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History of the Trans Siberian raiload. Transsib.

TRANS SIBERIAN RAILROAD

HISTORY OF THE TRANS SIBERIAN

Some people think that Transsib means the way that connects Ural with Far East and goes through Siberia (Trans-Siberian). But in reality it's different the contradiction comes from the name that English travelers gave to it - "Trans-Siberian Railway" instead of "Great Siberian Way" (this would be the literal translation from Russian) but then this name have rooted in Russian language.

And now the term Transsib means the way, that connects Center and Pacific Ocean, Moscow and Vladivostok and in broader meaning - ports of West with Russian capital and ways to Europe (Moscow, Saint Petersburg, Brest, Kaliningrad) with ports of the East and ways to Asia. Transsib - is the road that gave an impulse to the settling and developing of eastern areas of Russia and involvement of them into economy of the other part of great country.

Nowadays Jaroslavskiy train station in Moscow is Transsib's starting point and a final point of the way is Vladivostok train station. But not always it was so. Before the middle of 20s the main gate to Siberia and Far East was Kazanskiy train station and at very beginning of Transsib (beginning of 20th century) Kursko-Nizhegorodskiy (nowadays Kurskiy) train station of Moscow. It's also important to mention that before the October revolution Moscow train station of Saint Petersburg, which was a capital of Russian Empire in that time was considered to be the starting of the Great Siberian Way. Also Vladivostok not always was considered to be the final point, for some time (from 90's of 19th century till the crucial land battles of Russian-Japanese war in 1904-1905), contemporaries considered naval fortress and town of Port Arthur, which is located on on the shore of East-Chinese Sea on the Lao Dun peninnsula, rented by Russian Empire from China to be the end of the Great Road.

Grand laying took place at 19th of May 1891 near Vladivostok and was attended by prince Nikolay Aleksandrovitch (Emperor Nikolay The Second in a future).

But actually construction started a little bit earlier in the beginning of March 1891 with building of the railway from Miass to Chelyabinsk.

The regular communications between the Empire's capital - Saint-Petersburg and Pacific ports - Vladivostok and Dalniy by the railroad was established in July 1903 when East Chinese railway that comes through Manchuria was pu to operation and began to function routinely. But still there was a break in a railway. Trains were transported through the Baikal Like by the special ferry boat.

The continued railway between Saint Petersburg and Vladivostok appeared after the finishing of Circum-Baikal railway construction (18th September of 1904). A year after it was put in regular operation as a part of The Great Siberian Way. And regular passenger trains for a first time in history have go an ability to follow rails from Atlantic (Western Europe) to Pacific ocean (Vladivostok) without using of any ferry crossings.

The final step in history of Transsib's construction was putting in the operation the bridge over Amur river near Khabarovsk and beginning of train communication over the Amur.