| Color: | 025E21 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Other Name: | Bao-Cheng railway, Bao-Cheng line | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Module: |
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| Native Name Lang: | zh | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Type: | Heavy rail[1] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| System: | China Railway | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Status: | In operation | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Start: | Baoji | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| End: | Chengdu | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Open: | January 1, 1958 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Yearcompleted: | July 12, 1956 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Event1label: | Electrified | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Event1: | July 1, 1975 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Linelength Km: | 676 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Gauge: | 1435 mm | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Minradius: | less than 300 m (980 ft) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Electrification: | 50 Hz 25kV overhead | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Speed Km/H: | 120 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Map State: | collapsed | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The Baoji–Chengdu railway,[2] Bao-Cheng railway or Bao-Cheng Line was formerly designed as a rail line that connects Tianshui and Chengdu called Tianshui-Chengdu railway or Tiancheng railway .[3] The line is a mixed single- and double-track, electrified, 676-kilometer railroad in China between Baoji in Shaanxi province and Chengdu in Sichuan province. The line finished construction on 12 July 1956 and the operation began on 1 January 1958.[4] The rail line is also the first one throughout China to get electrified.[5] The Baoji-Guangyuan section of the line is under the control of China Railway Xi'an Group, and the rest is in charge of China Railway Chengdu Group.[6] The line is one of main lines that connects southwestern with northwestern China[7] and a part in Lanzhou-Kunming Corridor of the Eight Verticals.[8]
The Bao-Cheng Line runs southwards from Guanzhong Plain to Sichuan Basin and traverses the Qinling, Daba Mountains and Jianmen after leaving Baoji,[9] as the rail line goes through 5 different zones of geological structure (including granite, quartzite, greenschist, conglomerate and slate) [10] and an aggregate of 80% are in the mountainous area. The line stretches along the ancient roads and Qingjiang River after entering the Qin Mountains, as the track elevates with the slope of 30‰ in the Renjiawan-Yangjiawan section[11] and the steepest section can reach 33‰. Spiral is applied to make the topographical difficulties within the locomotives' reach by 3 horseshoe-shaped tracks and a figure-8 one, which is stacked in 3 layers and raised up to 817 meters. In avoidance to overheat of brakes during the downhill journey, Qingshiya station was established in the spiral to make the locomotives cool down, as the station is also the highest and steepest station with the smallest radius throughout the line.[12] A 2363.6-meter-long tunnel[13] brings the line to the Jialing River's drainage basin,[14] and the line starts its 12‰ downhill slope towards Guangyuan[15] with 14 bridges across the river in Qinling-Lüeyang section. The line has 304 tunnels and 1,001 bridges, which collectively account for 17% of the total track length.[16] The 4-kilometer Huilongchang Tunnel is the longest tunnel of the line.[17]
The line features several sections where slopes are long and steep and have multiple curves, especially the Baoji-Qinling one. The power of steam locomotives was so low that it had greatly degraded the line's transporting capabilities after the line's operation began, and the Guanyinshan Spiral took trains almost the same time to pass with the pedestrians.[18] Therefore, the line was listed high on the agenda of rail electrification. The line finished electrification in 1976, and has been using electric locomotives until now. Bank engines are still employed so far to secure the abundant power during the mountain climb and brakes for downhill journeys in Baoji-Qinling section[19] with the help of HXD3 locomotives[20] - 1 for passenger coaches and 2 for freight coaches[21] . The aggregate weight of trains to climb the mountains is limited to no more than 3000 tons and 2600 tons for the downhill ones.
