The Huanan railway did not return to work until April 9th so we needed to change our plans. We decided to visit Hegang and Jixi instead. The other four lines on our itinerary which are open for foreigners to visit were all running as planned. The outlook for their survival was mixed, but in one case the prospects look much better than on my last visit in December 2006.
Survey
Hegang currently has eleven serviceable SY’s. Their first five diesel locomotives are due for delivery by April 30th and another four are due by December 2007. When all nine are in service they’ll drop the fire in their SY’s for the last time.
The passenger timetable is slightly changed. The trains only run through to Junde occasionally and usually they stop short. Freight trains to Junde are rare as well. You can ask in Xing’an, they know about the services on the lines to Junde. These lines offer some photographic potential and are not electrified.
Complete list of locomotives (all SY) in March 2007:
It’s rare these days to have some good news but here is some from Jixi! Two months ago they were planning to dieselise two systems completely in May 2007. For whatever reason they’ve now revised their plan and going to get five diesels only in 2007. Unfortunately they’ll dieselise the Hengshan system first. Hengshan is a big loss as it offers regular double headers and banked trains, sometimes both double headed and banked. Hengshan is the first system where construction work on the line was under way to make the bridges fit to carry the heavier diesels. There are no new diesel deliveries planned for 2007.
All systems operated normally with no change to the previous reports. To complete the set of Jixi maps I drew a map of the Lishu system. To put them all in one place I publish the complete set of Jixi maps here:
Jixi is one of the best remaining systems in China. The staff are very welcoming here and so far we never had any trouble taking pictures in or around the mines, in the stations or in the stabling points. You need to pay an entrance fee if you want to visit the workshop but otherwise this seems to be among the most easy accessible lines and mines in China. You even do not need a guide although a guide can help to get timetable information from the stations. This sort of information is not always accurate as the systems are dependent on the delivery of empty wagons from the state railway and the demands of the coal mines. Most accurate information we found in Hengshan and Didao while Chengzihe is somewhat unpredictable.
Even if they are able to give you the times in advance they usually don’t know which way around the loco faces. There is a triangle at the washery and the locomotives operate either tender first or chimney first. Sometimes there are banked trains, sometimes chimney first and sometimes tender first. On the line from the state railway in Xi Jixi to the eastern end in Zhengyang they operate long trains which often get a banker. Trains are pulled out of Xi Jixi usually with one loco which brings the train to Dongchang (Lijing). Here long trains get a banker and continue to Zhengyang. It’s not uncommon that a part of the train will continue to Xinghua. As Zhengyang is a reversal station the banker of the train will do this job – and faces chimney first if the banking operation was tender first before.
In my opinion the best parts of the line are the bank from Zhengyang to Xinghua, the long bridge in Xi Jixi, the small stabling point north of Nanchang and the industrial backdrops in the triangle between Dongchang and Beichang.
Once Hengshan is dieselised Chengzihe seems likely to be the best remaining steam operation in the Jixi area.
The lines to the west (Dahangshan and Shannan) are out of use.
Usually there is not much to do in the morning until the shift change at 8am. Around 8am the state railway generally delivers empties which will be propelled by the Hengshan SY’s. One of the morning trains sees usually a double header or a banked train, sometimes both and sometimes even a double headed and banked train. On most days they have a train with two locomotives which goes at least as far as Zhongxin. It’s difficult, if not impossible, to get all three locomotives in one shot as the trains to Zhongxin are often very long and no part of the lineside is sufficiently open to allow a long view. Trains work fast out of Hengshan but lose speed the closer they get to Zhongxin. Zhongxin is the reversal station for the mine at Lijing (also called Xiao Hengshan). Locomotives all face east, so trains from Hengshan to Zhongxin, Zhangxin and Erdaohezi are chimney first while trains to Lijing are tender first. The line to Lijing is on a steep uphill gradient and trains are often banked on the section Zhongxin – Lijing. The loading process at Lijing can take a while (more than one hour) but sometimes you can enjoy trains from Lijing on the photogenic spoil spurs which leaving Lijing eastwards. Spoil trains are often banked.
Trains to Zhangxin can have up to three locomotives as well but this is a rare sight. More likely you will see trains just with a banker. The best position for open landscape photography (where you can see a banker if there is one) is close to Zhangxin. The last part of the line is on a gradient where the locomotives need to work hard.
This lovely small system has two well-maintained SY’s. The locos face west which means that the uphill trains from Xinfeng, the main yard of the system, to Pinggang (11 km) are tender first. The very beautiful lines to the southwest (where locos used to operate chimney first) to the mines Sanjing, Liukeng, Bakeng and Sankeng are closed. But they still have another line to a small mine to the northeast. The mine is called both Qijing and Qikeng. To get to this mine the locos go on the “main line“ to Taiping, loop around the train and hammer chimney first uphill afterwards. There are plenty of photographic opportunities on the run towards this small mine. Unfortunately the mine’s production is small and a normal day sees only one train with a few wagons. Shortly beyond Taiping is the siding at Sijing which is still staffed. The track there looked unused. How long Qikeng will continue to produce coal is unsure. The only mine with a secure future for the next few years is Pinggang.
Loading and shunting in Pinggang can take hours. Somtimes there are spoil trains which leave Pinggang for a spoil dump at the main line down to Xinfeng. The mine in Pinggang is pink and dark blue, nothing for the lover of old brick coloured mines.
Didao’s operation was described in the trip report for January 2007.
There’s nothing new to add to the previous reports about the small operation in Donghaikuang with two SYs.
The mine at the end of the line was back in service so we could enjoy the daily freight train again.
