Backgrounder: Yantai-Dalian Railway Ferry Project

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 ◆ Backgrounder: Yantai-Dalian Railway Ferry Project

The Yantai-Dalian Railway Ferry (YDRF) is an ocean railway corridor to be built by the Chinese government in the Bohai bay, connecting the provinces of Shandong and Liaoning.

It is the first major railway construction project which has accepted direct investment from overseas. It was officially approved by the government in 1997 and listed in the 10th Five-Year-Plan of Chinese Railways.

The railway project begins at Yangtouwa, Dalian City's Lushun District in the north and ends at Situdi in Yantai City in the south. It connects the south end of Liaoning East Peninsula and the north end of Shandong Peninsula, crossing 79.4 nautical miles or 147 km of the Bohai Bay.

This project is a key land-ocean link between Northeast China and the Yangtze Delta region and will shorten the traveling distance between Northeast China and the Yangtze Delta from 400 to 1,000 km.

The project will connect with the Harbin-Dalian Railway via the Lvshun branch line, and also connect with the expanding coastal railway which goes through the provinces of Shandong, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, via the railways of Lancun-Yantai and Ji'nan-Chingdao. accordingly It therefore forms an eastern coastal transport corridor from Harbin in the north to Shanghai in the south.

Road transportation in the area around the project is also very convenient.

The project is scheduled to be completed in two and a half years and to turn operational in 2005.