Tour in Kaiyuan by meter-gauge railway

Since it was put into operation in southeast Yunnan’s Kaiyuan City on July 20 this year, the Kaiyuan meter-gauge railway has transported 37,082 passengers. It is one of the sections of the century-old Yunnan-Vietnam Meter-gauge Railway.

Open to traffic in 1910, the Yunnan Vietnam Railway is 854 kilometers long, connecting Kunming of Yunnan province with Haiphong, Vietnam. For more than a century, it had facilitated the connectivity between southwest China and Southeast Asia through Vietnam. And its legendary history has endowed the cities along it with industrial heritages. 

However, with the development of standard gauge railways, the operation of passenger trains was stopped in the Chinese section (Kunming-Hekou) of the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway in 2003. 

The Yunnan-Vietnam Railway passes through the downtown Kaiyuan which was once regarded as a city prosperous for railways. In recent years, the city has made great efforts to improve its eco environment and develop local tourism, offering its citizens and tourists more destinations for recreations. 

This year, under the joint effort of China Railway Kunming Bureau and the Kaiyuan City government, the meter-gauge railway was reopened to traffic, starting from the Fenghuang Lake Eco Park and ending at the Ten-mile Cherry Flower Street. The revival of the railway not only facilitates the public transportation of the city, but also opens a new tourism route for visitors. 

Accordingly, there are 4 pairs of trains running on the meter-gauge railway on a daily basis. And it has a capacity of 186 passengers for each trip.

(Text and Photos from Wechat public account Kunming Railway)

Editor: John Li