The project of a direct railway corridor between Russia and Japan will require budgetary funding of no less than 75% of the total costs, Russian Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov said, TASS reports. “As for bringing in the off-budget investment, a preview modeling of the project has shown it won’t be workable if budgetary funding covers less than 75% of the costs and even then the investments will pay back with much difficulty and there’ll be a need for support all the same,” he explained.
He added that it was too early yet to specify the cost of the project but private investment might cover one-fourth of it at the very best. “A number of proposals have already been made and construction of a bridge or tunnel with a length of over 40 km is possible but first we must ensure a reliable transport link between (the Isle of) Sakhalin and mainland Russia and this will require an overhaul of several hundred kilometers of railway lines,” he further said.
To get down to the implementation of the momentous project, it was also important to assess the prospective size of the transit cargo flows between Europe and Japan via Russia, Sokolov said.
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