经济学人：通向西藏的新铁路 [英国媒体]

A new railway to Tibet

通向西藏的新铁路

Doubling down

双管齐下，双重挑战

Plans for a new railway line intoTibet pose a huge technological challenge—and a political one

新的铁路进藏计划面临巨大的技术挑战——以及政治挑战



“A COLOSSAL roller-coaster” is how a senior engineer describedit. He was talking about the railway that China plans to build from thelowlands of the south-west, across some of the world’s most forbidding terrain,into Tibet. Of all the country’s railway-building feats in recent years, thiswill be the most remarkable: a 1,600-kilometre (1,000-mile) track that willpass through snow-capped mountains in a region racked by earthquakes, withnearly half of it running through tunnels or over bridges. It will also bedogged all the way by controversy.

“它是一个巨型过山车”，一位高级工程师这样形容道。他谈到了中国计划建设的铁路，它从西南部的盆地起始，跨越一些世界上最令人望而却步的地形，直入西藏。纵观近年来全球铁路建设，这项工程的成就将无出其右：长达1600公里（约合1000英里）的轨道将穿越地震带上积雪覆盖的山脉，其中有一半里程将会是桥梁或隧道。而这项工程本身也将自始至终都饱受争议。

Chinese officials have dreamed of such a railway line for acentury. In 1912, shortly after he took over as China’s first president, SunYat-sen called for a trans-Tibetan line, not least to help prevent Tibet fromfalling under the sway of Britain (which had already invaded Tibet from India adecade earlier). Mao Zedong revived the idea in the 1950s. In the years since,many exploratory surveys have been carried out.

中国官员们梦想着这样一条铁路已有一个世纪了。在1912年，在孙中山当选了第一任中国总统后不久，就提出要修建一条穿藏铁路，特别是要借此来使西藏摆脱英国的统治（此时距离英国从印度支那入侵西藏已有10年了）。（注：可能指的就是川藏铁路，早在1899年，孙中山就提出修建一条由江宁到成都再进西藏的铁路，除此之外还有青藏铁路和滇藏铁路。他希望通过这三条入藏线路，使西藏形成面向中国内地的扇形铁路网络，从而改变西藏因交通落后而与内地隔阂的状况。）毛泽东在上世纪五十年代又重拾了这个想法。自此之后，许多勘探测量得以完成。

But it is only after building the world’s second-longest railwaynetwork—including, in the past few years, by far the biggest high-speedone—that China’s government has felt ready to take on the challenge. It had awarm-up with the construction of the first railway into Tibet, which opened in2006. That line, connecting Lhasa with Golmud in Qinghai province to the north(and extended two years ago from Lhasa to Tibet’s second city, Shigatse), wasproclaimed to be a huge accomplishment. It included the highest-altitudestretch in the world, parts of it across permafrost. It required ingeniousheat-regulating technology to keep the track from buckling.

但这项工程是在中国建设了世界第二长的铁路系统（注：世界最长的铁路系统在美国，美国的普通铁路系统还是很发达的。）之后才迟来的决定，尤其是过去几年中国还建立了世界最长的高铁系统----中国政府感觉自己已经准备好迎接挑战了。中国已经建设了第一条进藏的铁路作为热身，这就是2006年开通的青藏铁路。这条线路将拉萨向北和青海的格尔木连接起来（并且在两年前还从拉萨延伸到了西藏第二大城市日喀则），被称为是一项伟大成就。它包含了世界最高海拔的路段，有一部分还穿越了永久冻土。这个路段需要用到巧妙的热调节技术来防止轨道变形。

China further honed its skills with the opening of a high-speedline across the Tibetan plateau in 2014—though in Qinghai province, rather thanin Tibet proper. But neither track had anything like the natural barriers thatthe Sichuan-Tibet line will face. It will be just under half as long again asthe existing line to Tibet, but will take three times longer to build. Thesecond line’s estimated cost of 105 billion yuan ($16 billion) is several timesmore than the first one. Lhasa is about 3,200 metres (10,500 feet) higher thanChengdu, yet by the time the track goes up and down on the way there—crossing14 mountains, two of them higher than Mont Blanc, western Europe’s highestmountain—the cumulative ascent will be 14,000 metres. The existing road from Chengduto Lhasa that follows the proposed route into Tibet is a narrow highway notablefor the wreckage of lorries that have careered off it. Some Chinese driversregard the navigation of Highway 318 as the ultimate proof of their vehicles’,and their own, endurance.

