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A comment on Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020). Parent comment

Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by hef19898 on Monday April 05, 2021 @03:35PM (#26703555)
The gauge also changes between Spain and Italy. Changing containers between trains can be done at the border in roughly one hour for the whole train max, if memory serves well. The actual bottle neck is the number of rail lines crossing the border and not the gauge change. It does add cost and coordination effort, so it would be better without that.

Paperwork, for transit at least, doesn't seem to be a big headache along the new silk road. If you use specialist services to handle customs. And that should be the norm nowadays for international shippers and consignees anyway.

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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by burnte on Monday April 05, 2021 @03:59PM (#26703856)
> The gauge also changes between Spain and Italy.

So it changes in France? Or it changes where Italy and France meet? Or wher eFrance and Spain meet? Because Italy doesn't touch Spain.

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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by jcranmer on Monday April 05, 2021 @04:46PM (#26704487)
The gauge change is on the France/Spain border. Spain and Portugal use a different gauge from the rest of Europe.
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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by Scoundreller on Monday April 05, 2021 @05:24PM (#26704908)
Had to look this up, but the high-speed rail network in Portugal/Spain runs on standard gauge, so trips to France weren't a problem.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Track_gauge_in_Spain

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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by jcranmer on Monday April 05, 2021 @05:29PM (#26704958)
As far as I'm aware, HSR everywhere in the world is 4'8½", even where the local rail gauge isn't (i.e., Spain and Japan). Rail Baltica is similarly planning a 4'8½" line despite local rail being 5'.
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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by bobthepanda on Monday April 05, 2021 @08:20PM (#26706455)
Velaro RUS are built to Russian gauge.
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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by Scoundreller on Monday April 05, 2021 @05:18PM (#26704856)
> If you use specialist services to handle customs.

Sounds like the "better use the guy that knows a guy" system.

If you try to do it yourself, suddenly every rule starts to apply.

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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by hef19898 on Tuesday April 06, 2021 @03:36AM (#26709123)
All the rules always apply for everyone. It just a lot faster working with a party that knows all the rules and runs the paper work on a daily basis. There is a reason customs agencies exist. And would always use one of those, and not do customs declarations myself. Unless of course, customs declarations are my business.
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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by hef19898 on Tuesday April 06, 2021 @03:33AM (#26709099)
France and Spain, obviously. And for freight.

As a famous soccer player once put it:

Madrid or Mailand doesn't matter as long as it's Italy.

The gauge actually changes on the Spanish side at dedicated transit terminals. One line coming down from the north, one meeting it, and running parallel, from the south.

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