(TibetanReview.net, Feb28’26) – Although the multi-billion dollar funding for the project is far from certain, even as the technical challenges also remain enormous, the long-awaited feasibility study of a Tibet-Nepal railway is set to be completed by the end of Jun 2026, reported kathmandupost.com Feb 26.
The mega trans-Himalayan railway project is seen as giving China access to larger South Asian markets and cut through “complicated and arduous” Himalayan terrain.
China is completing the feasibility report for the Kerung-Kathmandu Railway, while Nepal’s southern neighbour, India, has already completed a similar study for a Raxaul-Kathmandu railway line, the report said, citing officials at Nepal’s Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transportation.
“They [Chinese] had completed the field study in April and are now drafting the feasibility study,” Bodh Bhandari, information officer at the Department of Railway, has said.
The feasibility study has been taking a long time indeed. The Xi’an-based China Railway First Survey and Design Institute Group Co. Ltd was entrusted to carry out the feasibility study, which was started in Dec 2022, the report noted.
The same firm had conducted a pre-feasibility study of the project in 2018 and concluded that the complex geological terrain and the laborious engineering workload will be the most significant obstacles to the project.
The pre-feasibility study was stated to have already raised questions about the project’s viability, including the payback period, economic rate of return, among other things. It covers three districts in Nepal: Kathmandu, Nuwakot, and Rasuwa.
After the pre-feasibility study, the current phase will finalise crucial details such as the total length; the numbers of tunnels, bridges, and stations; costs, and other key factors. Based on this, the government will work towards financial closure and, if feasible, to project financing, Bhandari has said.
The total cost of the feasibility study for the 72-km Nepal section of the railway is estimated at around Rs3.4 billion (180.47 million RMB), the report said.
While the total investment needed for the project will be known once the feasibility study is completed, the pre-feasibility study put the cost of the 72.25 km Nepali section at $2.75 billion.
According to the pre-feasibility study report, around 98.5% of the railway would either be bridges or tunnels, and the construction cost would be Rs3.55 billion per kilometre. It envisages that engineers would build ramps along the northern and southern slopes leading to Lake Paiku, near Kerung, to connect the tracks to the Kathmandu section. The goal of the ramps would be to overcome the significant elevation difference between the southern and northern toes of the Himalayas, the report said.
Bhandari has said the pre-feasibility had accounted for the fact that the Himalayan region is geologically fragile and is situated in a seismic zone.
China’s plan is stated to be to extend the railway from Shigatse to Kerung, and then to Nepal’s capital Kathmandu.
The Kerung-Kathmandu railway will be part of the 550-km railroad connecting the Tibetan city of Shigatse with Kerung near the Nepal-Tibet border, the report said.
Bhandari has expressed confidence that the feasibility study would be structured to allow the both technically and financially highly challenging project to proceed.