China has been constructing a train-ferry project across the Bohai straits with the hope of linking up its two prominent economic powerhouses, Liaoning and Shandong provinces.

 

Information from China Railways Bohai Sea Train Ferry Co. Ltd., the developer, said workers had so far completed the supporting railway extension, with a length of 34.35 km, and port infrastructure for the train-ferry route, which will connect Dalian, a port city in northeast China's Liaoning Province, and Yantai, also a coastal city in east China's Shandong Province.

 

The train-ferry route, with a length of 86.28 miles, began construction in December 2003. On completion, it will be the second train ferry service project in China and the longest of the kind in the country.

 

The first such train ferry service is built on Qiongzhou Straits in south China, connecting Haikou on Hainan Island with Hai'an in Guangdong Province.

 

With a budget of 2.3 billion yuan (about 284 million U.S. dollars), the new train ferry service project is designed to accommodate trains, motor vehicles, as well as passengers. It will take three years to finish and begin a trial run in the latter half next year. And formal operation will start a year later.

 

For a long time, passenger and cargo exchange between China's northeast rustbelt, Shandong Peninsula and Yangtze River Delta requires to bypass Beijing and Tianjin via train service, with the length amounting to 600 km to 1,000 km, as a result of geographic limitations.

 

The new train ferry service will be of great significance to improving travel efficiency, alleviating tension by rail and rejuvenating the industrial rust belt in northeast China.

 

(Xinhua News Agency December 29, 2005)