'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎80] (111/714)

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PERSIA
Extensions
of the
Trans-
caspian
Railway
again be heard of till forward operations are contemplated. On
the other hand, the extension from the present terminus at
Samarkand to Tashkent, which I previously predicted as
probable, has emerged into clearer perspective; and
General Annenkoff hoped to be able to start work upon
it in Mav 1890. 1 It has since been announced that
the Czar has given his approval to the scheme drawn up by a
special commission for the great Siberian "Railway, debouching upon
the Pacific at Vladivostock, which is to be 4,785 miles in length,
to occupy ten years in construction, and to cost a sum variously
estimated at from twenty-five to forty millions sterling. 2 Should the
scheme be carried out, it cannot be long before the Transcaspian
Railway, prolonged by then to Tashkent, will be carried forward
till it joins the Siberian trunk line and completes the circle with
European Russia. The point of junction is said to have been fixed
at Omsk. In Transcaspia itself a branch line is talked of from
Karibent on the Tejend to Sarakhs. This would take Russia
eighty miles nearer to Herat.
Casting our eyes back upon Europe, where the Caucasian rail
way system is the indispensable corollary and complement of the
Transcaspian Railway, we find that after many delays the
European Vladikavkas-Petrofsk line is said once again to have
extensions rece jy e( j tl ie Imperial sanction ; 3 although other voices
are heard recommending a junction with the Central Russian lines
1 Captain A. C. Yate, the latest English traveller on the Transcaspian Railway
{October 1890), informs me that there is now an idea of continuing the line from
Samarkand to Khokand, so as to avoid the expense of bridging the Syr Daria.
2 After a protracted controversy between the rival schemes of a combined rail
and waterway, and a continuous railway, the latter was decided upon in March
1891. The line will run from Zlatoust, the present terminus of the Samara-Ufa
line to the mining districts of Miask and Cheliabinsk (84 miles); thence via
Tukalinsk, Kaensk, Mariensk, Krasnoiarsk, and Kansk, to Nijni Udinsk (1,736
miles), the estimated cost of this section being 11,807,500Z. or 6,5001. a mile.
Thence the line will run via Uchtuskaia, Irkutsk, S. Baikal, Sretensk, and
Habarovka, to Yladivostock, (2,965 miles.) Total length, l.TSS miles ; total esti
mated cost, 36,765,000/., or an average of 7,680Z. a mile. Work has been com
menced at both extremities; and a few versts of rails were hurriedly laid at
Vladivostock to enable the Czarevitch to perform the opening ceremony in the
summer of 1891.
3 This line would be 160 miles long, and would, it is estimated, cost 1,200,000/.
In the Russian Financial Estimates for 1891, a sum of 100,000/. is allotted for the
preliminary expenses of construction. From Petrofsk to Baku, a further ex
tension, 220 miles in length, is also discussed.