Projects for the construction of railways between the Volga and the Don in 1930-1950s

The article is devoted to the connection of the Volga and Don rivers with railways in the place of greatest convergence (Perevoloka) in the 1830-1850s. During this period Perevoloka has become a transport corridor of national significance, through which the main stream of the industrial and forest products was transferred from Central Russia and the Urals to the South of the country - the sea of Azov and the North Caucasus. The article discusses the project of A. Bestuzhev 1834, who bore the form of the most General propositions about the need to build such road. Due to the lack of specifics, the project was not approved by the officials of the Main Department of Railways and public buildings. The next project was a note by an unknown author, dating from about 1837. It contained detailed calculations of the amounts needed for the construction of two ways - on a railway-horse road and steam-powered road, as well as justification of the railway route between Dubovka suburb on the Volga river and the Kachalinskaya-on-Don village. This railway-horse road was built by the same name joint stock company in 1846, however, could not compete with horse-drawn transport. After the Crimean war, the proposal on connecting the Volga and Don railway was made by Baron A. Meyendorff, captain of Kassel company, engineer Joffry, mechanical engineer Davison, the Italian Consul in Taganrog de Rossi, but their proposals did not satisfy the government. Permission to conduct the survey was received in 1856 by Alexander Derevitsky and count N.I. Musin-Pushkin, but soon lost the rights to the project of company of N. Novosel, V. A. Kokorev and P.P. Melnikov. This joint stock company built the first Volga-Don railway in the South of Russia.