China has officially opened traffic on a major new expressway cutting through the Tianshan mountain range in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, marking a significant milestone in infrastructure development after more than five years of construction.
The Urumqi–Yuli Expressway, which became operational on December 27, now links the northern and southern sides of the Tianshan Mountains, reducing driving time across the range by nearly 50 percent. Journeys between Urumqi, the regional capital located to the north, and Korla in the south have been shortened from around seven hours to approximately three and a half hours.
Stretching nearly 325 kilometers, the expressway crosses the vast Tianshan Mountains, which span about 2,500 kilometers across Xinjiang. The route includes 12 interchanges, 17 tunnels, and a large number of bridges and underpasses designed to navigate the region’s challenging terrain.
At the heart of the project is the Tianshan Shengli Tunnel, the expressway’s most significant engineering achievement. Measuring over 22 kilometers in length, it has been recognized as the longest tunnel in the world built for expressway traffic. The tunnel also features the deepest highway vertical shaft globally, setting two international records.
According to China Communications Construction Company, the completion of this tunnel represents a major breakthrough in high-altitude and complex mountain engineering, greatly improving transport efficiency and regional connectivity in northwest China.
