International Railroad Discussion > New China - Kazakhstan rail line?

This was started by emails from friends who have been to China/Russia pointed out an article in the Washington Post about the longest train journey in the world, usurping the TranSib in Russia. Opening it up it was about a single level container service from very Eastern China to Madrid, Spain. It showed a crude route map shorter than I thought it should be. I then pointed out to them this is not a train trip but a freight service...that may very well be the longest in the world....but it requires three gauge changes, and unless it uses the technology used on a few passenger trains to move wheels 3.5 inches between standard and Russian/Spain gauge it cannot be a thru train. I felt it was more likely done by container transfers at borders.

The Chinese built a rail line across the northern part of the Gobi desert about 30? years ago to Urumqi, China, which I understand is pronounced Woo-loo-moo-chi. Then it was extended to NW across easy terrain to Druzhba at the Kazakhstan border. From there you could, by a bit of circuity, get to Russia then across Poland, Germany, France to Spain. But the route looked shorter.

So I decided to follow the rail lines on Google Earth again after several years from Urumqi to Druzba. Then about halfway between the two I find, near Jinghe, a branch headed due west instead of NW. So I followed it and it was easy running then got into hills then mountains. It is hard to avoid mountains in China. Soon the typical Chinese engineering style took over. Don't follow water courses. Use some horseshoes and curves to reach some elevation the go right into a long tunnel thru the side of a mountain. Come out for a very short distance and go right back into the next mountain. It was hard to follow because you had to look for the brief creek crossings. After three or four of these things I lost track of it, partially due to older images with less detail. I used place marks for route markers where I could. Then I had to quit...lost it.

Later I followed the Kazakh line north from Almaty which I had done before. After a bid I followed a line branching off the main TurkSib route to the east and followed it. It went a long way! Zooming out it was aimed right towards the previous line I had followed in China. Some images were very poor and I could not follow. Over Thanksgiving since no one was here I decided to look around the city of Yining, China. On Google it just shows as Ill! Rarely do Google names match the printed names on decent paper maps I have bought. Quickly I found a rail line, and west of there at the Kazakh border huge yards and container transfer terminals. I could not find a complete line in Kazakh, but it looks like an easy route, no mountains to cross. Then I followed the China rail line east and after a number of tunnels found the same way I got within 10 miles of the previous search. This could be one long tunnel, but nothing to the Chinese. Many of the shorter tunnels had concrete enclosures extending many feet out each way from the tunnel itself, I presume for snow or sandstorms. I guess in this crossing of the 'Borohoro Shan' (shan is English spelling of Chinese for mountain) that there are at least 40 tunnels. The line is single track and appears to be electrified in places. Not so for the much easier Kazakh portion.

I feel this must be a complete thru rail line done in the last few years. It saves about 160 miles from China to Almaty and beyond from China. But somehow the Chinese must have thought its extensive construction worthwhile.

If anyone can add more info I'd be interested. I have not tried to seach it on TO, what name would I use to search? JL in DE

This is a highly interesting story, thank you tp117!

I've been trying to follow the discussion in the media too to find out how the "Southern route" from China to Europe is progressing. This should run through Turkey - Iran - Pakistan - India as well to cut some distance off.

Before checking facts, how may gauge changes would this cause? None? Every gauge change might mean it is more sensible to use ships or planes instead...I have not seen any Chinese freight cars in Europe yet, has anyone else here?

tp117: Can you give me coordinates to Google Maps/ Earth so I can check these on Apple Maps, which is often superior in detail accuracy and updated data on rural areas?

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India and Pakistan mainlines are 5'6" gauge; Turkey, Iran and China are standard gauge.

No easy way around gauge change here either then.

McKey,

Best i can guess is 44 degrees 38'24.40" N and 83 degrees 52.74" or 62" at the junction where the new line heads west from the Urumqui to Druzhba electrified main line. Elevation wa 747ft (really low for Western China) and eye at 1517ft.

Sorry, I do not use longitude and latidudes to find a place. I just open Google Earth, adjust it N or S to where I want to be, and zoom in. I have a decent sense of geography, and where the older rail lines might be. But I cannot figure out after getting a new SSD computer how to get G.E. to highlight rail lines like they used to. Asked son to help but no answer. But roads, place names and National Boundaries are highlighted for me on G.E. At least got that far. So i just zoom in and start following any line of interest.

My wife and daughter use Apple computers. Me, Son in law, and son the Microsoft stuff. So if you say Apple maps are better I gotta try them out. These overhead images are a lot of fun, armchair railfanning anywhere you want it. You can even see trains, count cars, and to some extend figure out what they are hauling. Over five years ago I followed the TransSib East from Novosibirsk. i think many think it is flat and straight. Not so! It is a mountain railroad, I counted over 20 horseshoe curves on it!I wonder what the grade percents are!

Where is that pic in your post taken, I did not see it posted. I guess the line Xi'an to Lanzhou where a new double track surpassed an old single track ROW over a decade ago, but they still use both because traffic is so heavy.

There's a friend of mine, Dr. John Kirchner, who teaches transportation studies at Cal State LA. He's traveled China's rail system extensively but is not a TO subscriber. I relayed the info in the original post to him and this is his response.

If the original poster was inquiring about the line west of Yining, John, unfortunately, has little or no information about it.

