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China Upgrades Qinghai-Tibet Highway
China has launched a large project to upgrade the Qinghai-Tibet highway, the world's highest road above sea level.
This is the fifth time that the Chinese government has ever upgraded the artery which connects Tibet with the hinterland of the country, according to communications sources from the Tibet Autonomous Region in southwest China and Qinghai Province in northwest China.
The projects to be upgraded include the Riyue Mountain-Golmud section inside Qinghai, and Yangbajain-Lhasa section in Tibet, totaling more than 700 kilometers and involving an investment of 1. 5 million yuan (180 million U.S. dollars).
The 600-km-long Riyue Mountain-Golmud section is expected to be completed in 2002. The Yangbajain-Lhasa section will become the best highway in Tibet upon completion. Tibet now boasts more than 20,000 km of highways.
The 1,937-km Qinghai-Tibet highway starts from Xining, capital of Qinghai, and ends at Lhasa, capital of Tibet. It is 4,000 meters above sea level.
This highway has handled over 85 percent of the cargo going to and out of Tibet annually since it opened to traffic in 1954. At the same time, it also transports fuel into Tibet and serves as a communication link between Tibet and other parts of China. The highway surmounts 15 mountains and 25 rivers in an area with low temperature and frozen earth.
The Chinese government turned the former sand-and-stone- surfaced highway into an asphalt road in 1973. The Ministry of Communications invested 850 million yuan (102 million U.S. dollars) in 1991-1996 in upgrading the highway.
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