New high-speed railway station to start operating by 2015

This artistic representation shows a bird’s eye view of the high-speed railway station which is under construction

Construction of the new high-speed railway station, in the Toutunhe district of Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, began in April, and the company in charge of the project said that it is expected to be put into use by 2015.

"The new railway station will be built step by step. It started with the northern part, and the project will focus on the southern part next year," said Zhang Peiyong, deputy managing director of the Urumqi High-Speed Railway Hub Comprehensive Development & Construction Investment Co.

"The rest work including square construction and landscape touch-up will be finished by 2015," he added.

The government expects to spend a total of 2.7 billion yuan on the new station, which covers an area of 750,000 square meters with a 110,000-square-meter building area.

Zhang also said that the Urumqi high-speed rails may have a pilot run via the new railway station by the end of 2014. And the new station will officially start operating in the second half of 2015.

The Urumqi high-speed rail extends 1,776 kilometers across the provinces of Xinjiang, Gansu, and Qinghai.

Edited by Zhou Yuanyuan and Roger Bradshaw