RR To Alaska

Sawtooth500

The current expansion of the Alaska RR made me wonder - going back in history did anyone ever try to build a continuous line going to Alaska from Canada? If so, what was the story of that attempt?

This might be a good link to start on for the History angle of Railroading inAlaska:

History of the Tanana Valley Railroad:     http://www.fairnet.org/agencies/tvrr/history.html

Then The White Pass and Yukon RR: (wikipedia) :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Pass_and_Yukon_Route

Then here is the ARR Website (Home): http://alaskarailroad.com/ 

 Check  this link for projects effecting ARR:

 http://www.alaskarailroad.com/corporate/CapitalProjects/Studies/tabid/490/Default.aspx

And at the bottom of that page you'll find a set of links to the alaskacanadarail.com and its progress on connections to the Canadian and American systems:

http://www.alaskarailroad.com/corporate/CapitalProjects/Studies/tabid/490/Default.aspx

this link takes you to a map of the proposed system: (as do the links noted from the 'Projects' on ARR's site):http://alaskacanadarail.com/documents/Map_Page_ACRL.pdf

And if curiosity, and time permit. o to the "Community Search" option on the right of the page. There have been several threads in the past that have pretty thoroughly surveyed the thoughts and ideas of some who have posted here.

Enjoy!

 The British Columbia Railroad (At the time the Pacific Great Eastern) once started to build an extension to Dease Lake (In the far reaches of northern BC) as a prelude to a rail line to Alaska back in the 60s and 70s. This fell through and the line was abandoned before completion...I suppose the Alaska highway was enough.

I recall reading about a proposed monorail to China from the United States that would travel through the center of the Earth. I don't think it ever got built but then, I did read about it in "National Lampoon."

54light15

I recall reading about a proposed monorail to China from the United States that would travel through the center of the Earth. I don't think it ever got built but then, I did read about it in "National Lampoon."

samfp1943

The current expansion of the Alaska RR made me wonder - going back in history did anyone ever try to build a continuous line going to Alaska from Canada?

{Above asked by Sawtooth500}

I remember of seeing a photo either on this forum, or possibly in an issue of TRAINS back some ways.....It showed some views of a ROW certainly not finished, but with this thought in mind.

....if such a line would be built.....Especially up where it really gets cold, I wonder what season they would have to lay CWR to stay out of trouble...?

Modelcar

....if such a line would be built.....Especially up where it really gets cold, I wonder what season they would have to lay CWR to stay out of trouble...?

Quinten: Can't answer your question directly refering the use of rail on the Western side of Canada, but found this referencing the building of the Mary River Railroad in Baffinland,Canada:

Railway    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baffinland_Iron_Mine

FTL:"...The Corporation plans to construct a railroad line to transport the ore to a port for transhipment.^[4] Two routes were considered.^[3] Initially a 100 kilometre route to Milne Inlet on Baffin Island's North Shore was preferred. However a 149 kilometre route to Steensby Inlet on the South Shore was chosen because it is ice-free for a longer portion of the year.

[edit] Railbed

Construction of the rail line is planned to begin in 2010.^[4] Because Baffin Island's soil is permafrost, the route was chosen so it lies on rock, gravel, or large-grained sand as much as possible. Fine-grained sand and clay soils pose more of a heaving problem when the surface layer annually thaws and freezes. The route will five multi-span bridges totalling 1400 metres in length. Two tunnels 800 meters and 250 meters will be required. The tunnels will have to be lined and insulated to make sure waste heat from the trains doesn't melt the permafrost surrounding the tunnel. The route detours around large areas of poorly drained glacial deposits and areas likely to contain deposits of fossil ice.

It is planned to use older carbon steel alloys for the rails, instead of more modern, higher performance alloys, because they can become brittle at very low temperatures.^[4] The rails and bridges are designed for fifty years of active service.

[edit] Rolling stock

The corporation plans to purchase three train sets, each containing 64 hopper cars, which will each make two round trips per day.^[4] The Railway Gazette reported in July 2008 that EMD SD70 and GE Dash-9 were candidates for the lines' locomotives. A personnel train would run several times per week.."

As noted in my previous post on this project. There has been quite a bit of interest and studies don at the behest of Canadian Government entities and the University of Alaska and the Alaska Railroad Corporation.

They are actually in Phase one of the first Cycle to build an extention from North Pole,Ak to Delta Jct to service the Military Bases at that area. Total new railroad construction on that Project is about 88 miles.

