The mileage of Anhui high-speed railway has already exceeded 2700 kilometers, firmly occupying the top spot in the Yangtze River Delta. Flowers bloom in multiple locations in Hefei, Bengbu, and Fuyang, with a 1-hour commute to Nanjing and Wuhan and a 3-hour direct ride to Shanghai and Beijing. However, deep in the Dabie Mountains, the transportation gap between western and southern Anhui is like a scar. The straight-line distance between Lu'an and Anqing is only a few hundred kilometers, but trains have to detour through Hefei, and commuting by road takes more than three hours. Huoshan, Yuexi and other revolutionary old areas guard the beautiful mountains and waters, making it difficult for local specialties to be exported and tourists to enter.

The deadlock has finally been broken. In November 2025, the bidding for the Lu'an-Anqing Railway will be launched; In April 2026, the bidding for the construction of the entire line was completed, and the preliminary project of Anqing section officially started. This 169 kilometer long steel dragon will completely rewrite the transportation history of the hinterland of the Dabie Mountains.

The most difficult mountainous tunnel group in East China

This is not an ordinary plain railway. The bridge tunnel ratio of the entire line is as high as 87.9%, and 14 tunnels with a total length of 30.8 kilometers need to be built in the western section alone. Among them, the risk level of Qingtianling Tunnel is extremely high, and the construction difficulty is very rare in East China.

The biggest obstacle to the project is the complex geological structure of the Dabie Mountains. The extra long single hole tunnel in the Yuexi section is over ten kilometers long, with broken rock layers and weak surrounding rocks, and sudden mud and water surges may occur at any time. The geological conditions are comparable to those in the southwestern mountainous areas. It is impossible to rely solely on manpower, and it is necessary to rely on the coordinated operation of shield tunneling machines and intelligent monitoring systems, monitor while excavating, and dynamically adjust the plan. This is the first time that the East China region has faced such a high difficulty mountainous tunnel construction, and every meter of excavation is the ultimate test of engineering technology.

Local specialties from the old district, departing in the morning and arriving in the afternoon

The significance of the Liuqing Railway goes far beyond intercity connections. To the north, connect to the Shanghai Hankou Chengdu high-speed railway, and to the south, connect to the Anjiu high-speed railway. After its opening, the travel time from Lu'an to Anqing will be reduced to less than 1 hour. Dushan Station reserves the interface for the Nanxinhe high-speed railway, which can be directly connected to Zhengzhou in the future; Qianshan South Station reserves an interface in the direction of Jiujiang. The longer-term blueprint is the Anqing Jingdezhen railway, which, if included in the national 15th Five Year Plan, will form a new channel connecting Anhui and Jiangxi provinces.

Change is tangible. Huoshan Shihu and Yuexi Cuilan depart in the morning and can be placed on the dining table in the Yangtze River Delta in the afternoon; Tianzhu Mountain and Mingtang Mountain scenic spots will welcome weekend visitors from Nanjing and Wuhan, and homestays and rural tourism will experience explosive growth. At the same time, the line can effectively divert the huge passenger flow pressure of the He'anjiu and Hefu high-speed railways. Keywords: transportation, railway transportation

Of course, challenges still exist. The goal of being completed by the end of 2030 is facing the test of geological variability, and there is a possibility of delay in the construction period. If the planning of the Anqing Jingdezhen railway fails, the route may become a dead end. The details of land acquisition and demolition, ecological protection, and fundraising have not been fully disclosed, but the railway dream of Dabie Mountains has finally moved from drawings to reality.Editor/Cheng Liting