For a long write up with more data and some reasons for it:
https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:ql4ykel4bgsqzslwsa3lflh2/post/3lcdewkbmf22w
Keep in mind Russia is a massive country and trains are amazing at transporting freight over long distances. So they have a lot of regions and industries depending on the railroad. Much more so then in most other countries. Some places can hardly be reached by road, but can be reached on train.
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Can’t run trains without bearings for the train wheels and nearly all of those kinds of bearings are made in the west.
Obviously the “4 days from collapse” in that article was exaggerated but the lack of maintenance parts, like bearings, is obviously taking its toll on the Russian train system.
Oh and China can’t make good ones either. They found that out the hard way when they screwed Germany.
Bit of additional information, train wheels use double tapered roller bearings, not ball bearings. They’re notably much harder to produce in good quality
Yeah, I kind of confused the two. The problem is mostly in the ball bearings but the races they go in also require tight tolerances and metal hardness that 2nd rate manufacturers can’t really match.
Yeah, they’re basically the alternate reality where cars never replaced trains even a little. Which is really cool honestly, I’d love to visit as soon as they stop being fascistoid dickheads.
We’ll see how their grip on Syria slipping and their currency giving out while they get a favourable US administration at the same time plays out.
I’d love to visit as soon as they stop being fascistoid dickheads.
I went in 2010-ish, which is pre 2079 and post-ww2, so they were definitely dickheads, but both central Moscow, central Saint Petersburg and WAY fucking far outside of the cities is absolutely beautiful.
Lets be honest, they (or at least the people with power) were dickheads before and during too. It’s just that pretty much anyone looks good put next to the Nazis.
The 80s it is then, I guess. Hopefully my vision is still good enough to appreciate it.
They have a huge swath of land that to drive it by truck would make US longhaul trucking look like a piece of cake.
The Far East needs infrasfructure if they are going to be sending stuff in the St. Petersburg and Moscow direction. Otherwise they will only ever have one or two real buyers of their products, China and North Korea.
A train only needs one crew of 2 or 3 in transit, to carry the same load as 100 truck driver crews. So the fact that they are letting their railroads rot is going to bite them in the ass 100-fold if they think over-the-road freight is going to replace it.
Not just the Far East, Moscow is no longer able to receive containers via train:
This data doesn’t really make sense… Unless it’s missing data from December for all years and most of the drop happens then, none of the year ends match the following year’s beginning.
But why were the Decembers cut off? Those seem to be the most interesting months…
It looks like they average the daily load for each month. There is only one data point per month. So each January has a lower average daily load than the previous December. The data isn’t continuous but the lines connecting the points make it seem like it is. It’s a poor graphic and should use dots or bars for each data point to be more clear.
But why were the Decembers cut off?
Because the the December 2024 numbers aren’t available yet so they did a YTD comparison of January through November for each year. It’s a fair comparison.
The 2024 line already ends earlier than the others, in November.
Looks good. What you are seeing for 2024 is a clear increased level of traffic, because Russian production is going up.
Saying otherwise is a lie, and if you do that, you will go to jail.
Regards your local chief of propaganda.
