The Longest Tunnel in Transcaucasia Holing-Through

On the evening of May 27th Beijing time, the left line of the T9 tunnel of Georgian modern railway, built by the China Railway 23th Bureau, was successfully holing-through, which lays the foundation for the early opening and operation of modern railway in Georgia.

The Georgian Railway Modernization Project is an infrastructure reconstruction project in Georgia. The China Railway 23th Bureau has contracted the project by EPC general contracting mode. The railway, which started construction at the end of 2011, is the longest railway in Georgia and also the key way for the “Yuxinou”(Chongqing-Xinjiang-Europe) international railway.

The railway is 56.56 kilometers long and the designed speed for passenger trains is 120 kilometers per hour, 80 kilometers per hour for goods train. After the completion of the project, time taken from Tbilisi to Batumi will be shortened from more than five hours to 3 hours and 20 minutes the railway cargo capacity will be increased to 100 million tons per year, and the annual  cargo capacity  will be increased by 100%.

The project, which is scheduled to be completed by 2020, will become an important channel for neighboring countries to pass through  Georgia  to other countries, and greatly increase the speed and capacity of existing Georgian lines, which is of great significance to Georgia's economic development.