constructed by JSC High-Speed Rail Lines (Russia), and to the European network of high-speed rail via Berlin (Germany).

 

Total: 6,392 miles (10,287 km).

jaclaz
 

P.S.: Oops, cross-posting with LostInSpace2012

P.P.S.: BTW, since I learned recently the expression "selling snake-oil", I would like to point out how LostInSpace2012, by not believing in the project may be losing a great opportunity :

http://www.interbering.com/InterBering-investment-funding.html

The minimum investment to InterBering, LLC is $1,000 (1 share). Even this minimal investment could result in a payoff of as much as 1 million dollars once the project gathers momentum and increasing interest from the broader investment market comes into play. Please read all the information contained on our online application page and consider becoming an investor.

 

bolding is mine.

Edited May 10, 2014 by jaclaz

[ZortMcGort11]

Thanks, Jaclaz. :-)

I'm a gambling man, and I would definitely be willing to plop down a $1,000 investment on the chance of making a $1,000,000!

My opinion on the train is now changed...

COME ON DOWN!

LOL.

Edited May 10, 2014 by LostInSpace2012

[jaclaz]

I'm a gambling man, and I would definitely be willing to plop down a $1,000 investment on the chance of making a $1,000,000!

My opinion on the train is now changed...

 

Good. :

I had expected that you would have contributed to the tradition of old gamblers on trains bound for nowhere

http://www.lyricsfreak.com/k/kenny+rogers/the+gambler_20077886.html

 

Otherwise, how would the kids learn something on the matter?

 

jaclaz

[ZortMcGort11]

Would the Us even allow china to build it in the first place?!?

That's a really good question. Who would be in charge of the security?

Maybe they're planning to stop and frisk everybody at the border... who knows...

[Flasche]

Hmmm, but one must ponder what this track would do in times of war...