Hong Kong media: From Beijing to Bangkok, only the last few kilometers of railway are left
2024-08-21
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Hong Kong's "Asia Times" website on August 20, original title: Beijing-Bangkok train is only a few kilometers away from reality. Last month, with the official opening of the railway passenger train connecting Thailand and Laos, the train journey from Bangkok to Beijing became one step closer. This is the first time that cross-border railway transportation has been realized between Thailand and Laos, and it also leaves only the last few kilometers of the railway to China.
With the opening of the new Thai-Laos railway, it now takes 12 hours by train from Bangkok's Apivas Central Railway Station to Kansavat Station in Vientiane, the capital of Laos. Kansavat Station, located a few kilometers outside the center of Vientiane, is the last stop on the new Thai-Laos railway.
To reach China, passengers and freight from Bangkok still need to take taxis, vans and other forms of transport through the streets of Vientiane, crossing several kilometers from Kansawa Station to Vientiane Railway Station, which is still a few miles away from the last stretch of track that some officials say could be laid by 2028. Vientiane Railway Station is a gleaming, spacious, pointy-roofed building built by China in the northeast of the city, where high-speed trains connect Vientiane to southern China.
The new Bangkok-Vientiane line is expected to increase trade between the two Southeast Asian countries and stimulate international tourism in Laos. Previously, trains from Bangkok terminated at Nong Khai because there was only one Friendship Bridge across the Mekong River connecting Nong Khai and Vientiane. Now, Thailand and Laos have successfully extended the railway from Nong Khai to Laos by about 8 kilometers, including a new railway bridge.
To enter China from Laos, the China-Laos Railway has been in operation since 2021, from Vientiane Station via Vangrong, Luang Prabang and Mengxai to Boten Station near Xishuangbanna in Yunnan Province. Subsequent trains from Boten connect to all railway destinations in China, including Kunming, Beijing, Shanghai and Tibet. The sleek trains travel through northern Laos, passing through hundreds of tunnels, dodging rugged karst hills, small waterfalls and unexploded bombs dropped by the United States in the last century.
A person in charge of the Vientiane Logistics Park said that the China-Laos Railway is particularly beneficial to agricultural products because the goods remain fresh when they reach Chinese consumers, and fresh products sell at a good price. The beneficiaries of fast transportation are consumers and farmers. (Author Richard Ehrlich, translated by Chen Xin)▲
