It is a little known fact that at the narrowest point, the Bering Strait between Alaska and Russian Siberia is just 42 miles across. Also, unlike the English Channel, where complex geology and many geologic faults complicated tunneling, the Bering Strait has relatively uncomplicated geology that makes a tunnel feasible at relatively low cost using modern tunneling techniques, such as those pioneered in the Swiss Alps. A relatively shallow depth means that ventilation issued could be solved by many means, for example, by two artificial islands.
With a rail tunnel under the Bering Straits and a railroad line from Calgary to Vladivostok, it would be possible to ship rail freight from North America to the Chinese/Korean frontier in three days and on to Europe in seven days using the trans-Siberian railroad. Such a rail tunnel would revolutionize global logistics, greatly reducing the need for ocean-borne freight, which is the source of much of the global pollution of oceans. It would also offer more dependable and lower cost freight options and open up the Russian territory east of Siberia, with all of its tremendous untapped mineral resources, to economic exploitation.
The construction of such a railroad and tunnel system would be a major boost to the worldwide economy, and greatly increase the availability of oil, precious minerals and industrial minerals which are currently in shorter supply than in previous decades. Construction of such a railroad and tunnel system should be undertaken to boost global economic activity, especially during a period of economic slow growth, such as we are now experiencing.
All technical challenges to such a project can be overcome. For example, the rails can be heated using technology developed in Canada to keep the temperature of rails from falling too low, which would otherwise lead to train wrecks. Financing of the proposed rail network could be undertaken by a combination of U.S., EU and Asian capital and a land grant by the Russian government, similar to that which opened up the U.S. West during the construction of the trans-continental railroads, where every other square mile for some hundreds of miles north and south of the railroad was granted to the railroad company as an incentive to fund the project.
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This idea was first proposed in the early 90s, when it was thought the collapse of Communism in the Soviet Union would make it politically feasible. I think the technological obstacles are much more formidable than this posting indicates. Though the tunneling itself may be easy, the extreme cold at the surface for most of the year presents major challenges for construction. Just building a rail connection from western Canada to and thru Alaska is a challenge, because of the very difficult terrain it would have to go thru. They briefly considered building a rail line to Alaska in the 1920s and abandoned the idea for that reason. They put the idea of a land connection to Alaska on hold for 20 years, then built the Alasky Highway during WW II. On the Russian side, though the terrain is slightly easier, they would have to build more than 1000 miles of new rail to connect with the existing rail system. Spending tens of billions on ANY rail system is very unpopular in the U.S. right now, whether done by private enterprise, the government, or both. I think I read a cost estimate of $40 billion for the entire project. I can't imagine the U.S., Canada, Russia, and private enterprise jointly spending that kind of money for something like this, no matter how great the potential economic benefits are. Even so, it might make sense to begin work on the first phase of this, that is, a rail connection from western Canada to central Alaska. This might make economic sense even if the rest of the project is never built.
A good idea, but it probably will not come off because of politics
The existing trans-Siberian railway runs to Vladivostok, only a short "ferry ride" to Japan, but I do not think this is much used for Japan - Europe freight. Possibly because for those huge distances sea transport is cheaper.
The S. Korean rail network does not connect to China or Russia, because N. Korea is "in the way" and the border to S. Korea is closed.
There is also a problem that Russian railways are a different track gauge to Europe.