Published : 2025-06-29
On June 29, 2001, the groundbreaking ceremony of the much-anticipated Qinghai-Xizang Railway (青藏鐵路) was held simultaneously in Golmud (格爾木), Qinghai Province, and Lhasa (拉薩), the capital of the Xizang (previously known as "Tibet").
The Qinghai-Xizang Railway is a landmark project in China's strategy to develop the western region.
Its full-scale construction embodies the Chinese people's ambition to build the highest and longest plateau railway in the world.
The Qinghai-Xizang Railway extends 1,956 km from Xining to Lhasa, with the 814 km section from Xining to Golmud completed in 1979 and put into operation in 1984.
The section of the Qinghai-Xizang Railway from Golmud to Lhasa is 1,142 km in total length, with 1,110 km of new track being laid.
It passes through 960 km of terrain over 4,000 metres in elevation, and the highest point of the railway over the Tanggula Mountains reaches an elevation of 5,072 metres.
The geological conditions along the Qinghai-Xizang Railway are highly complex, with the line traversing a continuous permafrost section spanning 550 km.
The construction period for the Qinghai-Xizang Railway is scheduled for six years, and it is designed to have a capacity of eight pairs of passenger trains and a one-way freight flow density of five million tonnes.
The ground-breaking ceremony for the Qinghai-Xizang Railway was simultaneously held at the Nanshankou Railway Station in Golmud at an elevation of 3,080 metres and at the Zaoerfeng tunnel construction site by the Lhasa River at an elevation of 3,639 metres.