中国已经通过建设一条穿行青藏高原的高铁线路进一步磨砺了技术，这条线路在2014年开通----虽然在青海，而不是真正的西藏。但没有一条线路遇到过川藏铁路将面对的自然屏障。它两端城市的直线距离不到现在青藏铁路里程的一半，但需要建设的里程却要三倍于青藏铁路。第二条进藏铁路预估将花费的1050亿人民币（约合160亿美元）数倍于第一条线路。拉萨的海拔比成都高3200米（约合10500英尺），然而真正的沿途的路会高低起伏----要翻越14座山，其中两座比西欧最高峰勃朗峰还要高----所以累计爬升高度将达14000米。现有的成都去往拉萨的建议进藏路线是一条狭窄的高速公路，这条路因冲出路面而坠毁的卡车残骸而为人所知。一些中国司机把在318国道上行驶视为对他们爱车的质量，以及对自己耐力的终极检验。

Work on easier stretches of the railway line, closest to Lhasaand Chengdu respectively, began in 2014. Now the government appears to begetting ready for the tougher parts. A national three-year “plan of action”,adopted in March for major transport-infrastructure projects, mentions the mostdifficult stretch: a 1,000km link between Kangding in Sichuan and the Tibetanprefecture of Linzhi (Nyingchi in Tibetan). The plan says this should be“pushed forward” by 2018. It will involve 16 bridges to carry the track overthe Yarlung Tsangpo river, known downstream as the Brahmaputra. Dai Bin ofSouthwest Jiaotong University in Chengdu says the Chengdu-Lhasa line could befinished by around 2030.

最容易的路段建设开始于2014年，分别是最接近拉萨和成都的路段。现在，政府看上去已经对更艰难的路段做好准备了。一个关于主要交通基础设施建设的全国性的三年“行动计划”在三月正式实施，其中提到了最艰难的路段：1000公里长的连接四川康定和西藏林芝的部分。计划称这个路段应提前至2018年开工。它涉及到16座桥梁来运输铁轨跨过雅鲁藏布江，它的下游也就是我们熟知的布拉马普特拉河（注：在印度境内称为布拉马普特拉河，为南亚第二大河，仅次于恒河。）西南交大的戴斌说，成都到拉萨的整个路段预计在2030年左右建成。



In Litang, a town high up in Sichuan on that difficult stretch,a Tibetan monk speaks approvingly of the project, which will bring moretourists to the remote community and its 16th-century monastery (rebuilt sincethe Chinese air force bombed it in 1956 to crush an uprising). But the impacton Tibet of the Golmud-Lhasa line still reverberates. It fuelled a tourism boomin Lhasa that attracted waves of ethnic Han Chinese from other parts of Chinato work in industries such as catering and transport. The resentment it createdamong Tibetans, who felt excluded from the new jobs, was a big cause of riotingin Lhasa in 2008 that ignited protests across the plateau. The new line willcut through some of the most restive areas. Since 2011 more than 110 Tibetansare reported to have killed themselves by setting themselves on fire in protestat China’s crackdown after the unrest. Some of the self-immolations havehappened in Tibetan-inhabited parts of Sichuan, including near Litang.

