Interesting Facts About The Amur Railway
The Amur Railway is known for its unique man-made structures, such as the Khabarovsk Bridge over the Amur River (considered the longest in Imperial Russia, Soviet Union, and Eurasia for decades; designed by Lavr Proskuryakov) and the first permafrost tunnel in the world with the use of insulation between its outer surface and the rock. At the suggestion of Alexander Liverovsky, the engineers devised a method of building piers with the use of heated concrete in below-zero weather conditions. They also built railway stations, railroad workshops, elementary schools and hospitals along the Amur Railway. Before the bridge was operational, they had arranged a train ferry in summertime and horse-drawn train platforms to cross the icebound Amur River in wintertime. In 1912, the government began issuing up to 400 rubles in allowances and necessary household articles to those workers who had decided to settle in this region.
The Amur Railway was put under the authority of the Ministry of Communications with its administration in Khabarovsk. In 1922, the railway was transferred to the authority of the People's Commissariat for Communications (Народный Комиссариат Путей Сообщения). In 1959, the Amur Railway and the Transbaikal section of the Transsib were merged to form the Transbaikal Railway.
The construction of the Amur Railway was completed before the outbreak of World War I and cost over 250,000 million rubles. The eastern section of the railroad alone cost 73 million rubles. The famous Norwegian explorer and geographer Fridtjof Nansen referred to the Trans-Siberian Railway as a "technical wonder". Its construction favoured the rapid development of formerly backward regions of Siberia and Far East.
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Western entrance to a tunnel on the Amur Railway during construction
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Railway workers at a construction over the river Bolshaya Omutnaya of the Amur Railway
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Russian prisoners at work on the Amur Railway
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