To one and all

Dear Humanity,

National and regional conflicts—political, religious and military—have become the main focus of discussion by international governmental and social organizations. Ever growing human needs have long overshadowed the atrocious and increasing confrontation between nature and man caused by civilizationally corrupted standards of living. Luxury and a perversely comfortable lifestyle are not always compatible with the laws of nature. By boorishly interfering in the evolutionary processes of the biosphere, homo sapiens is waging an environmental war that has resulted in innumerable human losses, exhaustion of the earth’s resources, and a radical change in the climate of our planet, thus boding disaster for humanity’s future. The time has come to focus on humanity’s intercommunion with nature and recognize and correct the mistakes homo sapiens has made during its existence on the planet Earth.

The EuRICAA initiative, the first global infrastructure project, should become a central UN program and give a boost to the UN Millennium Declaration adopted in 2000. EuRICAA is destined to become the high point of the UN’s social and intellectual activity. This initiative will spearhead the UN’s social and intellectual efforts aimed at resolving the fight between man and nature.

The UN member countries must use their authority and resources to promote the development of this project. To raise the efficacy of this initiative, conferences, discussions and forums on new standards of humanity’s existence on Earth must be organized on the UN tribunes on a permanent basis with the participation of all interested representatives of the world’s political, intellectual and financial elites, as well as representatives of Green parties, leading specialists from scientific research and strategic methodological institutions in the sphere of hydrometeorological forecasts, ecologists, nutritionists, doctors of biological and physical sciences, and representatives of agroindustrial sectors, in order to draw up recommendations for all the participating countries aimed at ensuring the successful implementation of this project. These efforts should also focus on analyzing and coordinating national specifics and elaborating principles for streamlining the funding, design, and technological aspects of building this mega global infrastructure. In order to spread the word, we recommend holding a talk show to launch a public discussion of the EuRICAA initiative. This systemic activity will help to define a new and extensive vector of international cooperation and interaction.

For the first time in its history, the UN will establish a special fund based on a legal structure for managing all the resources pertaining to EuRICAA. The establishment of such a fund will not contradict the UN Charter and will promote the resolution of all the tasks it must carry out (http://www.un.org/ru/charter-united-nations/index.html).

The UN must press the national parliaments to encourage voluntary contributions from legal and physical entities with high incomes. These resources will be accumulated in the EuRICAA fund. The world community—private and state investors—will have to fully trust the fund’s management. It is worth noting that I do not see this project as a commercial undertaking, but as a humanitarian idea called upon to save humanity from self-destruction. I have already invested 1/3 million dollars in the preparatory stage of the EuRICAA initiative alone.

The environmental situation in the world is rapidly deteriorating. We hear almost every day about the latest consequences of anthropogenic activity, which could lead to a devastating disaster on our planet. The total discharge of greenhouse gases in 2016 amounted to the equivalent of 53.4 billion tonnes of CO2. According to indirect calculations in 1918 this amount was no more than 0.001% of this figure. The forecast for 2051 is disappointing - the total amount of greenhouse gas emissions in the equivalent of CO2 in the amount of 82.8 billion tons is expected. And what will be the outcome? There has never before been such an excessive number of biosystems and amount of biomaterial on the planet. Look at the figures above: these pernicious amounts are primarily the result of man’s careless and irresponsible consumption. The time has come to seriously re-examine the standards of civilizational development and change the norms of electromagnetic and radiation security. The amount of discharges from consumption and the organization of human activity is stretching nature to the limit and exceeding the ability of modern utilization technology to cope with the growing demands without causing serious damage to the planet. If we do not unite to resolve this problem in the very near future, humanity will have no future.

In this respect, the UN must assume an enlightening mission that seeks to encourage active functioning of the world’s media aimed at changing the global broadcasting configuration. Unfortunately, today, entertainment shows that pursue commercial ends predominate in the media space. Media created under the UN auspices will provide humanity with new standards directed at protecting human health and the environment. The UN will assume responsibility for widely advocating a healthy lifestyle; a new universal food basket will be developed and offered that promotes longevity and optimal human wellbeing. At present, the eating habits of the majority of people is having a detrimental effect on their health, propagating illness, reducing their lifespan, and preventing them from fulfilling themselves physically and intellectually, thus leading to excessive spending on health care and having a negative influence on the environment. One of the UN’s main tasks today is to make every person aware of the importance of a healthy lifestyle.

Forbes Magazine has published a list of the top 5,000 wealthiest people of the world, whose personal fortune spans between one and 130 billion dollars. The UN has the ability to persuade these people to voluntarily invest a small part of their income in sponsoring the first global infrastructure project. Some of the money from the EuRICAA fund must be invested in new forms of technology that will ensure civilization’s safe development. The money must work toward establishing a green economy that will lead to an improvement in the health of the population and an increase in human wellbeing and social equality, as well as promote a significant decrease in the hazardous effects on the environment and the environmental deficit.

