China-Laos Railway to turn Laos from landlocked country into land-linked hub
The China-Laos Railway, a landmark project of high-quality Belt and Road cooperation, started operation on Friday.
The electrified passenger and freight railway runs 1,035 kilometers, including 422 kilometers in Laos, from the city of Kunming, southwest China's Yunnan Province, to Lao capital Vientiane.
The architecture style of the railway stations is designed to feature local culture.
Sleek bullet trains will travel at a speed of 160 kilometers per hour, through mountains and valleys.
Construction of the Laos section started in December 2016, and construction of the China part linking Yuxi and the border town of Mohan started in December 2015.
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A total of 167 tunnels and 301 bridges were built along the new sections stretching over 900 kilometers, after builders overcame many technical difficulties.
As a docking project between the Belt and Road Initiative and Laos' strategy to convert itself from a landlocked country to a land-linked one, the line will slash the travel time between Kunming to Vientiane to about 10 hours.
The railway could potentially increase aggregate income in Laos by up to 21 percent over the long term, the World Bank said in a report last year.