The Bei'an–Heihe railway, named the Beihei Railway (), is a railway line running between

Bei'an Bei'an () is a county-level city in west-central Heilongjiang province in the People's Republic of China. It is under the jurisdiction of Heihe. Bei'an was the provincial capital of Bei'an province of Manchukuo, a puppet state set up by Japan durin ...

and Heihe in Heilongjiang in north-eastern

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

. It is long with 17 stations, and was constructed between 1933 and 1935.

History

Original line

Construction of a railway line from Bei'an to Heihe was initiated by the

Manchukuo National Railway The Manchukuo National Railway (Traditional Chinese and Japanese kanji: , Japanese romanization: ''Manshū Kokuyū Tetsudō'') was the state-owned national railway company of Manchukuo. Generally called the "國線" ("National Line", ''Kokusen' ...

, which had been formed in 1933 by nationalising privately owned railways in the territory of the puppet state of

Manchukuo Manchukuo, officially the State of Manchuria prior to 1934 and the Empire of (Great) Manchuria after 1934, was a puppet state of the Empire of Japan in Northeast China, Manchuria from 1932 until 1945. It was founded as a republic in 1932 afte ...

, which had been established by Imperial Japan in the previous year. Work on the new line, called the Beihei Line (Hokkoku Line in Japanese), began at Bei'an, terminus of the main line of the former Haike Railway, in August 1933, and the first section, from Bei'an to Chenqing, was opened in November 1934. Work on the remaining section, from Chenqing to Heihe, began in May 1934, and was completed in February 1935. The complete line was inaugurated on 1 December 1935, with 20 stations, 29 bridges, and one tunnel. In August 1945, the Soviet Army invaded Manchukuo and took control of the Beihei Line. When the Heilongjiang River froze that winter, they built a temporary bridge over the ice to connect the line to the Soviet Railways at Blagoveshchensk on the other side of the border. The Soviet Army used this temporary connection to ship equipment stolen from Manchuria, and prior to the withdrawal in April 1946, the Beihei Line was ransacked, with anything moveable - locomotives, rolling stock, bridge components, tracks, etc. - being shipped to the Soviet Union. In the spring of 1949, basic repairs were undertaken on the line, but due to the difficulty of running trains, the tracks were removed in the autumn of that year.

Reconstruction

The project to rebuild the Bei'an–Heihe railway line - named Beihei Railway by

China Railway China State Railway Group Company, Ltd., doing business as China Railway (CR), is the national passenger and freight railroad corporation of the People's Republic of China. China Railway operates passenger and freight transport throughout Ch ...

- was officially initiated in May 1963, and the section from Bei'an to Longzhen was reopened in September of the same year. Service on that section began on a temporary basis in August 1964. The line from Bei'an to Jusheng was opened in November 1965, and officially put into operation in January 1966. However, the stretch from Longzhen to Jusheng was soon dismantled again, and due to worsening relations between China and the USSR, the planned reconstruction of the Longzhen–Heihe section was suspended for many years, until it was finally begun on 15 July 1986. Work was completed on 19 September 1989, and regular service between Longzhen and Heihe commenced on 14 December.

Upgrade

As of 2021, a project is underway to upgrade the Longzhen-Bei'an section of the line. Following the upgrade, the line will have a maximum speed of .

Route

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bei'an-Heihe railway Railway lines in China Rail transport in Heilongjiang Railway lines in Manchukuo Railway lines opened in 1935