A high-speed railway linking Xian with Chengdu has won approval from the National Development and Reform Commission, according to a Xinhua article quoting the China Railway First Survey and Design Institute.

Construction of the section between Xian and Jiangyou will start this year, the institute said, without giving a timetable. The Jiangyou-Chengdu section has already been under construction for more than a year.

The entire line will cost about Rmb68.8bn and it will be the first rail route to run through the Qinling Mountains. Some 127km of the line in this mountainous area will comprise tunnels.

When completed in 2014, the railway will help to cut the travel time between the two major cities in western China to less than three hours from the current 13 hours. It will have a designed speed of more than 250kph.