The line began its construction for another track in 1993 and the double-track section came into operation on 26 December 1999. The Baoji-Chengdu Railway was added to List of China's Industrial Heritages for Conservation in January 2018.[22] [23]
The rail tracks succeeded in making cities along the line core regions of the Third Front and played a key role in the fundamental supplies for the cities within the plan.[24] The openings of Xi'an-Chengdu Highspeed Railway on 6 December 2017 made the number of passenger trains on the start-from-Baoji line decrease to roughly 20.[25]
In Baoji, the line meets the Longhai railway, on which trains can travel east to Xi'an and the Central Plains or west to Lanzhou and the northwest, and Baoji-Zhongchuan railway. At Yangpingguan, the line intersects with the Yang'an railway which branches eastward along the Han River Valley.[26] In Chengdu, the line connects with the Chengyu Line to Chongqing, Chengqian Line to Guizhou, and Chengkun Line to Kunming.[27] The line meets Xi'an-Chengdu Highspeed Railway and Lanzhou-Chongqing railway in Guangyuan.[28]
The Bao-Cheng line was originally proposed in Sun Yat-sen's 1913 China National railway plan as part of the Datong–Chengdu railway[29] but failed to put the plan to practice because of the oversized scale. Beiyang government re-suggested schemes regarding a rail line that connects Tianshui with Chengdu in 1920 and the aerial topographical surveys for the line's section in Shaanxi Province were conducted by the project group in 1936, which was followed by 1940 and 1947 surveys,[30] but the blueprint was still not put into practice.Ministry of Railways of China P. R. managed to conduct further surveys for the Tianshui-Lüeyang section of the 1920 scheme along with a brand-new Baoji-Lüeyang one with the assistance of experts from Soviet Union, and the new one was selected after comparisons of the geological and transportation network conditions with the former one.[31] [32] Construction of the line was added to the First Five-year Plan afterwards.[33]
Construction began in Chengdu on 1 July 1952, when Mao Zedong instructed on the opening ceremony of Chengdu-Chongqing railway that "keep going on to turn the Tianshui-Chengdu railway into real",[34] and the construction throughout Sichuan began in 1953, as Track laying work of the railway started from the south to the north at the Chengdu end in April. The construction featured the technological assistance of over 30 Soviet along with 2 Hungarian experts as well as material supplies from residents along the line.[30] The maximum number of workers involved had reached 140 thousand during the construction.[35] The line got renamed as Baoji-Chengdu Railway on 1 December 1952 and construction in Shaanxi Province started from Baoji in January 1954. On 10 August 1955, under the guidance of Soviet experts, China Railway successfully carried out the grand blastings for Guanyinshan Station, which was also the first successful large-scale blasting throughout the history of China's railway construction.[36] The line got connected on 12 July 1956 in Huangshahe Village of Huixian County, Longnan,[30] which was 13 months ahead of schedule, and opened on 1 January 1958. Steam locomotives had been employed since then.[37]
The preparations for the electrification project of Baoji-Chengdu railway began in 1953. The MOR initially set the catenary to 3 kV DC and submitted the plan to the Soviet counterparts for evaluations in June 1955, but decisions were made again in April 1957 that single-phase electric power of 25 kV with utility frequency should be employed after the knowledge that other countries have been using this upgraded style, and the project was re-schemed soon after.
The new design was reevaluated by Moscow in May 1958 and put into practice after the agreement in June.[38] Engineers decided to reduce the demanded amount of the transformers from 6 to 4 for substations due to lack of key ingredients for silicon steel and high prices for imports because of the technological deniances from the Western countries, of which 3 were implemented in the substations and the rest 1 was placed on a flat wagon that travels among the 3 substations. The decision gave birth to China's first mobile transformer in 1965.
MOR kept insisting that electric locomotives should adopt both domestic and foreign production lines, as the domestic 6Y1 prototype of Shaoshan series began its experimental run in the 1960s and 25 imported have arrived at ports of mainland China, which later turned the major type of locomotives after the electrification in Baoji-Fengzhou section finished in 1961. The other 4 sections finished their electrifications respectively afterward before July 1 1975 when the ceremony of celebration took place.[39] The electrification made the line's maximum speed upgraded to 80 km/h, and further improvements on the shape and flexibility of cables were made around 1978.[40]
The HXD locomotive series was officially employed on the line after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake in pursuit of faster freight transportation with the help of the high power of the new locomotives. Substations started to be replaced by SCADA for smart and automatic controls to ensure continuous and abundant supplies of electricity.
MOR established an expert group in accordance to the frequent landslides on the line[41] [42] in 1955. 3 tunnels of a total length of 1,439 m and 10 culverts of 657 m had been built in Sichuan until late 1957 to improve the before-operation situation.
Xi'an Group, Chengdu Group and Lanzhou Group of MOR, in line with the principle of "opening first and then consolidating, taking care of the future", took measures to restore and reinforce the damaged bridges and roadbeds along the line after the 1981 flood on the line with over 15 thousand workers.
MOR decided to divert the high-slope section with limited capacity between Luomiaozhen and Majiaoba in December 1959. The diversion began on 15 February 1960 and was suspended in April 1962. The project restarted in November 1964 and finished in September 1969. Series of large-scale capacity improvements were made later on to meet the demands of economic growth and social development.
