Chongqing–Lanzhou Railway

Chongqing-Lanzhou High Speed Railway
Overview
Native name	渝兰高速铁路
Type	High-speed rail/Heavy rail
Status	Under construction Chongqing - Guangyuan opened Dec 2015 Guangyuan - Minxian opened Dec 2016
Locale	China
Termini	Chongqing Lanzhou West
Services	1
Operation
Operator(s)	China Railway High-speed
Technical
Line length	832 km (517 mi)
Track gauge	1,435 mm (4 ft 8 1⁄2 in)
Operating speed	200 km/h (120 mph)
Route map Longhai Railway to Lianyungang Baotou–Lanzhou Railway to Baotu Lanzhou East Longhai Railway to Lanzhou and Lanzhou West Weiyuan Minxian Hadapu Liangshui Longnan Gansu/Sichuan border Yaodu Yangmu Xi'an–Chengdu High-Speed Railway to Xi'an Guangyuan Xi'an–Chengdu High-Speed Railway to Chengdu Taigong Cangxi Langzhong Nanbu Nanchong North Chengdu-Dazhou Railway to Chengdu East Nanchong East Chengdu-Dazhou Railway to Dazhou Yuechi Guang'an South Xiangyu Railway to Xiangyang Wusheng Gaoxing Chongqing-Suining Railway to Chengdu East Sichuan/Chongqing border Hechuan Moxinpo Xiangyu Railway to Xiangyang Beibei Chongqing−Lichuan Railway Chongqing North Chongqing–Huaihua Railway Chongqing West Chengdu-Chongqing ICR Chongqing–Guizhou High-Speed Railway to Guiyang North

Chongqing–Lanzhou High-Speed Railway is a major trunk high speed railway selected for construction under the 11th Five Year Plan set by the Chinese Government. Construction started in 2010. The railway line was expected to be completed and opened for service by the end of 2016.^[1] However, by the end of 2016 only about 3/4 of the line was opened, namely the section from Chongqing to Guangyuan and Guangyuan to Minxian. The opening of the full length of the line was now expected to occur in July 2017.^[2] This will allow for high speed train travel between Chongqing and Lanzhou, Gansu via Nanchong and Guangyuan, Sichuan.

Introduction

With a total length of 820 km, of which 435 km is located within Gansu Province, in addition to the construction of a branch to Nanchong and Guang'an that is 95 km long. It is being built as a new double line electrified railway, with high-speed freight train capable of up to 160 km/h, high-speed passenger trains traveling at 200 km/h although the design speed has been set to 250 km/h. The capacity of the line is expected at 50 train pairs per day and 50,000,000 tonnes of freight per year.

Lanzhou-Chongqing railway project is estimated to need a total investment of 77.4 billion yuan, of which the Gansu Provincial Government is to invest about 43 billion yuan, with the rest of the funding coming from a Ministry of Railways, Sichuan and Chongqing joint construction effort. The construction period is expected to take 6 years. After the completion of Lanzhou-Chongqing railway, rail transport from Lanzhou and Chongqing will be shortened from 1466 kilometers to 820 kilometers, conventional train running time is reduced to 7 hours from 17.5 hours. High speed trains will complete the route in 5.5 hours.

Recent high speed rail reforms has also meant direct Chengdu-Lanzhou and Chongqing-Xi'an services will use a combination of Xi'an–Chengdu High-Speed Railway and Chongqing–Lanzhou High-Speed Railway from where they meet at Guangyuan, Sichuan. This will reduce the neeed for a separate direct Chongqing-Xi'an or Chengdu-Lanzhou line.^[3]

Because of hilly terrain between Guangyuan and Lanzhou on 832 km of railway there will be 285 bridges totaling 104 km (13% of the route) and 178 tunnels totaling 506 km (63% of the route). Twelve of the tunnels will exceed 10 km in length, while the longest tunnel will measure 29 km.^[4]

Route

Lanzhou-Chongqing Railway runs west out of Lanzhou City through Yuzhong County, Weiyuan County, Min County, Tanchang County, Longnan City in Gansu. Crossing into Sichuan Province territory, it then travels by Guangyuan, Cangxi County, Langzhong, Nanbu County, Nanchong. Finally it enters Chongqing City via Hechuan District and Beibei District before terminating at Chongqing North Railway Station.

Unlike most other previously constructed high-speed railways, the Lanzhou-Chongqing Railway will not parallel any existing "conventional" railways, but will follow an entirely new route, providing railway access to towns and counties that did not have railway service of any kind before.

History

• August 1, 2008, West Qinling Tunnel as the first part of the project is opened for tender and bidding started, marking the start of Lanzhou-Chongqing railway construction.^[5]
• July 19, 2014, West Qinling Tunnel construction is completed. ^[6]
• August 8, 2014, Nanchong East station branch opens with EMU services to Chengdu East ^[7]
• January 1, 2015, 70.7km of the southern end of the project is opened. This allows for Chongqing to Hechuan EMU services in just 20 minutes. ^[8]
• December 26, 2015, The southern section of the line, from Chongqing to Guangyuan, Sichuan, opened in December 2015.^[1] Initially with only conventional rail services. ^[9]
• May 15, 2016, High speed EMU services commence with train D5131 running from Chongqing to Guangyuan station in a total of 3 hours 06 minutes. It ran at a maximum speed of up to 200km / h. ^[10]
• December 26, 2016, The section between Guangyuan, Sichuan and Minxian, Gansu was completed in December 2016. However due to Minxian's small size and remote location, services will only commence to Longnan. ^{[11] [12]}

Incidents

In October 2011, 21 railway workers were killed when the vehicle they were traveling in overturned in Lintao County, Gansu. Seven other workers were injured.^[13]

References

External links

• China, People's Republic of: Lanzhou-Chongqing Railway Development Project (formerly Lanyu Railway)