Qingzang Railway

Encyclopedia : Q : QI : QIN : Qingzang Railway

---

The Qingzang railway, Qinghai–Xizang railway, or Qinghai–Tibet railway (Simplified Chinese: }}}; Traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: ), is a railway which connects Xining, Qinghai Province, to Lhasa, Tibet Autonomous Region, in the People's Republic of China.

The section of the railway between Golmud and Lhasa was inaugurated on 1 July 2006 by president Hu Jintao, when the first two passenger trains departed, "Qing 1" (Q1) from Golmud towards Lhasa, and on the return side "Zang 2" (J2) leaving from Lhasa.[link] Report of inauguration, accessed July 1, 2006 This railway is the first to connect China proper with the Tibet Autonomous Region, which due to its altitude and terrain was the last province-level entity in mainland China with no railways. Unmanned testing of the line and equipment had started on May 1 2006. Direct trains run from Beijing, Chengdu, Chongqing, Xining, and Lanzhou, establishing a straight connection between Lhasa and other major cities in the PRC.China Tibet Information Center. [Shanghai strives for straight train to Lhasa]. Retrieved April 7, 2006.

The line includes the Tanggula Pass, which at 5,072 metres above sea level is the world's highest rail track.

The 1,338 m Fenghuoshan tunnel is the highest rail tunnel in the world. It is 4,905 m above sea level. The 3,345-meter Yangbajing tunnel is the longest tunnel of the line. It is 4,264 m above sea level and located 80 kilometres NW of the regional capital, Lhasa.

Of the Golmud to Lhasa line, more than 960 km, or over 80% of the railway, is built at an altitude of more than 4,000 m, over half of it is laid on permafrost, and 675 bridges on the line, total length 159.88 km.

Stations

In the Golmud to Lhasa part of the line, 45 stations are constructed and open for service, 13 stations are planned. http://news.sina.com.cn/c/2006-07-01/193210306837.shtml Of the 45 stations, 38 are unstaffed, and monitored in the control center in Xining.

Train schedule

In October 2005, the 1,142 km Qinghai–Tibet railway to Lhasa was completed. The new section of track opened to regular traffic on July 1, 2006.[China rolls out railway], BBC News. Retrieved June 30, 2006. In the trial period, three passenger trains ran from Beijing, Chengdu/Chongqing, and Xining/Lanzhou, numbered T27/T28, T22/T23/T24/T21, T222/T223/T224/T221,N917/N918,K917/K918 repectively. The train from Beijing to Lhasa numbered T27 takes 47 hours, 28 minutes, covers 4064 kilometers (2500 miles), departs at 21:30 from Beijing west, and arrives in Lhasa at 20:58 on the third day. The ticket will cost 389 yuan for hard seat, 813 yuan for a lower hard sleeper, or 1262 yuan for a lower soft sleeper. The T28 from Lhasa to Beijing west departs at 08:00 and arrives in Beijing at 08:00 on the third day, taking 48 hours.

1. redirect

Ticket Prices

On the Qingzang railway in the section from Golmud to Lhasa, apart from hard seat tickets, there is an extra charge for forward-facing seats/berths. Compared with standard pricing for the same class, the soft seat, hard sleeper and soft sleeper tickets will have an added charge of 0.09, 0.10 or 0.16 yuan per kilometre per person respectively.

The ticket prices for 5-carriage trains in the testing period were as follows: (Unit: Chinese Yuan)

Train	From/To	Kilometres	Hard Seat	Hard Sleeper (lower berth)	Soft Sleeper (lower berth)
T27/28	Beijing West - Lhasa	4064	389	813	1262
T22/23/24/21	Chengdu - Lhasa	3360	331	712	1104
T222/223/224/221	Chongqing - Lhasa	3654	355	754	1168
K917/K918	Lanzhou - Lhasa	2188	242	552	854
N917/N918	Xining - Lhasa	1972	226	523	810

Construction

Since the formation of the Tibetan Autonomous Region in early 1950s, the Chinese central government has dreamed of building a railway connecting Tibet to the rest of China. Engineers were sent to investigate the possibility, and this project could not be started due to the shortage of technology and money.

The 815 km section from Xining, Qinghai to Golmud, Qinghai opened to traffic in 1984. Construction of the remaining 1,142 km section, from Golmud to Lhasa, could not be started until the recent economic growth of China. This section was formally started on 29 June 2001. Though this section was finished in mid-October 2005, signalling work and track testing took another eight months. The Golmud-Lhasa section was completed in five years at a cost of $3.68 billion.

Rail-laying in Tibet was launched from both directions, towards Tanggula Mountain and Lhasa, from Anduo Railway Station on 22 June 2004. On 24 August 2005, track was laid at the railway's highest point, the Tanggula Pass, which is 5,072 metres (16,640 feet) above sea level.Xinhua News Agency (August 24, 2005). [New height of world's railway born in Tibet]. Retrieved August 25, 2005.

44 new railway stations are to be built, among them Tanggula Mountain railway station, which at 5,068 m will be the world's highest (Cóndor station, at 4,786 m, on the Rio Mulatos-Potosí line, Bolivia, and La Galera station at 4,781 m in Peru being the next highest).

Bombardier Transportation provided 361 high-altitude passenger carriages with special enriched-oxygen and UV-protection systems (delivered between December 2005 and May 2006). Of these, 53 are luxury sleeper carriages for tourist service.Bombardier (February 25, 2005). [Bombardier Awarded A Contract For High Altitude Passenger Rail Cars In Tibet]. Retrieved August 25 2005. Trains travelling in the frozen earth areas attain maximum speeds of 100 kilometres per hour. On the non-frozen earth areas, speeds reach 120 kilometres per hour.