Representatives of all the UN member countries, presidents and prime ministers of all the world’s countries! Wake the people up! Put an end to the feast in time of plague! The time has come to shout out on the hour that the planet Earth is in serious danger. Our world is heading for a planetary disaster. However, humanity possesses enough intellectual and financial resources to prevent this disaster. And the UN, with its high prestige, must assist in this. There is simply no other way. Only the UN is capable of mobilizing all the intellectual, financial and political elites of the world and everyone who has the conscience and honour to participate in the EuRICAA project. Constant appeals must be made from the UN tribunes in order to inform the world of the imminent danger it faces—humanity is encountering the dire prospect of losing its future in the next few generations.

Sponsorship is essentially a mark of high culture and high level of intelligence, in turn forming the foundation of high politics, whereas an anti-political and uncultured approach paves the way to self-destruction. Representatives of all the UN member countries, presidents and prime ministers of all the countries of the world, please repeat these simple thoughts to your people and make it clear that any inaction is a disgrace.

When building the EuRICAA mega infrahighway, we plan to erect monuments every thousand kilometres bearing the names of those who have contributed their resources to the project. The names of the most generous patrons—companies and individuals—will be etched on green monuments, active sponsors of the new infrastructure will be displayed on blue monuments, and the names of those who refused to participate in the project will be shown on red monuments. I very much hope there will be no need to erect red monuments to the memory of those who are indifferent to the fate of the human civilization.

Globalization and World Transparency

Some people think that greater interaction among different spheres and processes of the world economy will lead to an imbalance in the world community and to the emergence of a new world model—a 20:80 world model, a world where only one fifth of society lives in plenty. The EuRICAA infrastructure mega infrahighway, which will incorporate the entire world, will be a direct refutation of this statement. In addition to its positive influence on the economic and political life of every country, EuRICAA will create a solid foundation for resolving many of humanity’s universal problems. Military and environmental problems are among humanity’s most serious global challenges, whereby the environmental situation is deteriorating with each passing day, while conflicts among civilizations are becoming increasingly frequent.

Here we present analytical data for review that will give an idea of the feasibility of implementing the EuRICAA project and of its immense contribution to the development of contemporary civilization.

Under the current growing competition, not one of the world’s countries is capable of controlling the risks of its own economy without effective infrastructural transportation options.

The national transportation strategy of every country is aimed at ensuring the state’s intensive, innovative and socially oriented development, thus guaranteeing an increase in the competitiveness of the national economy and the quality of the population’s life. These tasks cannot be carried out in isolation. This project for building a single intercontinental transportation artery is oriented toward joint action and intercommunication.

The decision to build the EuRICAA global transportation corridor must be based on international solidarity, since each country has different needs with respect to foreign sales, labour resource, technology and resource import markets.

This is a fledgling project, so all of the potential participating countries must:

• convince the UN and the world’s largest countries—the U.S., China, Germany, Russia and Japan—to become active development channels for the EuRICAA project;
• assess the multiplicative effect in each country from participating in the project;
• draw up urban-planning feasibility reports for building the mega infrahighway in accordance with the planned route;
• define financial and organizational models aimed at attracting investments, including private.

Alexander Potemkin

Humanity cannot exist in a static world—in order to evolve, it must make qualitative changes in the way it lives. Unfortunately, new opportunities to develop human potential frequently meet with opposition that threatens to destroy states and nations. However, today, at the beginning of the 21st century, more and more countries are declaring their will for peace and creativeness. The global community is increasingly turning its attention to humanity’s wellbeing, without wars and revolutionary upheavals.

This has given birth to the idea of globalization and world transparency. It is hoped that development of the labor and capital market will give nations and states a new incentive to draw closer together. This will remove the last barriers to free movement and create an atmosphere of complete mutual trust.

But which road will take us to this kind of future? And yes, we mean a road in the literal sense of this word. A look at history convinces us that all grandiose changes began with a road. Cyrus the Great, Alexander of Macedonia, the rulers of the Inca Empire, Rome, and Byzantium, Charlemagne, and Napoleon are good cases in point.

The idea has emerged of creating a Global Transport Network—a civilization hub that will unite all of the Earth’s continents. We are talking about a Europe – Russia – America – India – China – Africa mega infrahighway. This universal super long highway will help to bring states and nations out of their isolation. It will join dozens of countries in their pursuit of new diverse interests, such as high-speed, high-capacity freight services (of more than 500 tons), exotic travel itineraries, and opportunities for people of different nationalities, religions and races to take all kinds of business and private trips.