在四川理塘，这个艰难路段中处于高点的小镇，一位西藏的僧人对这个工程表示赞许，它将为这个遥远的小镇和其中16世纪的寺院带来更多游客（1956年因为中国空军镇压暴动而被空袭毁坏，后重建）。但是西藏的格尔木拉萨段的影响仍然余波未平。它引爆了拉萨旅游业的繁荣，它吸引了大批中国其他地区的汉族人到此从事餐饮和运输业。这使藏族人滋生了不满，他们觉得新工作将他们排除在外，这也是2008年拉萨骚乱的重要原因，而这也引发了遍及这片高原的广泛不满（注：此处经济学人引用的是达赖喇嘛的说法）。这条新铁路将穿过那些最不稳定的地区。自2011年开始，超过110名藏人被报道通过自焚的方式来抗议引骚乱招致的中国政府的镇压。一些自我牺牲者已经出现在了四川的藏族聚居区，包括在理塘附近。

With spectacular views, the new line is sure to be a big draw.It is also sure to attract many migrant workers from Sichuan, a province of 80mpeople, to cash in on Tibet’s tourism. The journey time from Chengdu to Lhasa isa gruelling three days by road, or more than 40 hours by train through Qinghai.The new line will reduce it to a mere 15 hours.

凭着壮观的景致，新线路必定会颇具吸引力。同样可以确定的是，它将吸引来自8000万人口的四川省的许多打工仔，靠西藏的旅游业赚钱。从成都至拉萨如果走公路的话，那么需要熬人的三天时间，从青海坐火车也要超过40小时。而新线路则将时间缩短到仅仅15小时。

Officials see other benefits. The route will cross a region richin natural resources, from timber to copper. It will also, to India’sconsternation, pass close to the contested border between the two countries.(China says India occupies “south Tibet”, and launched a brief invasion ofIndia there in 1962.) A Chinese government website, China Tibet News, said in2014 that building the Sichuan-Tibet railway had become “extremely urgent”, notjust for developing Tibet but also to meet “the needs of national-defence-building”.

官员们还看到了其他好处。这条路线穿越了一个自然资源丰富的地区，从木材到铜应有尽有。让印度惊慌失措的是，它还将穿越靠近两国争议边界的地区。（中国称印度占领了“藏南”，于1962年在此地发动了一场短暂的入侵。）一个名为“中国西藏新闻”的中国政府网站，在2014年称修建川藏铁路已经变得“刻不容缓”，不仅是为了发展西藏经济，也是为了迎合“国防建设的需要”。

Communist partyofficials in Tibet hope that the new line will be just the start of arailway-building spree in the once-isolated region. On May 16th TibetDaily, the government mouthpiece in Tibet, said that work would startin the coming five years on around 2,000km of track. It would include a linefrom Shigatse to Yadong (or Dromo), near the border with India and Bhutan, andanother one to Jilong (or Gyirong), near the border with Nepal. China’s railwaychief talks of “the extreme importance of railway-building for Tibet’sdevelopment and stability”. The region’s recent history offers scant evidence.

西藏的共产党官员希望，新线路只是这个一度封闭的地区铁路建设盛况的序曲。政府在西藏的喉舌《西藏日报》，5月16日称会在未来五年中启动大约2000公里的铁路建设。这包括一条从日喀则到亚东的线路，靠近与印度和不丹的国界，还有一条到吉隆，靠近与尼泊尔的边界。中国铁路总公司总经理谈到铁路“对于西藏的发展与稳定的极端重要性”。这个地区最近的历史提供了充分的证据。


Economistrants May 19th, 19:29
Any...t crying "free tibet" has obviously never been to Tibet or China.Be sure that I am neither chinese nor having any relationship with the chinesegovernment. I simply had the opportunity to visit that wonderful part of Chinaand saw for myself that the huge Tibetan ethnic group (not only in Tibetautonomous region, but also in many western provinces such as Sichuan, Yunan,etc..) is very happy being part of today's china, they are free to do whateverthey want, including practicing their religion, start businesses, travel andenjoy a level of prosperity and "freedom" they never experiencedbefore, especially under the "old regime" of the 1% Tibetanaristocracy and the Dalai lama. The old Tibetan aristocracy is complicit withwestern propaganda in fooling naive and ignorant westerners, while the 99% ofTibetans are enjoying freedom and prosperity in the new china. As to theengineering miracles that China keeps building, hats-off! instead ofcriticising the amazing infrastructure miracles ongoing in china for fourdecades now, have a look at the decaying infrastructure in the US and the Uk,while hundreds of billions are being spent on the military to flex muscles infar away continents and justify the insanity of the Trident nuclear program.

