Rarer than Panda

In the dust of the Gobi desert in China’s far west, ultra-modernity sweeps past an eddy of industrial history in one of railway transportation’s most remarkable close encounters. Hundreds of kilometres of track are being laid to connect the country’s bullet-train network with Xinjiang, a region bordering on Central Asia. Near Sandaoling, a grim and remote mining town on the edge of Xinjiang, the new line runs close to the world’s largest concentration of steam locomotives in active service.

The Sandaoling mine, which opened in 1970, is on a branch of the old railway line between Lanzhou and Urumqi. When the bullet trains start running, coal diggers in the area expect a boom; the plan is to dedicate the old line to freight, which should make transporting coal much cheaper. Every day Sandaoling uses steam locomotives to haul thousands of tonnes of coal out of the vast pit. Around 20 are still in use, far more than a trainspotter can expect to see at work in one place anywhere else.

Source: economist

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