Another upgrade was made in September 1990 between Guangyuan and Majiaoba on the automatic block signaling of axle counters, making the punctuality increase by 3.9 percent for freight trains and 0.3 percent for the passenger ones. The line completed its heavy rail upgrade in 1993, the year when the second track construction started on the line. The line's second track lies on its Yangpingguan-Chengdu section, as the capacity got greatly improved after its finish on 26 December 1999.[43] The second track in the Yangpingguan-Qingbaijiang section is also the first additional in-mountains track among China's electrified railway lines.[44] From 2008 to 2009, the line completed a seamless transformation; in 2014, the line once again upgraded the profiles and ties on the small radius curve of the main line.
The Sichuan government issued a plan about the provincial multi-layer rail transit system in 2021 and mentioned that a total length of 24.1 km and 10 stations on the Baoji-Chengdu Railway would be transformed to fit for a metro-styled operation, with trains traveling with smaller coaches but shorter intervals.[45] This plan also mentioned that the maximum speed of the line's Chengdu-Qingbaijiang section would be increased to 160 km/h owing to the transformation.[46]
China Railway issued a call for a new wave of capacity improvements on 30 May 2024.
The Huixian-Chengdu section of the line was once separated into 4 parts for temporary operations, of which the Chengdu-Mianyang section began in October 1953, Mianyang-Zhongba section began in February 1954, Zhongba-Guangyuan section began in February 1955 and the rest began in October 1956.
The temporary operation phase mainly focused on deliveries for construction-related materials, and some passengers were also granted with the ride - a collective amount of 2.75 million tons of road materials along with 2.42 million tons of local materials and 3.02 million passengers got delivered before the 1958 official openings. The temporary operations also made the line critical for goods and passengers to leave and enter Sichuan Basin in June 1956, when service of roadways had been dropped due to the 19-day storm season. The 1957 urgent food transmission from Sichuan, which was called by the State Council, also made the Bao-Cheng Line involved by delivering all 800 thousand tons of grains.
The official operations of Chengdu-Guangyuan section began in January 1955, and Guangyuan-Mianyang section was consigned in October. In January 1958, the Guangyuan-Fengzhou section of the line turned into official operations, which marked the end of the temporary operation period of Baoji-Chengdu railway.
Baoji-Chengdu Railway was assessed as "qualified and good project" after National Acceptance Committee's check during the stage of temporary operations. The committee also noted that the line featured short duration of construction, low costs, high rate of handing over fixed assets and quick comeback for the previous investments.
The Chengdu Group and Zhengzhou Group took control of the line initially. The Fengzhou-Shangxiba section of the line was transmitted to Xi'an Group for controls after it was separated from Zhengzhou Group in September 1958.[47] The section was then transmitted back to Zhengzhou after Zhengzhou Group got reunified and got transmitted to Xi'an again after Xi'an Group's 18-March independence in 2005.[48]
Opening ceremonies of Chengdu-Mianyang and Mianyang-Guangyuan sections had taken place already on 1 October 1953 and 1 January 1955 respectively,[49] which was followed by a 1956 ceremony for Guangyuan-Lüeyang section on the New Year's Day.[50]
The official opening ceremony of the whole line took place at 2 p.m. in Chengdu railway station on the New Year's Day of 1958. He Long, Nie Rongzhen, Kang Sheng, Teng Daiyuan, Huang Kecheng and other political figures in mainland China along with the vice minister of Union of Burma attended the ceremony, while Radio Moscow and major radio broadcasts in China conducted interviews and reports on the day.He Long started the ceremony with a speech which was followed by ones from Teng Daiyuan, the minister of MOR, Zhao Shoushan, the governor of Shaanxi Province, Huang Zhengqing, the vice governor of Gansu Province, Li Dazhang, the governor of Sichuan Province, Peskunov, the representative of Soviet experts and other workers, and hosted a ribbon cutting at 3 p.m.[51] An express train left Chengdu for Beijing at 4 p.m., which marked the total opening of the Bao-Cheng Railway. The train was also the first to-capital train for residents throughout southwestern China.[52]
Another ceremony was held to celebrate the finish of the line's electrification on 1 July 1975 in Chengdu railway station.[53] SS1008 locomotive, the first pusher that be named after the type Shaoshan, attended the ceremony.