In a new siding just beyond Shibanxi they have started to build two tourist coaches with open end platforms. At the moment the line is still as it was many years ago.
We found three locomotives under steam: no. 14 operated the passenger trains, no. 07 the freight train and no. 09 was freshly overhauled in the yard and shunted some wagons. No. 10 was in the depot minus tender but otherwise complete and obviously in working order. No locomotive was in the shed under overhaul.
The two Mudanjiang built diesels have lost their cover and are rotting away now. It’s most unlikely that they can be sold for any more than their scrap value.
The three electrics are all serviceable and are used to haul long coal trains on the 4km electrified section.
The never ending story! Although the management had been confident that the line would close by the end of December 2006 it still lingers on. For the first time they gave me some positive news: the rail operation should continue at least until the Chinese New Year early in 2008. They have never given me such a long-term forecast in the past. Ever since my first visit to this beautiful line in 1999 they have been predicting that the line would soon close, so this change of heart is most encouraging.
The wagons are in quite good condition. However the locomotives are in very poor condition mechanically as well as being dirty. It’s a tribute to the C2 design that they are still able to haul trains at all.
The operation is unchanged with one train in the morning, usually departing around 7am and returning by 8.15 and – if you are lucky – a second train around 8.45 am which returns by 10 am. Loaded trains are downhill tender first while empty trains are chimney first uphill. The unloading process at the terminus at Nihe takes only a few minutes. The coal is unloaded by gravity and is transported by an underground conveyor belt over two kilometres to a power plant.
The locomotive in service was no. 32 while no. 31 was under repair. No. 34 is dumped and will probably never return to service. They have another two boilers in the depot. I asked several people where these boilers came from. They told me that they are spares. Finally we were told that the company sold at least one locomotive, no. 33, when the passenger service stopped in the mid-1980’s but its boiler was kept as a spare. We couldn’t find out anything about the history of the other spare boiler. The more people we asked the more confusing it got. One worker said that there were ten locomotives in the 1960’s. This sounds unlikely as the line is supposed to have been opened in 1958 and has only ever been only 7.5 km long. However even this isn’t definite as another worker said that the line was in existence long before the revolution. Obviously this must have been a different line because of the concrete structure of the bridge. So far all that seems to be sure is that there were at least four locomotives until the railway withdrew the passenger service. There are still three passenger coaches in the yard and in the shed.
Operation was down to only one train a day (leaving Xiangyang around 5 pm, returning around 6.45 pm). After a mild winter demand for coal declined and prices dropped. The sparse operation started from mid-March. The railway wanted to start running three daily trains again from April 9th.
They have new plans for dieselisation and hope to buy their first diesel by mid-2008. This is bad news!
The mine in Huangmen (the village where the workshop is located) is called Xiaolongmiao. It was closed between 1994 and 1998 with the last coal train from Huangmen to Xiangyang running in 1998. Since then the line beyond the junction at Xiangyang has only been used for transferring light engines to and from the depot/workshop and occasionally for taking empty wagons for repair and for taking single wagons loaded with mining equipment to the mine at Liangjiawajing.
The railway has started to ask visiting enthusiasts for payment and the police have been called recently when I refused to pay (I mention this in my report from December 2006). This is a disturbing development which raises difficult questions for individual gricers and still more so for tour operators. The main problem, of course, is that once payment becomes the norm it makes things difficult for visitors in the future (remember Cuba). I felt I had no option but to pay the sum of 30 Yuan per person which was demanded. If not then my tour members would have had to leave empty handed and this would simply not have been fair when they had travelled such a long way to see the railway. There were two individual gricers visiting at the same time as us. They were being asked to pay 100 Yuan each but I was able to negotiate their fee down to the 30 Yuan my group was paying. Some people feel strongly that no payment should ever be made. I sympathise with this view but simply cannot, and will not, leave my tour members disappointed when the money demanded, less than 3 Euros each, is very small by western standards. It is understandable that individual railfans may well think it worthwhile to pay this sort of money as well rather than just leave the line unvisited.
After money became an issue I decided to charter a loaded coal train on the section between Huangmen (Xiaolongmiao) and Xiangyang over which the light engine movements are the only regular traffic as it makes a big difference to the photographic opportunities available on this most scenically attractive section of the railway. Again I appreciate that purists will object that the charter portrays traffic which would not otherwise run and is therefore “plastic” but frankly I think it is important to keep a sense of proportion over this. Anyway we appreciated the additional photo opportunities that this created and I really cannot see that any hard was done. The money demanded was small and, if your bargaining skills are good, would be within the reach of a group of two or three railfans. However please don’t be tempted to charter trains on the main line east from Xiangyang to Yinghao since this really could interfere with the railway’s commercial traffic and have the potential to spoil things for visitors in the future who want to photograph the regular trains there. I’m almost sure that there will be other groups who will pay a much higher amount for charter trains without making any attempt of negotiation and prices will increase quickly until the line is dieselised. So go there now or never. You had your chance to get it for free for several years, but this time has passed by. We have to admit that we’re writing 2007 AD.
Operation here was as normal and we had dry (sunny) weather. A round trip takes about one hour. As reported before all empties are uphill tender first and loaded trains are downhill chimney first. Loaded trains work hard for about one kilometre from the brick arch viaduct in Xiangyang.
Some trees have been planted close to the line near the loading point. They spoil some of the best positions but there are still plenty of exceptional photo opportunities along the line. The staff thought that the line was safe until the end of 2007.
Locomotive no. 207 was in use but suffered several technical problems which limited the number of round trips during the day to five. No. 07 was under repair in the depot.
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