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Not sure just what is new about these lines. Urumqi is UR_U_MU_CHI, at least that is how the locals pronounce it. I think his jargon is a very old Chinese spelling and pronunciation that one still sees on train number signs on the sides of passenger cars. Korla for example is Kuerla on train signs.

There are a bunch of new lines in Xinjiang shown on the maps - west, northwest, and northeast of Urumqui. Also out of Kashgar to the south. There is a line west of Yining, but I know nothing about it. Is that what he is referring to?

One spectacular railway, that is little known by outsiders, is the Turpan-Korla-Kashgar line - I've ridden it several times and the Korla-Turpan section is really neat. Many high bridges, snow capped mountains, spiral tunnels, etc. There are through Korla-Urumqi sleeper trains, as well as through trains Korla to the east, but most pass through the Tian Shan at night. I'm using it as fodder for my expanding model railroad. Actually, the new coastal line from Shanghai all the way to Shenzhen is quite remarkable; despite what they say, it's not a high speed railway, but a fast railway - up to 200 kph, not the 300-380 kph of the true high speed lines (like Gunagzhou-Wuhan-Beijing or Beijing-Shanghai). I did get some new mileage in September - rode Shanghai-Qingdao on a high speed train, but backtracking section to Qingdao is not true high speed despite the maps). Qingdao is a great place - beautiful city with a European look to it - German influence. Wonderful train station. I also rode sleepers from Wuishan to Fuzhou and from Fuzhou to Shanghai - soft class on both.

There is a lot of rail construction going on in far western China, so I'm not sure what is there that is not shown on these fairly crude maps. I also noticed errors or outdated info on the general rail map - notice no full coastal line south of Xiamen to Shenzhen, but it is properly shown on the high speed rail map. On the latter, the thin dotted lines are I think "fast" trains operating over conventional rail lines. I much prefer riding these trains, or conventional trains, because you see so much more of rail activities, including freight and passenger facilities, yards, etc I rode one such line, from Changsha to Nanchang last March, and connected with a diesel hauled local with a DF4D d/e up front and an all hard class consist of green coaches.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/04/14 05:08 by CA_Sou_MA_Agent.

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To CA Sou MA Agent and his friend 'John' at the university. Actually I am a 'John' too. Thanks for your updates. My pronunciation of Urumqui comes from a Revelation DVD maybe five years old. It is really hard for me to know how to pronounce, or translate, any Chinese or Russian names into English, there seems to be so many variations among various maps and Google Earth.

Yes the line I'm referring too is the one that goes west of Yining, and it does show on the upper map.

And yes, I have followed the Turpan to Korla line and it is amazing. I'd like to know the elevation changes and the grades. West of Korla it seems more straight forward, just protection from the sand storms that may occur in that area.

China's rail network is expanding like North America did 120 years ago. Then, under rampant capitalism, it expanded way too much before highways were developed. Now in China, their political system, good or bad, can legally favor rail over highways, especially for freight, and they may not have to go through the drastic reduction of their rail network like North America has had to endure the last 50 years, sometimes to its detriment.

I think China has a more realistic view of how much petroleum is needed for a US-style auto and truck based primary transportation network, and unless there is a drastic retrenchment of their population or economy, the network will serve them well for a long time.
One aspect of the US overbuilding was running parallel lines into areas that only needed one, just a competitive game between capitalists at the time. With central planning that probably won't happen there.

I had a look around the rail yards in Yining (Ili) when I was there in September. There seemed to be international type containers in the yard but I couldn't get close enough for a good look.

I traveled by bus from Urunchi to Yining. As the four lane road dropped from a high plateau into the Yining valley the road to my surprise (as the terrain was almost flat) entered a descending tunnel cut into in a low and gently sloped hill. The road emerged on the edge of a deep gorge, and after more tunnels, it executed a spectacular loop where the road crossed over itself on a high bridge. As an earlier correspondent noted, the Chinese don't do things by half measures. According to my Chinese map the railway line reaches the Yining basin through a long tunnel some 100km to the east of the road.

There was a link posed on this forum about 6 months ago with a link to detailed account in the New York Times of a train loaded with computer's journey from Chengdu to Hamburg, Germany.

There is an article in The Economist of November 15, 2014 on how the Chinese and Kazakstan goverments are working to reduce the travel time for containers from Chengdu to Duisburg, Germany to 10 days from the current 14 days.

A new direct line between Urumqi and Almaty known as the Khorgas crossing was opened at the end of 2012, thereby bypassing the previous connection via the very small town of Aktogai (where the Almaty - Semipalatinsk line crossed the Urumqi - Balkash - Karaganda route and where I once spent a very entertaining 24 hours a few years back; no paved roads, running water, or sewage system). There was an article about the new line in the International Railway Journal, if I recall correctly. The completed link was desperately needed, as previously there was only a two-lane highway with very poor surface conditions linking the two cities.

Old post, but, FYI, you can see all the rail lines of the world in Open Street Maps. I use an app on my phone called “PocketEarth”. You can download entire countries, including topo maps. So you do t need to go hunting in Google Earth.

And, I just took the train from Almaty west to Shymkent and Turkestan today, a very good ride. I did not go east to China, hopefully I’ll ride that line sometime in the future.

Ted in KZ