China - Third National Railway Project

Page 1 INTEGRATED SAFEGUARDS DATA SHEET CONCEPT STAGE Report No.: AC1025 Date ISDS Prepared/Updated: October 14, 2004/November 3, 2004 I. BASIC INFORMATION A. Basic Project Data Country: China Project ID: P086515 Project Name: China: Third National Railway Project Task Team Leader: Graham Smith Estimated Appraisal Date: March 21, 2004 Estimated Board Date: June/July, 2005 Managing Unit: EASTR Lending Instrument: Specific Investment Loan Sector: Railways (100%) Theme: Infrastructure services for private sector development (P) Safeguard Policies Specialists in the task team: Peishen Wang, Chaohua Zhang Loan amount ($m.): IBRD: 200 Other financing amounts by source ($m): Domestic funding: 864 B. Project Objective China has expressed interest in World Bank financing of components of the realignment and double-tracking of the existing single-track, electrified railway line between Liupanshui in Guizhou Province and Zhanyi in Yunnan Province (Liu-Zhan line) and the associated remodelling of the Liupanshui terminal area. The potential development objective of the Project is to improve services provided to the customers of the Liu-Zhan railway line. This would be achieved, once the project is completed, by cutting two hours from the travel time for express passenger trains and taking an extra 10 million tons of bulk freight that would otherwise have to go by road at a substantially higher cost, or not at all. C. Project Description In 2002 the Liu-Zhan line carried 10 pairs of passenger trains per day and 26 million tons of freight per year. It is working close to capacity (86% based on MOR standards) and cannot cater for the forecast traffic, as the western China economy continues to grow. In order to expand China Railway