Rivers of course have limits cause they don’t go everywhere. Railroads can go more places than rivers go. Railroads, however, are a lot more expensive to build. You don’t have to build rivers.

Methinks the authors probably meant to specificy that railroads are the most efficient/economical method of LAND transportation, which is true. They are not, however, nearly as flexible as trucks.

All that said, the Bering Strait Connection (whether by bridge, tunnel, or combination) is a long way off, precisely because for all practical purposes, it’s a connection between Nowhere and Nowhereski.

Without looking at exactly what the Russki’s are planning, my guess is they are going to be significantly improving their infrastracture through Siberia to tap the natural resources, and simply shipping the resources to Japan and North America from Eastern Pacific ports and running ‘em by rail to China.

If there were enough freight to move that way, you would move it south in Russia to a year-round port or spend a few hundred million to make a more northern port usable all year. Then you would load the freight to ships for the west coast of the U.S. It would be far less costly in terms of both initial capital and ongoing expense.

If there were enough freight to move in either direction and it made economic sense, it would already be moving.

Not only is this idea nonsensical from an economic development and investment standpoint,it is probably just plain false. Is it possible that the Russian government “greenlighted” this project without having high level meetings and some sort of agreement with the U.S., Canada and Alaska? Since no one has heard of those meetings, the odds are that some one made this up whole cloth.