New railroads in Tibet open up economic possibilities
September 6, 2009 – 3:33 amNote: You might want to open Google Earth or some other map-tool before starting to read this article.
Lhasa, a fast growing city in Tibet on its path to modernity with an impressive mountainous background.
Tibet (西藏) is currently mostly known for public unrest and fruitless dialogs on the one hand and beautiful culture and nature on the other. But this might change and investing in Tibet might be mainstream soon, too. Until 2006 it was quite hard to get to Tibet. You could either take the road, be a victim to reckless drivers and drown in some nameless icy mountain river or take the plane and take a chance to get a first hand impression of lithobreaking1 into the flank of some 5000+ meter mountain. Beginning at 1. July 2006 the Qinghai Tibet railway, also known as qingzang railway (青藏铁路), started operations. A ride on the 1956 kilometer long railway that peaks at 5072 meters takes about 12 hours and with this method of traveling chances of arriving healthy have increased dramatically. The qingzang railway connects Xining (西宁) the capital of Qinghai (青海) with Lhasa (拉萨), which is the capital of Tibet. About halfway the train stops at Golmud / Ge’ermu (格尔木).
While nostalgics and patriotic Tibetians probably are not so happy about the qingzang railway, other elements of the Chinese society are rather happy. I’m personally not a conservative and it simply is a matter of fact that ethnicities as they exist today will only be a fairy tale in a few hundred years. Not connecting developed China with Tibet only delays the unavoidable mixing of the ethnicities. Furthermore racial prejudices mainly exist there where one ethnicity does not come in contact with others – a phenomenon that can be observed worldwide. Go to any small countryside village where the population is ethnically homogeneous and compare with a big multicultural city. Therefore I cannot understand the crying of the Dalai Lama for independence or autonomy.
But the qingzang railway is not the end, rather a beginning to the Western China Development (西部大开发). A number of projects are planned to bring Tibet up to speed. Let me draw an overview with an focus on Tibet.
Newly planned railway connections in Tibet
- Lhasa <-> Xigazê <-> Zhangmu (拉萨 <-> 日喀则 <-> 樟木)
- Lhasa <-> Khasha / Nepal (拉萨 <-> ? / 尼泊尔)
- Lhasa <-> Chengdu (拉萨 <-> 成都)
- Lhasa <-> Kunming (拉萨 <-> 昆明)
The extension from Lhasa to Xigazê is a short addition and a logical extension to the qingzang railway line. This line then further extends to Zhangmu which is just west of Mount Everest, close to Nepal and not far from the Nepalese capital Kathmandu (加德滿都). A connection from Lhasa to Nepal is planned, the station on the Nepalese side should be in Khasha. (I couldn’t really locate that one on a map or find the Chinese equivalent for it, please comment if You know something). Maybe this is just a city on the Nepalese side not far from Zhangmu. This extension through Xigazê to Nepal should be completed before 2013
A surprise is the possible extension to Chengdu in Sichuan (四川) and/or Kunming in Yunnan (云南). Both would be expensive projects that could cost billions. This year in autumn the Kunming <-> Dali railroad (昆明 <-> 大理) will see the opening of the further extension to Lijiang (丽江). It is planed that another extension could lead to Lhasa someday. After reading some websites these new railroad lines in Tibet could start operations in the early 2020s.
All these new railroad lines probably will definitely strengthen the economy in Lhasa and many other parts of Tibet. If You like Tibet as many 外国人 do, then the upcoming economic rise of Tibet might be of interest to You. Or maybe we can see Tibet as a region with lots of cheap sweatshops producing cheap goods for the west. Not unlikely given the realities of the Chinese coast, where the production of goods slowly moves to the inner parts due to rising living standards and costs. It is also unknown what undiscovered natural resources might be found someday in the mountains of Tibet. This also opens up opportunities for the Chinese – Indian trade, although some tensions have to be overcome first.
Previously I was pretty bored by Tibet, but now with these possibilities I’m suddenly excited about this place. Maybe I can visit Tibet during the next years. Investing in real estate in Lhasa could pay of at some point not to far into the future. To be honest, if You asked me yesterday I would have laughed at investing in realestate in Tibet or Lhasa, but now I think this is a viable option. I might even say this is hot right now! At the same time this could also be a boost for Kunming and Chengdu, which I have both visited before. I really start to like the south-west of China. And somehow I’m happy that I’m learning my Mandarin Chinese with a slight southern accent. Who needs the frosty north if so much is happening in the hot south-west.
西藏自治区 Xīzàng zìzhìqū – Tibet Autonomous Region
西藏 Xīzàng – Tibet
拉萨 Lāsà – Lhasa (capital of Tibet)
青海 Qīnghǎi – Qinghai
西宁Xīníng – Xining (capital of Qinghai)
格尔木 Gé’ěrmù – Golmud (city in Qinghai)
青藏铁路 Qīngzàng Tiělù – Qinghai Tibet railway / qingzang railway
西部大开发 Xībù Dàkāifā – China Western Development
日喀则 Rìkāzé – Xigazê (second largest city in Tibet)
樟木 zhāngmù – Zhangmu (small town just west of Mount Everest inside Tibet at the Nepalese border)
尼泊尔 Níbóěr – Nepal
加德滿都 jiā dé mǎn dū – Kathmandu (capital of Nepal)
四川 Sìchuān – Sichuan
成都 Chéngdū – Chengdu (capital of Sichuan)
云南 Yúnnán – Yunnan
昆明 Kūnmíng – Kunming (capital of Yunnan)
大理 dàlǐ – Dali (small touristic city in Yunnan, west of Kunming)
丽江 lì jiāng – Lijiang (small town in Yunnan not far from Dali)
(1) lithobraking is a term from astrophysics. You might have heard the word lithosphere, which means the outer stony crust of the earth or any other solid body (planet, asteroid, …) in the universe. When an spacecraft coming from space wants to land on earth (or any other solid body with an athmosphere) a technique called aerobraking is used, which basically says that excess speed of the spacecraft is consumed by friction with the athmosphere and the spacecraft slows down in a healthy way. Landing on a body without atmosphere is way harder as aerobraking can’t be used, because obviously there is no atmosphere. With lithobraking, a word derived from aerobraking, the spacecraft could use the friction of the lithosphere (read: cold hard stones) to slow down (read: crash violently). In the above text lithobraking is used as an euphemism. Com’on… “plane crash” sounds so old fashioned 
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