任何嚷嚷着要“解放西藏”的都显然没去过西藏或者其他中国的地方。当然我既不是中国人也和中国政府扯不上任何关系。我只是有个机会能到访那个中国的奇妙地区，亲眼看到庞大的藏族群体（不仅是在西藏自治区，还在许多诸如四川云南这样的西部省份）都很高兴成为今日中国的一部分，他们可以自由的去做他们想干的任何事情，包括修习宗教，创业，旅行，以及享受他们之前从没有想过的繁荣和自由，尤其是在旧制度的1%藏族贵族和达赖喇嘛统治之下。在旧西藏贵族和西方宣传喉舌沆瀣一气欺骗天真无知的西方人的时候，99%的西藏人是在享受新中国带来的繁荣和自由。至于中国不停建造的那些工程奇迹，我表示脱帽致敬！而不是对40多年不间断建设的惊人基础设施奇观冷嘲热讽。看看美国和英国日渐破败的基础设施吧，与此同时却要在军队上一掷千金，远赴千里之外展示肌肉，证明三叉戟核计划的愚蠢荒唐。

CHBlackman in reply to Economistrants May 19th, 21:52
Acut and paste job from the PLA cyberbrigade. How many more preprepared andvetted paragraphs do you have?
Pleasebuy some Western property using monies earned for this job. Yuans will be worthlesssoon.
Hereit is for you:
FREETIBET!!!
FREEEAST TURKMENISTAN!!
FREEINNER MONGOLIA!!!

这明显是解放军网络部队的剪切粘贴。你有多少预先准备的，经过审查的段落？
请多用你借此赚的钱买点西方资产。人民币很快将一文不值。
这是送给你的：
解放西藏！！！
解放东突厥斯坦！！
解放内蒙古！！！

Canabanain reply to CHBlackman May 20th, 06:04
FREETURKEY!!!
FREECOFFEE!!!
FREECANDIES!!!

解放土耳其！！（免费火鸡！！！）
解放科菲！！！（免费咖啡！！！）
解放坎迪斯！！（免费糖果！！！）

FR O Y in reply to Economistrants May 20th, 07:02
Ifthey were so "happy being part of today's China" they wouldn't berioting every few years against Chinese rule. Perhaps it has to do with thefact that Tibetans are seeing very few of the "prosperity" created bythe CCP, which mostly goes to the hands of ethnic Hans, while most Tibetanslive in squalor with the highest illiteracy rates and the lowest lifeexpectancy in all China.

如果他们真的如此“高兴成为今日中国的一部分”，他们就不应该每隔几年就为反对中国统治而骚乱。或许事实真相是藏人极少看到中共创造的“繁荣”，它们通常都被汉人享有，与此同时大多数的藏人都生活在赤贫的状态，忍受着中国最高的文盲率和最低的预期寿命。

Economistrants in reply to CHBlackman May 20th, 14:53
For40 years western propaganda has been successful in fooling the western massesthat the great chinese miracle is based on abusing people, lack of freedom, andother nonsense. You are clearly a victim of this propaganda by western regimeswho have nothing to show for other than disastrous foreign interventions overthe last 40 years, while inequality in western democracies is reachingdangerous levels and infrastructure is decaying to embarrassing level. Untilyou are able to visit China and see for yourself, you clearly don't know whatyou are talking about.

