(TibetanReview.net, Jan06’21) – China has indicated Jan 5 that it will complete the construction of and start running the Lhasa-Nyingchi (Tibetan: Nyingtri) railway in occupied Tibet in June this year, with its official media reporting that the trains running on its tracks will be the Fuxing bullet trains.
The announcement was made at the annual conference of China’s national railway operator on Jan 4, reported China’s official global.chinadaily.com.cn Jan 6, citing the official cctv. The report said the region had witnessed railway expansion since the operation of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway in 2006, which runs from Xining of Qinghai to Lhasa.
With the launch of its Tibet service, the Fuxing bullet train series will be available in all provincial-level regions of the People’s Republic of China on the mainland, the China State Railway Group Co. Ltd was cited as saying.
It was earlier reported that track-laying work for the rail line was completed on Dec 31, 2020 and that it will be the first electrified railroad in Tibet.
The Fuxing bullet train to run in Tibet will be a customised version of the one which runs at 160 km per hour, reported China’s official Xinhua news agency Jan 5. It will have oxygen supply equipment and two kinds of power traction: internal combustion and electric power, since more than 90% of the track will pass through areas about 3,000 meters above sea level, the report noted.
With a designed speed of 160 km per hour, the 435-km rail line passes through 47 tunnels and 120 bridges, the Tibet Railway Construction Co. Ltd, which is building the railway, was cited as saying.
Lhasa-Linzhi (or Nyingchi) Railway runs along the Yarlung Zangbo River between the Gangdise block and the Himalayan block on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in Southwest China’s Tibet Autonomous Region, the official globaltimes.cn Jan 5 cited a Chinese language Xinhua report as saying.
The Lhasa-Nyingchi railway is part of China’s highly strategic Sichuan-Tibet Railway which starts from Chengdu, capital of Sichuan Province. It travels through Ya’an and enters Tibet via Kangding (Dartsedo) in Sichuan Province before crossing into Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) through Qamdo (Chamdo).
