ST. PETERSBURG, Russia—As an engineer pulls the throttle, villagers track side gawk at the bullet-shaped train as it gathers speed. Soon, forests and wooden shacks are a blur as a dashboard display reads 250 kilometers an hour (155 miles per hour).
Ten years in the making, Russia's state-owned railway is testing eight trains that in December will rush travelers from here to Moscow in less than four hours. With fancy kitchens and leather seats in first class, the Sapsans (Russian for peregrine falcons) mark a change in Russia's egalitarian rail tradition.
More broadly, though, Russia's new trains mirror a global push in high-speed rail that spans from China to the U.S., an effort that is buffering Siemens AG, Hitachi Ltd., Bombardier Inc. and other industrial giants against the economic slump.
Global spending on trains, tracks and equipment is expected to reach €122 billion ($182 billion) this year, up 18% from 2004, according to Unife, an international trade association. It projects that the figure will rise to €150 billion by 2016.
Rail spending "has a short-term effect on unemployment as well as a longer-term effect on economic growth," says Michael Clausecker, Unife's director general.
A high-speed rail link between Madrid and Barcelona that opened last year has stolen former air travelers, cutting daily flights between the cities in half to 35. France hopes to double its high-speed track to about 2,500 miles by 2020.
In the U.S., President Barack Obama has vowed to spend $13 billion over five years to build high-speed rail links between major cities.
The spending is aiding the fortunes of train makers.>>>
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