This link is  to the overall map of the various route and connections proposed and studied to link Alaska to the Rail systems of Both Canada and the US .ttp://alaskacanadarail.com/documents/Map_Page_ACRL.pdf

The following is a link to the Alaska Canada Rail Link Project. The Feasibility Report and The Alternate Route Segment Assessment- ( Work Package B1(g) ).

http://alaskacanadarail.com/documents/WPB1/B1g%20AlternateRouteSegmentAssessment-Yukon&BC-FinalReport-RevisionJune2006_060609.pdf

Back in January, we thrashed this topic around then and the consensus seemed to be at that time that it was not goingt to happen.  The mention was made of a lot of minerals being discovered in the Artic Regions and how they needed ways out to their consumers. Oil Drilling, Gold and Diamonds . The gold and diamonds are comodities that do not require lots of heavy transport, but pipelines require infrastructure to get their supplies in and they apparently have also be some sizable coal reserves identified as well. 

[The CN Currently has a rail yard in Hay River west of Yellowknife, In The Canadian Province of NWT.]

Admittedly, that is pretty far East to have any bearing on the potential for rail construction that would effect the proposed service into Alaska.                 The fact that the ARRC has funded and is moving ahead with the construction to Delta Jct. Which appears to be a key point in the Proposed Project to connect Alaska by land with a railroad to the Lower 48 via Canada, would seem to give creedence to the potential for more rail construction in Northwestern Canada and linking up to the ARR and WP&Y RR  an eventuality. 

Back in the late 1960's/ early 1970's when the 800-mile long Alyeska oil pipeline was being considered from the North Slope to Valdez, John Kneiling advocated hauling the oil instead by special purpose integral tank trains that would have been around 10 miles loing each.  In his (and others') view then, the natural market for that oil was the US Midwest and NorthEast, so a new rail line would have been required all the way from the North Slope to a connection with one of the Canadian systems to get there.  He claimed that with the projected volume and compared to the cost of the pipeline and tank-ship transport and loading/ unloading, etc., it would have been cost-competitive, but I don't recall seeing even 'back of the envelope' level figures to support that assertion.

Quentin/ modelcar - I believe the photo you have in mind is from a mid-1980's Trains article on the failed BCR extensions to the north, and / or another article from the same time frame titled something like "Mixed Train to Alaska".

Laying the CWR would not be significantly worse than anyplace else in western Canada where it gets really cold in the winter.  Pull-aparts can still occur, but the real hazards are the sun kinks, and those occur when the rail is inadequately anchored and/ or laid at too cool of a temperature compared to the desired 'neutral' temeprature for that territory.  So you wouldn't want to do it in the dead of winter - not that you would anyway - because it would be impractical to heat the rail up to the neutral temperature, which is probably in the 90-degree Fahrenheit range.  But you could do it just fine in late spring and early fall - the rail can get much warmer from sun heating than just the air temperature, and there is also propane-fired rail-heating equipment to assist with that.  In summer, early morning would be good, until the rail gets too hot. 

Actually, the weak subgrade of the muskeg-type stuff would be more of a challenge than the cold for the CWR .  Almost all accounts of building the Alaska Highway and the pipeline refer to the seemingly bottomless pits of that stuff and the extraordinary lengths that the construction crews had to go to in order to overcome it . . .  

- Paul North.

Paul_D_North_Jr

Quentin/ modelcar - I believe the photo you have in mind is from a mid-1980's Trains article on the failed BCR extensions to the north, and / or another article from the same time frame titled something like "Mixed Train to Alaska".

Yes, those do sound familiar, and the time frame possibly in the bracket.

I believe the US has a air base at Diego Garcia....such a line would simplify the logistics of supplying the base.

I'm sure that a curveof some sort could be made somewhere on the line if it was to serve the China/US travel market. Aren't there all these brainy science guys that could figure it out? Aren't monorails the way of the future? Speaking of which, where the hell is the helicopter I could keep in my garage? Wasn't I promised one back in 1960? Well?

54light15

 Speaking of which, where the hell is the helicopter I could keep in my garage? Wasn't I promised one back in 1960? Well?

"Aerocar" was the word of the day back then. It was designed to fly and use the highways. Unfortunately, it never did either.

 I heard they might run it through Port Aspestose. Lots of handy people in that town.

Sawtooth500

 

While we're at it, how about that bridge across the bearing strait I keep occasionally hearing about? :)

  http://cs.trains.com/trccs/forums/p/32256/414619.aspx#414619  

The above thread is from March 2005......  Go to Community Search and enter Bering Strait.

This is another Topic that get resurected   when the Summer doldrumds hit..  Community Search will lead you down a pretty good Thread about this topic.  Interesting, but time consuming.

In the 1960s the experts were telling us that we would have electric cars and videos phones in 10 years.

In the 1970s they said the oil would run out in 15 years and that the air pollution would block the sun and bring on a new Ice Age.

