Trans-Siberian Railway one side of the lake to the other until the completion of the Lake Baikal spur along the southern edge of the lake. With the Amur River Line north of the Chinese border being completed in 1916, there was a continuous railway from Petrograd to Vladivostok that remains to this day the world's longest railway line. Electrification of the line, begun in 1929 and completed in 2002, allowed a doubling of train weights to 6,000 tonnes. There were expectations upon electrification that it would increase rail traffic on the line by 40 percent. The additional Chinese Eastern Railway was constructed
Far Eastern Railway footing in a very short period of time and began supplying the Eastern Front with military equipment, ammunition, and provisions. The railway management provided frontline railroads with staff, rolling stock, spare parts, and materials. Also, the Far Eastern Railway played an important role in assisting the Soviet Army in defeating the Imperial Japanese Army and seizing Southern Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands. In 1947, the Komsomolsk-on-Amur—Sovetskaya Gavan line was commissioned, providing the second (after the Trans-Siberian Railway) railroad access to the Pacific Ocean and cutting the distance in 1000 km for maritime transportation to Sakhalin, Kamchatka, and Magadan Oblast. Due