On the morning of June 25, 2021, the groundbreaking ceremony of the Longchang to Xuyong Section of the Longhuang Railway was officially held in Luzhou, Sichuan.

Longxu Railway Expansion and Reconstruction Project

The Longchang to Xuyong section of the Longhuang Railway is an important part of the National “Master Plan for the New Western Land-Sea Corridor”. The project line starts from the Longchang Station of the Chengdu-Chongqing Railway in the north and passes through the Neijiang Longchang City, Luxian County, Longmatan District, Luzhou City, etc. Jiangyang District, Naxi District, and Xuyong County have crossed the Tuojiang River and the Yangtze River to the south to the Xuyong North Station of the Xuyong-Bi Railway under construction, and will be connected to the Xuyong-Bi Railway, Bihuang Railway and Huangbai Railway under construction.

After the expansion of the Longxu Railway, the total length of the line is 138.6km, of which 109.4km is the newly built line (excluding the new Yangtze River Bridge project), the existing Longxu line is 2km, the existing Longxu line is 23.9km, and the Xubei railway under construction is used 3.2km. The expansion project is constructed in accordance with Class I, single-track, long-term double-track conditions, and a speed of 120 kilometers per hour. The estimated total investment is about 12.46 billion yuan and the planned construction period is 3.5 years. The key and controlling projects on the whole line are the Huguo Tunnel and the Luzhou Tuojiang Railway Bridge.

There are a total of 11 stations on the whole line. Among them, the existing Longchang Station, Fuji Station and Naxi Station are used, and the Xuyongbei Station is under construction. Jiaming Station, Shuangjia Station, Luzhou West Station, Tianxian Station, Huguo East Station, Jiangmen are newly built Zhendong Station and Xinglong Zhendong Station.

It is understood that the Longchang to Xuyong section of the Longhuang Railway is a convenient cargo transportation channel from the south to the sea in Sichuan Province. It is also a channel for light and fast cargo exchange between Chengdu-Chongqing, southern Sichuan and Beibu Gulf regions. The main line railway is mainly for freight transportation and also for customers. The implementation of the expansion and transformation of the project is an urgent need for Sichuan Province to implement national development strategies such as the One Belt One Road, the Western Land-Sea Channel, the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and the comprehensive transportation development plan for the Chengdu-Chongqing Double City Economic Circle to promote the opening of the southwest inland economy. After completion, it will accelerate the promotion of southbound interconnection, help improve the level of southbound opening up cooperation, actively integrate into the country’s opening-up strategy, fully connect the China-Indochina Peninsula Economic Corridor and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road, and expand the opening up with countries along the Belt and Road. Cooperation, cultivate new advantages of opening up, and further expand new space for development. Editor/He Yuting