Mombasa-Nairobi railway

(The Belt and Road Initiative)

Updated:2017-04-20 | By:China.org.cn

Mombasa-Nairobi railway

The 471-kilometer-long Mombasa-Nairobi stretch is the first section of a planned East Africa railway network. Passenger trains will travel at 120 km/hour, while freight trains will run at 80 km/hour and be able to carry 25 million tons per year. Connecting Nairobi, the capital city of Kenya, with Mombasa, the largest port in East Africa, this will be the first rail link conforming to Chinese standards ever built outside of China. It will also be the first new rail line in Kenya in a century.

The project started in October 2014, and the railway is scheduled to open to traffic on June 1, 2017. Once in service, it will cut the travel time from Mombasa to Nairobi from over ten hours to a little more than four hours.

A long-term masterplan envisions a rail system serving six East African countries, namely – Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and South Sudan. This modern network will help promote economic development in East Africa and beyond. Statistics indicate that construction of the Mombasa-Nairobi section has created nearly 30,000 jobs in Kenya and boosted annual GDP growth by 1.5 percent. The cost of movement of goods is expected to be reduced by 40 percent after the completion of this initial project.

蒙内铁路

蒙内铁路是东非铁路网的起始段,全长471公里,设计运力2500万吨,设计客运时速120公里、货运时速80公里,连接肯尼亚首都内罗毕和东非第一大港蒙巴萨港,是首条在海外全部采用“中国标准”建造的铁路。因为是肯尼亚百年来修建的第一条新铁路,所以有该国“世纪铁路”之称。该铁路于2014年10月正式开工建设,预计2017年6月1日开通试运行。建成后,蒙巴萨到内罗毕将从目前的10多个小时缩短到4个多小时。根据远期规划,该铁路将连接肯尼亚、坦桑尼亚、乌干达、卢旺达、布隆迪和南苏丹等东非6国,促进东非现代化铁路网的形成和地区经济发展。据统计,蒙内铁路建设期间,为肯尼亚带来近3万个就业机会,年均拉动国内生产总值增长1.5%。建成后,当地物流成本可以降低40%。