Plus the usual predictions of world wide famine just around the corner that have been issued since the 1960s.

Sawtooth500

While we're at it, how about that bridge across the bearing strait I keep occasionally hearing about? :)

Current studies favor a tunnel under the Strait. Recently a Russian Billionaire claimed he was going to build it in the next few years....I was going to buy stock in the project but I sunk all my capital in purchasing this Bridge in Brooklyn..

Paul_D_North_Jr

Back in the late 1960's/ early 1970's when the 800-mile long Alyeska oil pipeline was being considered from the North Slope to Valdez, John Kneiling advocated hauling the oil instead by special purpose integral tank trains that would have been around 10 miles loing each.  In his (and others') view then, the natural market for that oil was the US Midwest and NorthEast, so a new rail line would have been required all the way from the North Slope to a connection with one of the Canadian systems to get there.  He claimed that with the projected volume and compared to the cost of the pipeline and tank-ship transport and loading/ unloading, etc., it would have been cost-competitive, but I don't recall seeing even 'back of the envelope' level figures to support that assertion.

Quentin/ modelcar - I believe the photo you have in mind is from a mid-1980's Trains article on the failed BCR extensions to the north, and / or another article from the same time frame titled something like "Mixed Train to Alaska".

Laying the CWR would not be significantly worse than anyplace else in western Canada where it gets really cold in the winter.  Pull-aparts can still occur, but the real hazards are the sun kinks, and those occur when the rail is inadequately anchored and/ or laid at too cool of a temperature compared to the desired 'neutral' temeprature for that territory.  So you wouldn't want to do it in the dead of winter - not that you would anyway - because it would be impractical to heat the rail up to the neutral temperature, which is probably in the 90-degree Fahrenheit range.  But you could do it just fine in late spring and early fall - the rail can get much warmer from sun heating than just the air temperature, and there is also propane-fired rail-heating equipment to assist with that.  In summer, early morning would be good, until the rail gets too hot. 

Actually, the weak subgrade of the muskeg-type stuff would be more of a challenge than the cold for the CWR .  Almost all accounts of building the Alaska Highway and the pipeline refer to the seemingly bottomless pits of that stuff and the extraordinary lengths that the construction crews had to go to in order to overcome it . . .  

- Paul North.

Anyway, one of the railroad engineering consulting firms of the day, A.T. Kearney I think, did put together a proposal for a rail line.  The northern terminal would be placed at the head of navagation of the MacKensie river, with storage at the terminal to supply trains when the river was closed for the season.  As I recall, barge/rail service was proposed to eliminate much of the requirement to build over perma-frost that would be necessary for an all rail route.  As you probably know, building something over perma-frost requires a foundation structure that keeps the sub-soil frozen.  Optionally, one can let the structure just sink out of sight in the muck.

The trains would have consisted of convential jumbo tank cars of a 100 tons net, maybe with 100 car trains.  Remember that this was before the time of DPU's.  The trains would be loaded in motion on a loop track using a rotating carousel loading rack.  I don't recall the southern terminal, and I am not sure if the plan was to move the train past the southern point on existing lines or offload to existing pipelines.

I believe the study had construction and operating numbers better than those for the Alyeska pipeline, but construction of the rail line would take several years longer, perhaps a decade more than the pipeline.

As much as anything else, given that petroleum business types always think pipeline, the train proposal didn't get much traction.

jeaton

Paul_D_North_Jr

Back in the late 1960's/ early 1970's when the 800-mile long Alyeska oil pipeline was being considered from the North Slope to Valdez, John Kneiling advocated hauling the oil instead by special purpose integral tank trains that would have been around 10 miles loing each. [ snip] 

1

10 Mile long trains?  I assume John had a design for high-strength drawbars.  Kneiling had many interesting concepts.  Problem was that few of the assertions that the economics were there held up to real world cost analysis. [snip]

John was an early advocate of what we now call "distributed power" to overcome that limitation, same as is done now.  Only he would have used blocks of cars, each with its own set of locomotives and fuel tenders, as well as a version of a "slug" - powered motor trucks under the next car or two - adjacent to the locomotives.  Control would have been by a train wire, instead of analog radio - the Locotrol of the day.  You could look it up . . .

I didn't know about the A. T. Kearney proposal, but it all seems plausible except for the carousel loading part.  Further, if that proposal had workable economics, then John's scheme might have had merit, too.

But all this was not only before DPUs, it was before the Tank Train, the "oil cans", ethanol unit trains, the Staggers Act, and many other game-changers and multiple actual demonstrations and performance of what railroad technology can do to haul petroleum products in large quantties for long distances.  At that time, it was just speculation, and the railroads really weren't that credible, either technologically or from a management or business perspective, so I agree with your last sentence, too.