This road will be around seventy thousand kilometers in length. . It will pass through territories inhabited by more than six billion people. The author of the initiative thinks that the mega infrahighway could begin in Cape Town, go on to Brazzaville, Abuja, Rabat, through a tunnel under Gibraltar and on to Madrid, Paris, Brussels, Berlin, Warsaw, Minsk, and then into the expanses of Russia. It will continue on through Tver and Vologda, crossing the Urals near Perm, to pass into Siberia, where it will reach Surgut, and Yakutsk. From there, it is only a stone’s throw to Uelen, the easternmost settlement on the Russian mainland. On a clear day, you can see the Diomede Islands, the boundary separating Russia and America, from Uelen.

Building a tunnel and bridges across the Dezhnev Strait and the Diomede Islands will accelerate the development of the Siberian regions and exploration of their riches and natural diversity. Instead of being the most remote points on the planet, the town of Wales on Cape Prince of Wales, which is the westernmost point of the North American continent, and Russia’s Uelen on the Eurasian sub-continent will become genial and welcoming symbols of the new global civilization of the third millennium.

Passing through the city of Fairbanks in Alaska, and on through Canada’s Whitehorse, Prince George, and Vancouver, the mega infrahighway will run down the U.S. West coast from Seattle to Los Angeles…

Then the mega infrahighway will pass through Mexico and the Isthmus of Panama to Patagonia, the Argentine port of Ushuajja on the Tierra del Fuego, and from Lisbon throughout the length of Africa to Cape Town in South Africa. However, it will be the governments and people of the countries the road passes through who will make the final decision about building the Great EuRICAA Highway. It stands to reason that the more states and nations EuRICAA unites, the greater the benefit people will gain from it.

The southern meridianal route will branch into Russian territory. One of its branches through Central Asia and Afghanistan will reach India, another branch—the southeastern—will unite China and the Southeast Asian countries into a single transport system.

Russia as an Integral Part of Civilization’s Transport Hub

Humanity urgently needs a single intercontinental transport artery capable of becoming the center of contemporary civilization. However, so far, only partial and feeble attempts have been made to bring this to fruition. The transport infrastructure in the developed countries—the U.S., Germany, France, Great Britain, Spain, Italy, Russia—is distinguished by impeccable quality and huge potential for further development and convergence with carrier service partners. But we are talking about an entirely new road that can handle articulated vehicles with a carrying capacity of approximately 500 tons controlled by automatic pilot systems based on atomic batteries. The EuRICAA mega infrahighway will prevent arduous interruptions in freight services and unite the existing and newly created potential into a streamlined network.

 The 20th century has shown us ways to join territories separated by water. The most recent examples are the La Manche Tunnel and the bridge across the Biscayne Bay. Now we need to span the Bering Strait. From the technical viewpoint, this is not a terribly complicated task—the length of the bridge is no more than 20 kilometers at a sea depth of 40 m. However, it makes no sense to cross the Bering Strait if the EuRICAA mega infrahighway does not pass through Russian territory. It is this section that will become the key link in the entire project. Only by uniting Europe, Asia, America and Africa with a highway that passes through Russia (in addition to the Northern Sea Route and the Trans-Siberian Rail Road through the south of Russia) will it be possible to form civilization’s full-fledged intercontinental transport hub.

Unexplored, Undeveloped, Global

There are many mineral deposits in Russia, Canada, the U.S., Latin America, and Africa, the resources of which have not been explored. To these can be added gas deposits that have even more impressive resources. Deposits of raw hydrocarbons, as well as coal, diamonds, gold, precious stones, base metals, uranium ores, iron, platinum, titanium, copper, tin, zinc, and rock crystal have been discovered (or are in the process of being surveyed) in the territories through which the mega infrahighway will pass, or those adjacent to it. Thermal springs possessing high balneotherapeutic properties are also found here. And of course, there are forests, forests, and more forests, millions of hectares, billions of cubic meters of forests, which means not only raw material for the cellulose and paper industry, building business, and pharmacology, but also an inexhaustible giant oxygen plant, the significance of which is difficult to overestimate in light of the Kyoto Protocol.

One of the largest gold deposits in the world – Sukhoi Log – awaits its turn in the Irkutsk natural resource region. Its reserves are such that they could yield half of today’s entire gold supplies. This is more than the total gold production of half of the planet’s countries. Many countries with tempestuously growing economies cannot wait to get their hands on all of these resources, primarily the neighboring industries of Japan, America, China, and others.

 The EuRICAA mega infrahighway will bring to life inaccessible regions of the world rich in potential. They will be incorporated into the global development trends of the national economies. The efficiency of corporate ties will dramatically grow, integration economic, political, and cultural processes will intensify, and investments will reach a qualitatively new level.

