Drive from Europe to the U.S.? Russia proposes world's greatest superhighway

Baked.noodle

Just thought this might be of interest. Grand idea I think. Wonder if I will get to drive something like this in my lifetime.

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/03/24/travel/trans-siberian-road/

Route as roughly interpreted by CNN. The proposed plan for a massive trans-Siberian highway would link Russia's eastern border with the U.S. state of Alaska.

Edit: Just noticed I should have posted this in the Travel forum. Sorry.

Carawaystick

Considering you can't drive from Nome to Fairbanks at present, nor from London to France, this seems a bit like a tunnel from Ireland to Britain - far fetched crayonism

L1011

There's no way this is happening with the current political situation anyway

Rawr

L1011 wrote: »

There's no way this is happening with the current political situation anyway

True.

Also recently I watched an episode of Dangerous Roads which covered a section of the main Siberian Highway. Even the recently upgraded parts of it we're treacherous and winter conditions are so incredibly cold that you cannot turn the engine off unless you are parked in a heated garage.

Doesn't really seem to be a good idea

Greenmachine

Who wants to drive those distances. Logistical nightmare. Fuel costs, food, accomodation, hazardous terrain. Hugely unpredictable journey times. It sound like a pipe dream from a different era altogether. Stick the cargo on a ship same as others would do, if it is urgent airfreight it.

cgcsb

I don't think anyone would make the journey by car, in terms of route length there is a large stretch where there are hardly any significant population centres. In fact between Western Russian and Southern Canada there's hardly a soul. A journey bar would take several day/weeks. If a similar high speed rail could make the journey within 48 hours at a cost lower than flying it might be worth it.

Dom84

Have a look at Ewan McGregor's Long way round. He does that trip. Parts of Russia are are almost complete no go areas.

Polar101

Dom84 wrote: »

Have a look at Ewan McGregor's Long way round. He does that trip. Parts of Russia are are almost complete no go areas.

If they had done a bit of research, they could have avoided the floods, though. But yeah, I agree anyway.

GerardKeating

Polar101 wrote: »

If they had done a bit of research, they could have avoided the floods, though. But yeah, I agree anyway.

I would imagine that they did the research, that's how they found the floods?

Cen taurus

I see the armchair naysayers and war lovers are out in force already.

Greenmachine

Cen taurus wrote: »

I see the armchair naysayers and war lovers are out in force already.

Enlighten us to the huge opportunity in my midst.

MGWR

Greenmachine wrote: »

Who wants to drive those distances. Logistical nightmare. Fuel costs, food, accommodation, hazardous terrain. Hugely unpredictable journey times. It sound like a pipe dream from a different era altogether. Stick the cargo on a ship same as others would do, if it is urgent airfreight it.

Loads of people would like to attempt to drive such distances. But the logistics of building such a road, especially through impossibly dangerous terrain (aside from permafrost and tundra, parts of the route are directly on the Ring of Fire, very volcanically active regions) are the main barrier rather than food/fuel availability (some people would carry extra storage and/or fuel in a trailer or tender, for example; or might even own/hire a mobile home or caravan thus bringing their accommodations along), and for such a journey, what one may term as "reliable" is according to one's personal whim.

Does not seem very logical for a trucking route, to be sure, no matter how many way stations one would plan for it.