A remnant of the Last Ice Age, the strait between Alaska and the Russian Far East is thought to have been a land-bridge for late Palaeolithic human trans-migrations, from the Old World to the New, perhaps dating to 85,000 years ago. (See AMERICAN INDIAN — An Overview on the Ascension University CMS)
Over the past 150 years, at least one Russian czar and several American entrepreneurs have devised plans for linking the continents. William Gilpin (1813-1893), first Governor of the Territory of Colorado, proposed a rail link as early as 1849. Gilpin’s Isothermal Axis Theory is still used in the study of geopolitics. The idea at that time was to link the rail networks of the Americas, Asia and Europe.
In the late 1890s, E.H. Harriman of the Union Pacific Railroad envisaged a similar concept. The Trans-Siberian Railroad had recently been completed (c. 1900; 1903). Harriman’s vision included an 800-mile rail corridor from Alaska’s Cook Inlet to Cape Prince of Wales, where a rail-ferry crossing was also planned. “The Harriman Plan” was shelved due to the advent of the Russo-Japan War of 1904-05.
In 1942, the Bering crossing was resurrected as the ‘Delano initiative’ to provide matèrial to the USA’s then allies – the Russians. A rail corridor was surveyed (not for the first time) by the Army Corps of Engineers all the way along the Rocky Mountains trench as far as the Bering Strait region.
An intermodal East-West trade corridor evolved in the interim. The rail networks of North America and Siberia are now effectively linked by the shipping lanes between Seattle and Vladivostock.
In 1992, The Interhemispheric Bering Strait Tunnel & Railroad Group (IBSTRG) was formed to revisit the notion of a fixed transport link across the strait.
Aevia — Consider the Source (Slideshow)