Along The BAM
Tayshet to Lake Baikal -1064 km: 0:Tayshet: about 300 km east of Krasnoyarsk, Trans-Siberian Railway, M53 highway to Irkutsk. 129:Sosnovye Rodniki: timber port. Chuna River 142:Chuna. 269:Vikhorevka: railway administration. 282:Anzebi: 20 km spur line to Bratsk town. About 330: Bratsk Dam: Railway runs across the top of the dam. 463:Vidim. 546:Shredneilimskya on the Ust-Ilimsk reservoir. 554:Zheleznogorsk-Ilimsky:mining town. 575: Khrebetovaya: branch line north to Ust-Ilimsk (see branches below) Enter Lena basin. Kuta River. 715:Ust-Kut: port on the Lena River where goods are loaded onto boats for transport north. End of the line until 1974. 736:Lena Vostochnaya: east of the Lena, start of the BAM proper from 1974. Line tends east southeast. 786:Zvyozdnaya: first new town built on the BAM. 890:Kirenga: 12 km east is the larger town of Magistralnyy. Kirenga River and bridge. 931:Ul'kan: on the Ulkan branch of the Kirenga. 1005:Delbichenda: last stop before the 6.7 km Baikal Mountain Tunnel (between 1979 and 1984 there was a 15 km bypass over the mountain). 1014:Daben. 1064: Lake Baikal.
Lake Baikal to Tynda 1300 km: 1064:Severobaykalsk. Four small tunnels along the lake. 1104:Nizhneangarsk. leave Lake Baikal, northeast up the valley of the Upper Angara River. 1257:Novy Uoyan: there is talk of building a railroad south from here to the Trans-Siberian. Enter Severomuysk Mountains. Much permafrost from here to Tynda. 1385-1400: Severomuysky Tunnel: 15.7 km long, very difficult construction. Exit mountain. Scenic section with mountains to north and south. Much fog. 1484:Taksimo:end of electrified section. Muya River. 1548:Shivery: leave Buryat Republic. Vitim River. 1577:Kuanda: official 'completion' of the BAM was celebrated here in September 1984. Valley into mountains. 1664:Kodar: Kodar mountains, 1.9 km tunnel. 1734:Novaya Chara. 1879:Khani: the only BAM town in the Sakha Republic. Northernmost point on the line. Line turns south southeast along the Olyokma River. Enter Amur basin. 2364:Tynda
Tynda to Komsomolsk 1473 km :2364:Tynda: Branch railway and highway north to Yakutsk, little BAM south to the Trans-Siberian. 2704: Bridge over Zeya Reservoir. Line heads southeast. 3205:Bureya River bridge. 3315:Novy Urgal:Branch south to Trans-Siberian. 3403:east to Dusse-Alin Tunnel. Northeast up the Amgun River. 3633:Postyshevo: east. 3697:Evoron Lake. southeast to 3837:Komsomolsk-on-Amur.
Komsomolsk to Sovetskaya Gavan 486 km. This section was completed by prisoners during World War II, except for the 19 km section east of Komsomolsk which was completed in 1974. Komsomolsk. 1734m Amur River Bridge. 0:Pivan(new numbering system). 51:Selikhin: Branch. 95-340:Sikhote Alin Mountains. 403:Mongokhto 441:Vanino: port, train ferry to Sakhalin Island, practical end of passenger service. 467:Sovetskaya Gavan: naval base.
In April 2008 the state-owned Bamtonnelstroy corporation started work on a new 3.91 km single-track tunnel to bypass the ageing Kuznetsov. It was due to he handed over to Russian Railways in mid-2013. This, the state railway's president, Vladmir Yakunin, told a November 2011 railway congress, would relieve a bottleneck on the BAM. The 59.8 bn roubles (about $1.93 bn) project included 20 km of new track. In 2010, Yakunin had said, the stretch between Komsomolsk and Sovetskaya Gavan was the weakest link on the BAM, which, he said, could be carrying 100 million tons of freight a year in 2050.
Read more about this topic: Baikal-Amur Mainline