--- SEARCH ---
WEATHER
CHINA
INTERNATIONAL
BUSINESS
CULTURE
GOVERNMENT
SCI-TECH
ENVIRONMENT
LIFE
PEOPLE
TRAVEL
WEEKLY REVIEW
Learning Chinese
Learn to Cook Chinese Dishes
Exchange Rates
Hotel Service


Hot Links
China Development Gateway
Chinese Embassies
Info
FedEx
China Post
China Air Express
Hospitals in China
Chinese Embassies
Foreign Embassies
Golfing China
China
Construction Bank
People's
Bank of China
Industrial and Commercial Bank of China
Travel Agencies
China Travel Service
China International Travel Service
Beijing Youth Travel Service
Links
China Tours
China National Tourism Administration

Qinghai-Tibet Railway to Shore up Tourists to World's Roof

The number of travelers to southwest China's Tibetan Autonomous Region, known as the "roof of the world," is expected to rise by 15-20 percent annually when the Qinghai-Tibet Railway goes into operation in 2007.

 

The 1,956-km Qinghai-Tibet railway line, which will run from Xining, capital of northwest Qinghai Province, to Lhasa, Tibetan capital, will give a big impetus to the development of tourism in Tibet, which is a key factor for local economic growth, said Wang Taifu with the academy of social sciences in Tibet.

 

The section from Xining to Golmud City in Qinghai was completed in 1984. Construction of the 1,118-km section connecting Golmud with Lhasa began in June 2001 and is expected to be completed by 2007.

 

It is also estimated that 1.8 million people will travel to and out of Tibet in 2010, 630,000 of which will make the trip by train on the Qinghai-Tibet line, the first railway stretching to Tibet.

 

Tibet accepted 930,000 tourists in 2003, who arrived in the region by air and bus.

 

The long and tiring journey by buses and expensive trips by air have greatly contained arrivals of tourists to Tibet, posing a big bottleneck for local tourism development and the regional economic growth as a whole, said Wang.

 

The operation of the railway line will not only encourage an influx of tourists, but also make it much more convenient for Tibetans to travel outside of the region, said Wang.

 

The railway line will have little impact on the performance of air services, said Wang, though he pointed out that bus transport linking Tibet with neighboring Qinghai, Sichuan and Yunnan provinces as well as Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region will largely lose their passengers to trains, which render more safe, comfortable and cheaper transport.

 

(Xinhua News Agency March 11, 2004)

 

High-speed Rail to Connect Cities
Guangzhou-Zhuhai Railway Drops Maglev
Large-scale Railway Construction to Be Launched
Chinese Railways to Have Reforms in Joint-stock System
Railway Gives Sea Outlet to Northeast Border Areas
Print This Page
|
Email This Page
About Us SiteMap Feedback
Copyright © China Internet Information Center. All Rights Reserved
E-mail: webmaster@china.org.cn Tel: 86-10-68326688