This new lane of the mega infrahighway will breathe new life into the northern 1,000-kilometer belt of currently uninhabited land. People will stop moving out of this area, on the contrary, people will move in, since many workers and specialists will be needed. The regions adjacent to the mega infrahighway could become an area of “great resettlement.” After all, uninhabited, virgin areas are the planet’s main reserve, capable of receiving any number of people in the event of natural global disasters.

Financial-Economic Aspect of the Project

The estimated cost will be determined after carrying out survey and design work at the pre-design preparation stage.

Estimated cost:

min. 5 trillion USD,

max. 7 trillion USD.

Investment period: 20 years.

Annual funding requirements:

min. 250 billion USD,

max. 500 billion USD.

Every transportation artery is a strictly individual engineering project, the cost of which depends on many factors:

• road category and number of lanes meet the latest transport technology for the future of the civilization.;
• area through which each section is laid in keeping with road and climatic zoning regulations, type of locality and subsurface classification, as well as evidence of valuable land, built-up areas, mountainous regions, etc.;
• existence, length and design parameters of artificial structures (tunnels, bridges, crossovers, viaducts, ramps, culverts, as well as road junctions, intersections and connecting roads at different levels).

Nevertheless, any calculations are complicated by the absence of a unified interstate methodology for calculating highway construction, so it is difficult to determine the cost of one kilometer of highway in any given country. According to the established regulations, in the European countries, the US and Canada, expenditures on land purchase, removal of forests, demolition and transfer of buildings, structures and engineering communications compensated for at the level of national budgets are not included in the estimated cost of road-building. Neither do these estimates include expenditures relating to the drawing up of pre-design documentation, nor the amount of VAT levied (in some countries).

As for EuRICAA, the minimal cost of building one kilometer of one lane will amount to 71.4 million USD. The cost includes building an atomic power plant and artificial structures.

In so doing, the cost of building EuRICAA is much lower than the cost of building transport infrastructure presented in the report “Infrastructure until 2030” put out by OECD (the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) for 2006-07, where the total investments for 2010-30 amount to 53 trillion USD and the amount of annual investment requirements to 2.5% of the world GDP.

The minimal cost of building the EuRICAA project for the participating countries will be proportional to the nominal gross domestic product in the amount of 0.32%.

The EuRICAA Joint-Stock Company is a commercial enterprise. After the mega infrahighway goes into operation, it will begin earning money. The intercontinental highway will become a lively multifunctional corridor and accrue commercial and related ametlies. In addition to the global projects mentioned above, the resources of the territories adjacent to the Great Highway can be used: fish, wild game, furs, berries, mushrooms, recreational sports complexes… This will also generate enormous revenue.

Every resident of the Earth must receive his/her share in the EuRICAA project.

A New Geopolitical Space

The appearance of an intercontinental mega infrahighway will inevitably have an impact on global geopolitics. Various political alliances will begin to develop. These European and American alliances with their multimillion residents will be joined on entirely new principles.

A multitude of states still on the margins of civilization and not in demand will join the world political system as its active and influential participants. The African continent, South America, and Southeast Asia will no longer feel like second fiddles far removed from the centers of international influence. There will be a radical re-estimation on a planetary level of the role and place of the member states in the EuRICAA project.

A Super-Capacity Investment Project

The world has never engaged in anything as extensive or powerful before. Participation in the project will provide an opportunity to make expensive investments that will become more lucrative over time, super-advantageous investments with unlimited return.

Investors will primarily be states that are able to contribute some of their budget funds. This will give the investor states a powerful boost for economic growth at the implementation stage by promoting the intensive development of road-building engineering, the design industry, and personal training spheres, as well as incorporating the vast army of unemployed currently living on benefits into construction.

This super-capacity nature of the investment project will make it possible for both the largest transnational corporations and small companies, even private individuals, to participate in it. Thus the world stock-exchange market will acquire a new attractive asset, which will significantly enliven and activate the financial sector. In contrast to shady financial deals and virtual manipulations with securities, the EuRICAA project will provide its participants with a material equivalent of their investments.

Operation of the mega infrahighway is a new qualitative level for transnational management. EuRICAA envisages the creation of new managerial technologies and programs, a network of learning institutions for training new personnel, and a mass of prestigious vacancies.

It stands to reason that the main investors will be transport companies with the opportunity to form and service global routes, companies specializing in the manufacture of road technology, and machine-building holdings that receive contracts for the manufacture of articulated vehicles with carrying capacities of approximately 500 tons and operated by automatic pilot systems using uranium batteries. Recently, when the idea for this project was being elaborated, the automobile industry was the first to respond and show its interest in participating in the project.

Symbol of the Generation

EuRICAA will become a true school of learning, coming-of-age, and management for humanity’s upcoming generations. It will also become a symbol of heroic pioneering labor that every generation should have.

It is an honor for our fellow countrymen and the world business elite to begin the century with a discussion of such a Great Road proposed by your contemporary.