The operational efficiency of the Guinea Maribaya Port to Simandou Mining Area railway, a landmark project in West Africa constructed by China Railway 21st Bureau, continues to upgrade, and the transportation system is becoming increasingly perfect, with steady release of heavy load capacity. This modern heavy-duty railway, which is built entirely using Chinese technology and standards, has successfully opened up a key channel for Guinea's mineral resources to go abroad, activated the vitality of West African regional economic development, and consolidated the foundation of pragmatic cooperation between China and Africa with high-quality infrastructure achievements.

Chinese standard heavy-duty railway

The Ma Xi Railway has a total length of 551.92 kilometers and is the core transportation artery of the Simandou Iron Mine project in Guinea. Its designed annual transportation capacity is as high as 220 million tons, and it is also a crucial land sea intermodal transportation backbone in West Africa. The completion and opening of this railway has established an integrated intermodal transportation system for mines, railways, and ports, forming a closed-loop operation mode for the entire process of iron ore mining, transportation, and going abroad. It has completely broken the transportation constraints of local mineral resources transportation, filled the gaps in transportation infrastructure in West Africa, and laid a solid foundation for local resource development and circulation. In January 2024, China Railway 21st Bureau Electric Power Company successfully won the bid for the MXSD1 section project of the Maxi Railway, mainly responsible for the communication, signal, and power engineering of the 231 kilometer line, as well as the construction and operation of tunnel wind turbine power supply. The project contract amount is 1.51 billion yuan.

Building a solid foundation for the Three Electric Engineering

As the nerve center of the railway system, the three electrical engineering is directly related to the efficiency of heavy-duty transportation and overall operational safety, and is the core key to the smooth operation and efficient release of railway capacity. During the project construction, the construction team directly faced multiple construction problems such as the harsh climate of high temperature rainstorm in West Africa, complex and changeable geological conditions, shortage of materials and equipment, scientifically optimized the construction plan, carefully controlled the construction details of each link, and efficiently completed core construction tasks such as equipment installation, line laying, system commissioning, etc. The team overcame difficulties and steadily promoted construction, and completed the construction of the three electricity main projects ahead of schedule before the official operation of the railway on November 11, 2025, laying a solid foundation for the smooth opening and long-term stable operation and maintenance of the railway. Keywords: Infrastructure News Network, Transportation, International

Capacity release drives development

Since the operation of the train, the project operation and maintenance team has continuously optimized the transportation organization mode, dynamically adjusted the operation plan, gradually expanded the train formation scale, increased the departure frequency, and achieved a dual improvement in the line's heavy load capacity and ore export volume. Relying on this major artery for shipping, high-quality iron ore from Guinea can be efficiently transported to ports and smoothly exported to various parts of the world, effectively enriching the global iron ore supply chain. At the same time, the continuous release of railway channel efficiency has promoted Guinea to smoothly transform its local resource advantages into real economic development advantages, driving the development of local industries such as mining and logistics. The project team also deeply cultivates localization construction, training more than 260 local workers in Guinea and cultivating 86 local technical backbones who can work independently, providing reliable talent support for Guinea to build an independent railway operation and maintenance system.Editor/Gao Xue