RUSSIAN RAILWAY CONSTRUCTION FOR 1886.

New Zealand Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 7775, 6 May 1886, Page 4

RUSSIAN RAILWAY CONSTRUCTION FOR 1886.

The period of stagnation in railway oonstrnotion in Russia, which prevailed from the close of the Turkish war until last year, is being followed by considerable enterprise and activity. Two of the lines sanctioned and already commenced are of special importance. The first is the railway from Askabad to the Oxus via Merv, about 400 miles long, which will penetrate to the heart of Central Asia, and enable one to go by steam across Europe _ to the very Afghan frontier. The second is a line from Samara to Ufa, 303 miles, and an extension beyond, across t}»e Ural Mountains 200 miles, tp pne of the stations on the Ekaterinburg Railway. This line, although likely to occasion less political interest than the other, is yet of particular importance, because it will be the trunk line to Siberia, The locomotive has already, it is true, entered the Asiatic dependency of Russia ; but the line starts from Perm, and between Perm and Nijni-Novgo-rod there is a gap of many hundred miles, at present not likely to be closed, the inoonvenenoe of which is minimised in summer by steamers running by a roundabout route

between the two places. By the new line, however, the traveller arriving at Samara on the Volga from Western Europe, without having once quitted the railway, will be carried on straight to Ufa, at the foot of the Urals, and thence over those mountains, or rather hills, into Siberia between Ekaterinburg and Tiumin. The railway will traverse a wonderfully rich agricultural and pastoral country, and connect the iron district of the Urals with the waterway of the River Volga. A grant of £1,000,000 sterling has already been assigned for the line. A third railway, to which we have already called attention in these columns, runs from Novorossisk to Petrovsk, connecting the Black Sea and Caspian north of the Caucasus. This was commenced last year, and will be completed this. The rest of the railway undertakings sanctioned are chiefly branches. The GomelBriansk will he 173 miles long, the grant sanctioned £BIO,OOO ; the Romno-Krement-chong, 130 miles, grant £400,000 ; the Brest-Kholmsk. 70 miles, grant £410,000 ; the Baranovitcui-Bailostock, 130 miles, grant £273,000; and the Siedlitz-Malkenak, 42 miles, grant £233,000. The whole of these lines are to be supplied exclusively with steel rail, and iron bridges, &c., of Russjan manufacture ; a clause to that effect being inserted in all the contracts by the Minister of Railways.—Engineering.