The construction of the railway was part of the China Western Development strategy, an attempt to develop the western provinces of China, which are much less developed than eastern China. Now that the line is open, it is possible to travel from Beijing to Lhasa in 50 hours, and from Shanghai in 52 hours. The railway will later be extended to Zhangmu via Shigatse (日喀则) to the west, and Dali via Nyingchi (林芝) to the east. A further extension is planned to link Shigatse with Yadong near the China-India border [Extension plans]. Retrieved June 28, 2006 (Map http://sun-bin.blogspot.com/2006/07/qinghai-tibet-railway-videos.html).

Engineering challenges

There were and are many technical difficulties for such a railway.

About half of the second section was built on barely permanent permafrost. In the summer, the uppermost layer thaws, and the ground becomes muddy. Chinese engineers dealt with this problem by building elevated tracks with foundations sunk deep into the ground, inserting vertical pipes that circulate liquid nitrogen and cold nitrogen gas into the ground, building hollow concrete pipes beneath the tracks to keep the rail bed frozen, and using metal sun shades.Wired Magazine Issue 14.07. [link] However, global warming may require new methods to be invented in the coming decades to keep this railway operating.

The air in Tibet is much thinner, having 35% to 40% of the oxygen of air at sea level, and therefore special passenger rail cars must be used, and several oxygen factories were built along the railway. At this altitude, ballpoint pens can explode and water in toilets must be heated to prevent freezing. The Chinese government claimed that no construction worker died during the construction due to altitude sickness related diseases. [News on Chinese government website (in Chinese)] quotes: The vice president of Qinghai Medical University, Dr. Gerili said "Because of proper preventions and treatments, among tens of thousands of workers from low altitude, no one died due to altitude sickness. You cannot deny that it's a miracle."

The railway passes the Kunlun Mountains, an earthquake zone. A magnitude 8.1 earthquake struck in 2001. Dozens of earthquake monitors have been installed along the railway.

Environmental impact

The environmental impact of the new railway is an ongoing concern. Certainly the increase in passenger traffic will result in greater tourism and economic activity in Tibet. It is argued that combustion of coal will result in less deforestation. However the combustion of coal is a major source of pollution due to the greenhouse gases it produces, including carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide. Certainly burning coal in place of wood may result in a slight environmental benefit but an increase in overall combustion due to increased human activity—in an already thin atmosphere—may affect the long term health of the local population.

Some people have worried that railway passengers will throw trash out of train windows. This is unlikely, as all the passenger cars will be sealed for oxygen enhancement purposes once a train enters Tibet. Trash will be carried back to Golmud by trains to be processed.

The effect of this railway on wild animals such as antelope and plants is currently unknown. Special bridges for animals have been built allowing continued animal migration, [here] is the Google Maps satellite image of one of such bridges.

Criticism

The Chinese leadership has not hidden its political agenda in constructing the railway, which is a pivotal project of China’s ambitious campaign to develop its western regions. Strategically, Western development reflects the Party’s long-standing aim of ensuring the security of its borders and preserving ‘political stability’ through the integration of the region into China and suppression of dissent to Party rule.

Opponents of China's Tibet policies have claimed that the railway was built to strengthen political control over Tibet despite doubts over its economic viability, and that more money has been spent on it than on healthcare and education in the Tibet Autonomous Region over the last five decades. http://www.savetibet.org/news/newsitem.php?id=497

China's economic policies including the railway are further increasing immigration from the rest of China, especially from ethnic Han, reducing the proportion of Tibetans in the Tibet Autonomous Region, and meaning that Tibetans find it increasingly difficult to compete in the job market against Chinese workers with more skills (most of the workers on the railway were Chinese).http://www.chinapost.com.tw/asiapacific/detail.asp?ID=84633&GRP=C Tibetans and activist groups have also expressed concerns that the Chinese government will use the railway to strengthen its military presence in the Tibet Autonomous Region as well as to increase exploitation of Tibet's natural resources and further damage Tibet's environment. As a result, Bombardier Transportation, a Canadian company, has faced international criticism from some pro-independence organizations for its involvement in constructing rail cars for the project.http://www.bombardieroutoftibet.orghttp://actionnetwork.org/sft/alert-description.tcl?alert_id=3492803http://www.tibet.ca/en/wtnarchive/2005/6/18_3.html

Fleet

• 361 Bombardier Sifang Power (Qingdao) Transportation Ltd./Power Corporation of Canada/China South Locomotive and Rolling Stock Industry (Group) Corporation High-Grade Coach - 308 standard cars and 53 special tourist cars
• Qishuyang Locomotive Factory DF8CJ 9001 locomotive - similar to the Bombardier Transportation-GE Transportation Blue Tiger diesel electric locomotive

Photos

• [Actual Images published in the Wired Magazine]

Videos

• A train travelling near the Tsonag Lake, Cuonahu railway station. [link] [link] [link]

See also

• Rail transport in mainland China
• List of railways in China
• Transportation in the People's Republic of China

References

External links

• [Railway map of China]
• [Environmental Protection Along the Qinghai-Tibet Railway], US Embassy report
• The Guardian, 20 September 2005, ["The railway across the roof of the world"]
• Wired Magazine, July 2006, ["Train to the Roof of the World"]
• [Tibet railway construction]
• [Tibet railway videos]

 

---

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.

Search Titles

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

?