Transcontinental Electric Trains

ELECTRIC TRACTION has recently replaced steam and diesel locomotives on the 3,300-mile railroad from Moscow to Irkutsk—about two-thirds of the transcontinental haul between the European and Asian parts of the Soviet Union. This trunk line links many industrial cities and farm regions. On its way to Lake Baikal it cuts through forest and steppe, semidesert and taiga country. It crosses the Ural range and passes by the spurs of the Sayan Mountains. It spans some of the largest Russian rivers—the Volga and Irtysh, the Ob and the Yenisei.

To convert the railroad, hundreds of electric substations had to be built, thousands of miles of cable laid and millions of feet of contact wire strung between gray-green concrete support poles. Even for the Soviet Union with its numerous large-scale construction projects this was a big job, especially since it was all done without interrupting the usual train traffic. The construction men joked about working "right under and over the wheels."

Trace the Moscow-Irkutsk run on a railroad map of the Soviet Union and you'll see the reason for this immense conversion project. From the nation's capital eastward, you have a radiating beam of track, but at the Urals and in Siberia the beam narrows. Beyond Novosibirsk there is only one thread of track that stretches to Lake Baikal and on to the Pacific.

This single thread of road was sufficient to handle the traffic of prerevolutionary Russia. But it comes nowhere near meeting freight and passenger needs today, in spite of a very considerable development of highway, river and air transport. Hundreds of new industrial and agricultural centers new dot parts of the map that were blank at the turn of the century.

The many times multiplied volume of traffic must have additional carriers between the center of the country and the Urals, between the Urals and Siberia, and between Siberia and the Far East. In addition

Hauling freight on the Moscow-Irkutsk trunk line, the world's longest electrified railway — 3,300 miles between the European and Asian parts of the Soviet Union. At the right is a control panel for this automated and telemetered line.

there is the growing freight and passenger traffic between the Soviet Union and China, Korea, Mongolia and other countries in Asia. These are two of the reasons for congestion on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, especially on the section between Omsk and Irkutsk.

The electrification of the Moscow-Irkutsk railroad is more profitable than the construction of a parallel line for steam and diesel locomotives. The change-over to electric traction has already tripled traffic capacity on many sections of the Trans-Siberian Railroad. Climate is an important factor here. Steam locomotives are very sensitive to the bitter Siberian winter, while electric locomotives run better at low temperatures since their motors do not overheat.

Here is a typical example. The section between Krasnoyarsk and Kacha has many steep grades and sharp turns. Even a powerful steam locomotive can barely pull a train of 1,400 metric tons on the stretch. A diesel locomotive can pull a 3,000-ton train, but on long upgrades it will do no more than ten miles an hour. The section is now electrified, and 5,500 horsepower electric locomotives have no trouble pulling 3,000-ton trains; the speed on steep grades is 30 miles an hour and better.

Another example. The Omsk section carried the country's heaviest traffic and was very congested. Now, with electric traction, the line moves more freight than any other road anywhere, and without the slightest delay.

The cost of the conversion job for the Moscow-Irkutsk road is estimated at about 350 million rubles, as figured in terms of the new ruble. Electrification will more than pay for itself. The estimate is that operational economies from electric traction during the current seven-year plan period ending in 1965 will amount to three billion rubles.

1