Trans-Siberian Railway Similar to the First Transcontinental Railroad in the US, Russian engineers started construction at both ends and worked towards the centre. From Vladivostok the railway was laid north along the right bank of the Ussuri River to Khabarovsk at the Amur River, becoming the Ussuri Railway. In 1890, a bridge across the Ural River was built and the new railway entered Asia. The bridge across the Ob River was built in 1898 and the small city of Novonikolaevsk, founded in 1883, grew into the large Siberian city of Novosibirsk. In 1898 the first train reached Irkutsk and the shores of
Return of the Chinese Eastern Railway the Soviet Union would regain partial control of the China Eastern Railway in the same arrangement as the original Russian concession from 1896. The railway was to be jointly owned and operated by the Soviet Union and Republic of China. In addition, the Soviet Union would regain sovereign interest in the ports of Lüshun and Dalian, which were at the terminus of the southern branch of the Chinese Changchun Railway, the South Manchuria Railway. The Yalta Agreement stated: "The Chinese-Eastern Railroad and the South Manchuria Railroad, which provides an outlet to Dairen shall be jointly operated by the establishment of