Thailand’s Transport Minister Arkhom Termpittayapaisith announced that the construction of an initial 3.5 km section of the railway link to China will start soon after a bidding in early 2017, which will be followed by other sections of the first phase. The design work of the second phase, Nakhon Ratchasima to Nong Khai will also begin early next year.
The Thai government decided to divide the project into two phases and build a 256 km railway from Bangkok to Nakhon Ratchasima first. The remaining part will link Nakhon Ratchasima with Nong Khai.
The first phase may be completed in 3 years and the whole project may take 5 years and the railway will also be extended to the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur and finally Singapore.
The planned China-Thailand railway linking the Thai-Lao border with Bangkok will benefit Thailand as the high-speed railway is expected to improve rail transport system. Once the will be connected with the China-Laos railway, it would take around 4 hours to travel from the Lao capital of Vientiane to Bangkok.
The China-Thailand railway will allow passenger trains to run with a maximum speed of 250 km while freight trains will run on the existing meter-gauge rail network.
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