40年来，西方的宣传机构已经成功地愚弄了大多数民众，就是中国的经济奇迹是建立在虐待人民，缺乏自由还有其他的扯淡理由上的。你显然是西方政权宣传喉舌的其中一个受害者，这些政权在过去40多年来除了粗暴干涉别国之外没干别的，与此同时西方民主制度的不平等也接近了一个危险的水平，基础设施也破败到了令人尴尬的地步。在你有能力去中国亲眼看看之前，你显然不知道你都在说些什么。

Economistrants in reply to F R O Y May 20th, 14:47
Goand visit and then judge for yourself. You will realise that it is the westernmedia and western governments that are sowing propaganda for geo-politicalreasons and regime change objectives.

去拜访中国，然后自己判断。你会意识到，那都是西方媒体和西方政府为了地缘政治的原因和政权更迭的目标而灌输的宣传。

Jouris May 19th, 22:28
Itis quite impressive how much money the Chinese government is willing to spendto encourage the movement of Han Chinese into Tibet. And, thereby, thedestruction of the native people and culture.
Ofcourse, they have been doing similarly in Xinjiang. But the cost was lowerthere.

中国政府为了鼓励汉族人进入西藏的不惜血本真是太令人印象深刻了。而且，因此影响了当地人，破坏了当地的文化。

Ashbird in reply to jouris May 20th, 04:04
Ithink passengers travel both ways, jouris.

Jouris，我觉得旅客旅游是两全其美的事。

Ashbird in reply to jouris May 20th, 04:12
ASto Xinjiang, there is China National Highway 219, completed in 1950's andrepaved in 2013. Due to the terrain of the region, it was a similar feat ofconstruction. To my knowledge, the highway also runs both directions. Just somefacts for you. :) A map and google will provide any further details you need.Motorists have been using that highway for years.

对于新疆，有中国的219国道，在上世纪五十年代建成并于2013年重新铺设。由于该地区的地形，这是一种结构相似的技艺。据我所知，这条高速公路是双向的。只是给你列举一些事实。: ) 一张地图外加Google一下就可以给你提供任何你想要的细节。摩托车驾驶者已经走了那条高速路好多年了。

Ashbird in reply to jouris May 20th, 04:29
ASto costs, I don't have the figure on top of my head. I imagine it (the highway)wouldn't be pennies as the road stretches an altitude of 16,076 feet. You canfind trogues and pictures posted by tourists who have visited that part ofthe country. Pictures avaiable on You-tube as well. I am planning a trip therein 2017 if my lungs can tolerate the altitude. I got altitude sickness evenvisting Lake Tahoe once (altitude 6,224 feet). We can also compare Machu Picchuin Peru and the railroad that got you there -7,970 feet - I didn't go, beingforewarned.

至于成本，我没有办法估测超出我想象的东西。我想象它（那个高速公路）在海拔16000英尺之上，造价应该不会低。你可以找找去过那儿的游客发的游记或者照片什么的。照片在Youtube上也有。我计划在2017年去那儿旅行，如果我的肺能承受那儿的海拔的话。我有次去了塔霍湖（注：美国着名度假区，海拔6224英尺，约合1897米）都产生了高原反应。我们还可以比较秘鲁的马丘比丘和那里的铁路——7970英尺（约合2430米）——我没去，因为被预先警告了。

CHBlackman May 20th, 14:33
Beijing-backedsocial media users flood Web, says Harvard study:
"China’sgovernment fabricates and posts several hundred million social media posts ayear to influence public opinion about the country, according to a new paper byU.S. researchers examining one of the most opaque aspects of the CommunistParty’s rule."
http://atimes.com/2016/05/beijing-backed-social-media-users-flood-web-st...
Letscount 3, 2, 1....

北京支持的社交媒体用户泛滥网络，哈佛大学研究说的：
“中国政府一年编造和发出数亿社交媒体帖子来影响公众舆论，这是根据美国研究人员对共产党统治的最不透明的一个方面的新论文得出的结论”。
http://atimes.com/2016/05/beijing-backed-social-media-users-flood-web-study/
倒数3、2、1。。。

Blueberry8823 May 21st, 05:23
Anantagonistic piece full of Geopolitical paranoia, typical TE.

一片充满地缘政治偏执的敌意的文章，典型的经济学人风格。