Qinghai–Tibet Railway Opens

The Qinghai–Tibet Railway runs from Xining, Qinghai, in the north to Lhasa, Tibet, in the south, 1,956 km in all. The 814 km Xining–Golmud section opened in 1984, and construction of the 1,142 km Golmud–Lhasa section began in June 2001. The latter crosses the Kunlun and Tanggula mountains and other plateau terrain; it is the highest plateau railway in the world and the longest on permafrost, with more than 960 km of track above 4,000 meters. Building it meant facing “three great problems”: permafrost, extreme cold with thin air, and a fragile ecology. Builders used technical measures such as bridges in place of embankments, crushed-rock ventilated roadbeds and thermosyphon pipes to solve the worldwide problem of permafrost, and built dedicated wildlife passages to let Tibetan antelope and other animals migrate. After five years of work by over a hundred thousand builders in the “forbidden zone for life,” the whole line opened on 1 July 2006. The Fenghuoshan Tunnel, at 4,905 meters, is the world’s highest permafrost tunnel, and Tanggula Station, at 5,068 meters, is the world’s highest railway station. The railway ended Tibet’s lack of rail service, greatly strengthened links between the interior and the frontier, boosted economic and social development and tourism in Qinghai and Tibet, and promoted ethnic unity. The song “Sky Road,” with its line “That is a magical road in the sky, carrying the warmth of the world to the frontier,” expressed the joy of people of all ethnic groups. The Lhasa–Shigatse railway opened in 2014, and in 2021 the Lhasa–Nyingchi railway began operating, bringing Fuxing bullet trains to Tibet.