The bus drove out of the city, and the vineyards and pomegranate gardens retreated behind. The mountain scenery changed from green to brown, and the desolation spread all the way to the horizon. A few hours later, the person stood on a long platform with a row of country names above their heads and railway tracks stretching towards Central Asia beneath their feet.

The platform is filled with country names

In July 2026, a China Europe freight train departed from Xinjiang. In the operation area of Kashgar Logistics Park, above the enclosed freight platform, the names and flags of Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia are arranged in sequence. The platform is lined with rails, and a long row of brand new white freight vehicles are parked neatly. The containers are stacked in place, and the loading and unloading cranes are operating. The phrase 'Five mouths connecting eight countries, all the way connecting Europe and Asia' in the exhibition center becomes concrete here. For thousands of years, Kashgar has flourished due to the ancient Silk Road, and now its geographical location has become an economic advantage. In 2023, Kashgar, together with Urumqi and Khorgos, will be included in the China (Xinjiang) Pilot Free Trade Zone, covering an area of 28.48 square kilometers. The positioning of the area is not only for the transit and transfer of goods, but also integrates warehousing, customs clearance, sorting, processing, production, and distribution here. Kashgar also has China's first professional TIR transportation center certified by the International Road Transport Union, which integrates cargo consolidation, transportation support, and document processing. Goods shipped from Kashgar to Central Asia, the Middle East, and Europe can reduce customs clearance time by more than 30% and transportation costs by more than 15%. In the park, highways, railways, airports, storage and processing sites are adjacent to each other, and trucks are parked next to the railway platform, adjacent to container and international cargo distribution areas.

Time is measured in days instead

The Xinjiang logistics hub in Urumqi is of a different scale. The international land port area gathers goods from various parts of China, completes consolidation and grouping, and loads them onto international freight trains to transport them westward to farther places. 21 international railway lines have been operated here, connecting 26 cities in 19 countries in Europe and Asia. The delivery time is also on the table. The train departing from Urumqi takes about two days to Kazakhstan, about three days to Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, eight days to Russia, and 16 days to the Netherlands. The Tianshan train can reach Almaty in two days. Looking to the west, this year, the number of China Europe Central Asia trains passing through the Alataw Pass and Khorgos double ports exceeded 15000, and the daily average import and export trains in Khorgos remained around 28, with the maximum number of 35 trains in a single day. The two hubs each have their own division of labor, one gathering inland bulk goods flowing through Central Asia and continuing westward, and the other relying on its proximity advantages to run highways and multimodal transport, leading to Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Pakistan and extending to the Middle East. The faster the train formation, the smoother the document processing and customs clearance process, and the higher the operational efficiency of the passage. Keywords: China Europe freight trains, multimodal transport

On the ancient Silk Road, the routes of caravans were determined by mountain passes, deserts, and oases. Nowadays, railways, highways, freight stations, and electronic customs clearance have established new channels, and the distance between countries is no longer measured on a monthly basis, but on a daily basis.Editor/Min Jing