- Paul North.

Paul_D_North_Jr

jeaton

Paul_D_North_Jr

Back in the late 1960's/ early 1970's when the 800-mile long Alyeska oil pipeline was being considered from the North Slope to Valdez, John Kneiling advocated hauling the oil instead by special purpose integral tank trains that would have been around 10 miles loing each. [ snip] 

1

10 Mile long trains?  I assume John had a design for high-strength drawbars.  Kneiling had many interesting concepts.  Problem was that few of the assertions that the economics were there held up to real world cost analysis. [snip]

John was an early advocate of what we now call "distributed power" to overcome that limitation, same as is done now.  Only he would have used blocks of cars, each with its own set of locomotives and fuel tenders, as well as a version of a "slug" - powered motor trucks under the next car or two - adjacent to the locomotives.  Control would have been by a train wire, instead of analog radio - the Locotrol of the day.  You could look it up . . .

I didn't know about the A. T. Kearney proposal, but it all seems plausible except for the carousel loading part.  Further, if that proposal had workable economics, then John's scheme might have had merit, too.

But all this was not only before DPUs, it was before the Tank Train, the "oil cans", ethanol unit trains, the Staggers Act, and many other game-changers and multiple actual demonstrations and performance of what railroad technology can do to haul petroleum products in large quantties for long distances.  At that time, it was just speculation, and the railroads really weren't that credible, either technologically or from a management or business perspective, so I agree with your last sentence, too.

- Paul North.

 He makes reference to the technology in his book when he discusses how the first generation integral train would operate using existing locomotives and cars and DPU systems. It's interesting that that form of unit train has, in fact, become the industry standard ,so he was prophetic..

There is an good article in the September issue of TRAINS recounting the early employment of DPU..

RR to Alaska? and where would this railway come from? if it was to come from the United States,, it seems there is the 2nd largest country in the world between the U.S. and Alaska, called Canada. What would  be the benefit of allowing a railway to cross it's country, Canada has no truck with Alaska and is trying to establish relations with Asia. Maybe you mean a railway to Alaska across the Bering Strait from Russia?

Norm48327

54light15

 Speaking of which, where the hell is the helicopter I could keep in my garage? Wasn't I promised one back in 1960? Well?

 

"Aerocar" was the word of the day back then. It was designed to fly and use the highways. Unfortunately, it never did either.

tatans

RR to Alaska? and where would this railway come from? if it was to come from the United States,, it seems there is the 2nd largest country in the world between the U.S. and Alaska, called Canada. What would  be the benefit of allowing a railway to cross it's country, Canada has no truck with Alaska and is trying to establish relations with Asia. Maybe you mean a railway to Alaska across the Bering Strait from Russia?

To run a RR from the US thru Canada thru Alaska to under the Bearing Straights thru Russia to connect with the Trans Siberian RR and China's rail system would take how much capital? (maybe over $100B?). How could that much capital invested ever make a return on investment? For example to carrry the present (2010) container traffic would take at least a double track facility (even with DP probably controlled by a hard wiring vs radio) the whole way with triple track in locations that have a ruling grade over a certain amount (1-1/2%?). I ask that question because UP & BNSF transcons each already need a double track main.

Then connections would have to be improved in SE Asia for all those locations that now uses ships.  Now would it take less fuel (if diesel locomotivess used) by ship or train? 

The FRA would have to change crew rest rules in Alaska (maybe have crews on a crew car like Australia?) because the establishment of villages and crew rest locations is problematic. In fact construction towns and maintenance bases in Alaska????

There were several flying cars over the years. In the thirties was the Waterman Arrowbile, in the fifities there was a flying car maybe called the Aerocar. There was a fifties-vintage flying car at the Meadowbrook classic car show last August; I don't recall the make but it might have been an Aerocar.  I was told that it did fly and was first owned by Bob Cummings. In the seventies there was a flying Ford Pinto that used the wings of a Cessna Skymaster and its rear-mounted engine. This flew on a test flight that actually was successful until the pilot tried to fly directly to China (or Diego Garcia.) They were going to give him an award for his achievment once they scraped him off the runway.  

I was always wondering why they did not build the ALCAN RR instead of the ALCAN highway.

spikejones52002

I was always wondering why they did not build the ALCAN RR instead of the ALCAN highway.

Time was a major factor and priorities for strategic materials may have been another.

The justification apparently is to reach a distant destination. Little has been said about what is between someplace and the destination.  Are there other resources along the way that could be developed to make it pay? Homesteading muskeg does not appear an option. 

 How about a flying train? Now that would solve all of our problems.