2 homicide wanted fled from Guangxi on 10 May 1987 and hijacked a taxi in Baoji to enter Guanyinshan railway station of the line on 20 May. Police officer in the station, along with station operators, found them 2 suspicious and brought them back to the duty room. The 2 criminals suddenly shot the 3 in-station workers and fled into the mountains. Public Security Bureau in Shaanxi made immediate urgent plans after receiving the call of help and ask for the assistance from counterparts in Sichuan and Gansu. The 2 wanted got arrested at 3.45 p.m. on 22 May in Baoji and all firearms are handed out.[54]
China Railway Xi'an Group intended to preserve only 2 trains on the line after the storms in July 2018 in search of stabilities and securities for trains' service, but received complaints from residents in Gansu and Shaanxi Provinces. [55] [56] Xi'an decided to withdraw by recovering operations of 6 more trains on the line, but instructed that all these passenger trains must pass the Yangpingguan-Lüeyang section before sun falls.[57]
It was no more than a decade after the foundation of China P. R. when Baoji-Chengdu Railway was built, and the level of economy was not high enough to secure the standard of technologies applied for railway constructions due to lack of facilities. Accidents thus keep occurring from the line's establishment in a high frequency due to the extreme weather along the railway.[58]
In 1982, China Railway Xi'an Group determined that route should be changed near Lingguanxia due to the subgrade sink which was caused by the mountain shifts. The construction finished in 1986.
On 21 June 1984, a seat coach was attacked by 3 rocks that fell from a mountain in Wangjiatuo-Lesuhe section, as 5 passengers got injured and coach windows got demolished.
2008 Sichuan earthquake denied Tunnel No. 109 on the line, in which an oil tank coach exploded after being hit by a falling rock due to the disaster.[59] A new Tunnel 109 was built on 12 November 2008, which abandoned the former Tunnel 110 for a faster speed of trains.[60] The earthquake also made the entire line's service pause for 12 days.[61]
In the afternoon of 19 August 2010, a bridge of the railway in Guanghan was brought down by floods, as 2 coaches of a train on the bridge at that time fell into the river.[62] All 1,318 passengers on the train were evacuated with no one injured[63] The bridge got rebuilt on 21 August[64] and the service got restored on 13 October.[65]
In July 2024, over 70 places on the line got destroyed by the flood in Baoji. In the midnight of 17 July, a safety maintenance locomotive fall down from a flood-destroyed bridge into river.[66] On 10 August, services of the section got restored.
Baoji-Chengdu Railway succeeded in cultivating talents regarding the design, construction and manufacturings of electric locomotives and railroads owing to its role as the first electrified railway line in China, which had pushed forward domestic education regarding electrical engineering. The great benefits that this line had brought also made the MOR convinced that all lines should employ electrical networks afterwards,[67] which spelt an increasing demand on electric operations and therefore an increasing number of related schools in colleges nationwide. This in turn brought more talents for further promotion of electrified railroads in China.[68]
Yan Yi, a writer from Hebei, published The Rainbow Bridge, a 1500-row narrative poetry in July 1957 basing on stories of bridge construction in the Bao-Cheng Line. [69]
In 1958, Du Pengcheng, another domestic writer, published A Night Walk in Lingguanxia, a novel basing on his interview and experiences at the construction site of the line in 1955 autumn. The work was once copied to Mandarin Chinese textbooks in some regions.[70]
In 2008, Fengxian transformed the abandoned tunnels after the 1980s flood to scenic spots for tourism.[71]
Xujiaping, a town in Lüeyang County, cooperates with China Railway Xi'an Group[72] to transform ruins of tunnels and railroads for cultural zones.[73] The ruins now have been listed as a provincial site for preservation.[74] China Railway Xi'an Group also built museums and theme parks regarding the line near Qinling railway station on 18 May 2022.[75]
Baoji Locomotive Maintenance Factory held the 2nd National Stamp Collecting Exhibition on Rail Cultures with the aim of celebrating the 65th anniversary of the line's official operations in April 2023.[76] The exhibition was also intended to celebrate the achievements China P. R. have reached and to stimulate the patriotism of the public.[77]
Descendants concluded the superb spirits of workers on the line as the "Bao-Cheng Spirit", which stands for "Say no to quit, say no to surrender, say no to equivocate" and got passed down to nowadays.[78]