Russian Railways: Billions for HSR?

[CHamilton]

Russian Railways May Build $157 Billion of High-Speed Links

OAO Russian Railways is planning more than 5 trillion rubles ($157 billion) of high-speed rail links as the world’s largest country by land mass plans to host the 2018 soccer World Cup.

“Building high-speed rail links is a brand new trend for the development of our economy,” Russian Railways Chief Executive Officer Vladimir Yakunin said in Sochi, the Black Sea city that will host the 2014 Winter Olympics. The plans are drawing interest from large foreign companies including Siemens AG (SIE) and Alstom SA (ALO), he said.
Russia’s ambitions to hold world sporting events is forcing the government to expand the national transportation system. The country doesn’t have a single high-speed rail line, while Japan introduced the world’s first service in the 1960s, according to data from OAO High-Speed Rail Lines, a unit of RZD as the Russian rail monopoly is known.
State-owned Russian Railways plans the routes from Moscow to St. Petersburg, Sochi and Kazan, with an extension to Yekaterinburg near the border of Europe and Asia. The company is trying to start the pilot link to Kazan in time to race soccer fans to stadiums in four of the 11 cities hosting World Cup matches.

 

[DET63]

They want to have several lines up-and-running by 2018, just five years from now? In the U.S., mentioning a brand-new high-speed rail line today might mean the first environmental impact statement would be drafted by 2018.

 

[ALC Rail Writer]

They want to have several lines up-and-running by 2018, just five years from now? In the U.S., mentioning a brand-new high-speed rail line today might mean the first environmental impact statement would be drafted by 2018.

You're forgetting how business is conducted in Putin's Russia. There's likely a few very rich railroad men who will become even more obscenely rich, meanwhile Putin will use the full force of the state to have these projects complete. The choice of five years is probably not a historical coincidence. Unemployment is very high, unions very weak, they will have no problem finding the labor... and financing them is easy when you hate petro-dollars.

So the short answer is yes, if Putin's administration wants such a huge public works project it is certainly capable of pulling it off... at a cost.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

They want to have several lines up-and-running by 2018, just five years from now? In the U.S., mentioning a brand-new high-speed rail line today might mean the first environmental impact statement would be drafted by 2018.

It's funny to see you imply the EIS is the issue even after seeing the Keystone XL debacle.

Bottom line: Environmental impact won't stop anything at this point, not even the dirtiest fuel source ever devised.

 

[Anderson]

An EIS may not stop anything...but they can sure slow things down and run the clock out on them, not only in making the reports, but also in any contests surrounding them (lawsuits, etc.). Even if it goes through all the way, how many years has it taken to get Keystone through the EIS process?

 

[Devil's Advocate]

An EIS may not stop anything...but they can sure slow things down and run the clock out on them, not only in making the reports, but also in any contests surrounding them (lawsuits, etc.). Even if it goes through all the way, how many years has it taken to get Keystone through the EIS process?

Phase 1 is already built. Took two years to get it approved and another two years to build it IIRC. If the potential impact to the environment is irrelevant why do we even bother with the EIS anymore? It doesn't appear to serve any real purpose at this point so we might as well just get rid of it and take a page from our ethically challenged friends in Russia and China.

 

[Anderson]

An EIS may not stop anything...but they can sure slow things down and run the clock out on them, not only in making the reports, but also in any contests surrounding them (lawsuits, etc.). Even if it goes through all the way, how many years has it taken to get Keystone through the EIS process?

Phase 1 is already built. Took two years to get it approved and another two years to build it IIRC. If the potential impact to the environment is irrelevant why do we even bother with the EIS anymore? It doesn't appear to serve any real purpose at this point so we might as well just get rid of it and take a page from our ethically challenged friends in Russia and China.

I'm not inclined to disagree with axing EISes; at least, I'd like the scope reduced somewhat so it's less of a burden.

 

[ALC Rail Writer]

An EIS may not stop anything...but they can sure slow things down and run the clock out on them, not only in making the reports, but also in any contests surrounding them (lawsuits, etc.). Even if it goes through all the way, how many years has it taken to get Keystone through the EIS process?

You're mistaking the EIS process for political pressure. Many, many dirty fuel projects get through the EPA every day without much trouble. K-Street writes the laws after all... Keystone is one project which has drawn major criticism and has both grassroots political pressure as well as pressure from people on the Hill.

Bottom line-- There are many pipelines across the country that get built without any NIMBY protests and which come through the EIS process and get EPA approval. I don't see how you can call these "burdensome", with record profits and record sales and record amounts of leases in the US and abroad just how exactly is an ounce of prevention a bad thing?

 

[Anderson]

An EIS may not stop anything...but they can sure slow things down and run the clock out on them, not only in making the reports, but also in any contests surrounding them (lawsuits, etc.). Even if it goes through all the way, how many years has it taken to get Keystone through the EIS process?

