GEOGRAPHICAL POSITION OF THE BAIKAL-AMUR MAIN LINE
BAM – the Baikal-Amur Main Line – is one of the longest railway lines in the world. Its total length from Taishet to Sovetskaya Gavan is 4,287 km, but after including branches and connecting lines it stretches for 5,600 km. The Baikal-Amur Main Line (BAM) runs through the 3 time zones and 6 subjects of the Russian Federation – territory of Irkutsk region, Amur Region, the Republic of Buryatia and Yakutia, Khabarovsk Territory and Trans-Baikal Territory. Along the line there are 63 cities and towns and 280 railway stations and sidings.
Key stations on the BAM:
- Tayshet;
- Lena;
- Taksimo;
- Tynda;
- Neryungi;
- New Urgal;
- Komsomolsk-on-Amur;
- Vanino;
- Sovetskaya Gavan.
BAM passes through territory characterised by harsh climatic conditions, including permafrost with depths from 1-3 to hundreds of metres, and high seismicity with shocks up 9 on the Richter scale. BAM crosses 11 full-flowing rivers (including the Lena, Amur, Zeya, Vitim, Olekma, Selemdzha and Bureya) and 7 ridges (Baikal, Severomuisky, Udokansky, Kodarsky, Olekminsky Stanovik, Turan and Dusse Alinsky).
BAM is the shortest railway route to the ports on the Pacific Ocean. The line reduces the distance for passengers and goods have to travel in order to reach Primorye, Vladivostok and Nakhodka by more than 200 km, to Vanino by almost 500 km, and to Sakhalin, Kamchatka and Magadan by 1,000 km. Due to the difficult terrain it has to traverse, more than 30 km of the railway line passes through tunnels. At 15.3 km, the longest is Severomuysky, followed by Baikalsky at 6.7 km. The highest mountain tunnel is Kodarsky, which is 996 m above sea level. The Mururinsky Pass is the BAM’s highest point and lies at 1,323 m above sea level.
During the construction of BAM, the latest design, developed and patented new construction and operational methods were used under complex hydraulic and geological conditions.
History of BAM's construction
The impulse for the construction of the Baikal-Amur Main Line developed from the disappointing results of the Russian-Japanese War of 1904-1905, which showed the urgent need to build a second lateral railway in Russia's Far East which would duplicate Trans-Siberian Main Line.
According to the original plan, the line was to run from Ufa by the shortest distance to the eastern sea coast via the northern tip of Lake Baikal.
In the Soviet period, research on the development of the railway network in the east of the country resumed in the late 1920s and early 1930s. It was then that the line to the east from Taishet first received its present name of the Baikal-Amur Main Line. It was proposed to begin the line from Urusha station, which lies approximately at BAM's mid-point near Skovorodina, with the terminal station planned for Komsomolsk-on-Amur, which at that time was a Perm village.
In 1932, the People's Commissars adopted a decree "On the Construction of the Baikal-Amur Main Line", which approved the plan for BAM's construction. The construction was scheduled to be completed in three years: through traffic in working operation mode all long the main line was due to begin at the end of 1935.
However, the construction of the line was repeatedly halted for various reasons, such as a lack of manpower, the Great Patriotic War and earthquakes at and near the construction work at the end of the 1950s.
Active construction on the BAM was resumed in 1974 and was largely undertaken by military engineers and volunteers from the Young Communists (Komsomol). Komsomol groups from the various Soviet republics competed with each other and built their "own" objects: the large Urgal station was built by volunteers from the Ukrainian SSR, Muyakan station by Belarussians, Uoyan by Lithuanians, Kichera by Estonians, Tayura by Armenians, Ulkan by Azeri, Soloni by Tajiks and Alonku by Moldovans. Tynda, the capital of the BAM, was built by Muscovites.
By 1980, the management of the Baikal-Amur Main Line was located in Tynda.
On 29 September 1984, a "golden" docking took place at Balbukhta junction in the Kalar district of Chita region, when the BAM's builders in the east and west met after advancing towards each other for 10 years. On 1 October 1984, "golden" links on the BAM were laid at Kuanda station in the Kalar district of Chita region.
The completion of the Baikal-Amur Main Line can be considered as 5 December 2003, when the North-Muya tunnel was opened to traffic. At 15,343 metres, the North-Muya tunnel is the longest tunnel in Russia and the fifth-longest in the world. Conditions for the construction of the tunnel were unique, and workers had to contend with permafrost, an abundance of groundwater, talus deposits, landslides and tectonic faults.
BAM now
- opening access to the vast region's natural resources;
- ensuring transit transport;
- creating the shortest east-west intercontinental route, running 10,000 km along Russia's railways;
- in military and strategic terms, the line provides a back-up against possible failures and interruptions in train movement along the Trans-Siberian Railway.
At the moment, BAM's social and economic potential has not been fully realised and Russian Railways does not yet make any profit from operating the line. The main reason for this situation is the slow development of the areas along the line. Of the planned nine territorial and production clusters which were to provide freight on the BAM, only one has been realised, namely the Neryungri coal basin.
Since 2013, Russian Railways has been implementing a programme to modernise the infrastructure of the railway system in Eastern Russia, a significant part of which is made up by BAM. The programme’s goal is to eliminate bottlenecks on the railways in Siberia and the Far East. As a result, the carrying capacity of the BAM has tripled during the last 10 years and freight loading volumes amounted to 46.8 million tons.
- See the photo gallery "Baikal-Amur Mainline"
Prospects for BAM's development. BAM's main catchment areafor mineral deposits
BAM's strategic position and the technical and economic potential of the region through which it passes are so great that the railway line will of course be in demand in Russia in the foreseeable future.
Deposits which are currently being developed on an industrial scale and play a cargo-generating role in utilising the Baikal-Amur Main Line:
- Neryungri and Urgalsk coal fields;
- Korshunov and Rudnogorsk iron ore deposits.
The best-studied deposits with an estimated cost-effectiveness of development:
- Apsat, Ogodzhinskaya and Elga coal desposits;
- Chiney, Taiga and Garinsky iron deposits;
- Udokansky copper deposit;
- Kuranakh and Katuginskoe polymetallic deposits;
- Evgenevskoe apatite deposit;
- Kovykta gas field;
- Talakanskoye, Verkhnechonskoe, Chayandinskoe, Srednebotuobinskoye, Yarakta, Dulisminskoye, Ayan and Adnikanskoe oil and gas fields.
The development of these fields requires the development of transport infrastructure.
Promising fields that require further exploration and an evaluation of the economic benefit of the development:
- Neryundinskoye, Kapaevskoye, Polivskoye iron ore deposits;
- Khlodnenskoe and Shamanic polymetallic deposits;
- Golevskoe synnyrite deposits;
- Ukduska and Seligdarskoye apatite deposits;
- Nepa potash basin.