You're mistaking the EIS process for political pressure. Many, many dirty fuel projects get through the EPA every day without much trouble. K-Street writes the laws after all... Keystone is one project which has drawn major criticism and has both grassroots political pressure as well as pressure from people on the Hill.

Bottom line-- There are many pipelines across the country that get built without any NIMBY protests and which come through the EIS process and get EPA approval. I don't see how you can call these "burdensome", with record profits and record sales and record amounts of leases in the US and abroad just how exactly is an ounce of prevention a bad thing?

On the one hand, I know what you're saying. On the other hand, I look at how all sorts of stuff has to go into long queues and spend a decade in the "engineering" phase (look at the potential timeline on the HSR lines around Atlanta), in no small part because of EIS reports...and getting around the parts of that process that can be gotten around proves hard when doing so often forgoes an 80-90% federal match,

 

[ALC Rail Writer]

Keystone also has energized the Native Rights movement, especially in Canada. Harper's been a regular Nixon and Keystone may very go down with him depending on how they kick him out after that election fraud bit...

As for Russia, those comrades don't have to deal with an EPA. The same goes for China. As they begin to catch up with the last half of the 20th Century one would expect many more of these projects which are cost a lot of money, resources, labor, blood, and carbon. Don't get me wrong an HSR project isn't the worst thing for the planet, but it is being built on the backs of the gas fields. Those of us concerned with the state of the environment, like me, see that Keystone and other projects will bring the same negative impacts here. Not only is our domestic land worth protecting we must compensate and lead in front of Russia and China in developing HSR and sustainable, clean energy. Carbon levels are locked for 30 years, so if we don't start turning down the dial on the burner soon we're gonna get burnt...

 

[jis]

Moscow to Kazan is sort of an equivalent of Boston to Washington DC. Kazan is also on the route to Yekaterinburg (which incidentally I flew over on the way to India in December ). Moscow to Yekaterinburg would be distance-wise equivalent to New York to Chicago.

I can see Moscow to St. Petersburg and Moscow to Kazan happening in relatively short order. One all the way to Yekaterinburg will take longer.

 

[Anderson]

I'm not seeing any evidence Harper is about to be slammed out of office. Yes, he's down in the polls, but a lot of that is down to the Libs having just elected a new leader who hasn't had much of a chance to screw up. Don't get me wrong, I want Harper gone...but I don't see him getting the boot just yet.

As to the Russian network and the future of it: I agree that St. Petersburg-Moscow-Kazan is a "realistic" portion of a system to look at, but let's not forget that the Russians are also throwing in for the Bering Strait Line (which from what I can tell has serious prospects for making money). Also, IIRC Russian Railways has wanted to invest in a more substantial network of mid-speed trains on top of the HSR network.

Finally, I'd point out that almost everything out there is built on something less pleasant. The Russians and Chinese at least have the sense to realize that "cheap" oil can't last forever (and in China's case, that they can't fit nearly enough cars for everyone on their roads).

 

[DET63]

My point about EIS's is not that they're good or bad per se, but rather that they are one part of a long bureaucratic process that takes years, sometimes decades, to complete--if it's ever completed at all. If someone seriously floated a proposal today to build a new HSR somewhere in the U.S., planners would probably still be working on the EIS in 2018, and might not even have started it before 2016.

 

[ALC Rail Writer]

My point about EIS's is not that they're good or bad per se, but rather that they are one part of a long bureaucratic process that takes years, sometimes decades, to complete--if it's ever completed at all. If someone seriously floated a proposal today to build a new HSR somewhere in the U.S., planners would probably still be working on the EIS in 2018, and might not even have started it before 2016.

Let me adjust your statement to make it true:

"My point about EIS's is not that they're good or bad per se, but rather that they are one part of a long bureaucratic process that can take years, sometimes decades, to complete--but is usually completed quickly with the help of greased political wheels."

 

[DET63]

Change usually to sometimes.

 

[Anderson]

I'd go for this version:
"My point about EIS's is not that they're good or bad per se, but rather that they are one part of a long bureaucratic process that can take years, sometimes decades, to complete--while it can be completed comparatively quickly with the help of greased political wheels, at the same time it can be used by opponents to put forward vexatious claims latching onto any excuse to stop the project."

 

[George Harris]

I'd go for this version:"My point about EIS's is not that they're good or bad per se, but rather that they are one part of a long bureaucratic process that can take years, sometimes decades, to complete--while it can be completed comparatively quickly with the help of greased political wheels, at the same time it can be used by opponents to put forward vexatious claims latching onto any excuse to stop the project."

This is more nearly right. My main problem with the whole EIS concept and process is that it is commonly prostituted by the opposition to delay or outright kill a project, frequently by focusing on the small to insignificant and ignoring the big picture.