The Changsang Line is an electrified freight-only
railway
Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in Track (rail transport), tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the ...
line of the
Korean State Railway
The Korean State Railway (), commonly called the State Rail () is the operating arm of the Ministry of Railways of North Korea and has its headquarters at P'yŏngyang. The current Minister of Railways is Chang Jun Song.
History
1945–195 ...
in
South P'yŏngan Province,
North Korea
North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and ...
, running from
Hyangjang on the
P'yŏngdŏk Line to
Changsang.
[Kokubu, Hayato, 将軍様の鉄道 (Shōgun-sama no Tetsudō) ]
History
On 21 June 1940, the
West Chosen Central Railway, which since 1939 had been operating a line between
Sŭnghori and
P'yŏngnam Kangdong,
[ (The Public Journal of the Governor-General of Korea), Shōwa No. 3851, 20 November 1939 (in Japanese)] received approval from the
Railway Bureau of the Government-General of Korea to build a line to the Changsang coal fields via
Tŏkch'ŏn;
[ (The Public Journal of the Governor-General of Korea), Shōwa No. 4021, 18 June 1940 (in Japanese)] the
Chosen Anthracite Company had opened mines around Changsang and Tŏkch'ŏn in 1938
From Tŏkch'ŏn, which it had reached in the summer of 1945, the West Chosen Central Railway planned its Tŏkpal Line () line to run from Tŏkch'ŏn to
Kujang via Changsangri (today's Changsang Station), to connect there with the
Chosen Government Railway's
Manp'o Line
The Manp'o Line is an electrified standard-gauge trunk line of the North Korean State Railway running from Sunch'ŏn on the P'yŏngra Line to Manp'o on the Pukpu Line. The line continues on from Manp'o to Ji'an, China.Kokubu, Hayato, 将軍� ...
. However, the terrain proved too difficult, and, after adding a signal station at
Hyangjang between
Hyangwŏn and Changsangri, construction on the current alignment of the line to Kujang began. However, this wasn't completed before the end of the
Pacific War, and it was only after the end of the
Korean War
{{Infobox military conflict
, conflict = Korean War
, partof = the Cold War and the Korean conflict
, image = Korean War Montage 2.png
, image_size = 300px
, caption = Clockwise from top: ...
that the connection to Kujang and the Manp'o Line was finally made.
After the
partition of Korea
The division of Korea began with the defeat of Japan in World War II. During the war, the Allied leaders considered the question of Korea's future after Japan's surrender in the war. The leaders reached an understanding that Korea would be l ...
following Japan's defeat in the war, all railways in North Korea were nationalised and made part of the Korean State Railway.
The
P'yŏngyang Colliery Line (P'yŏngyang–Sinsŏngch'ŏn) and the former West Chosen Central Railway mainline (Sinsŏngch'ŏn–Tŏkch'ŏn) were joined together to form the
P'yŏngdŏk Line; after the Tŏkpal Line was extended to Kujang after the end of the Korean War, it was later merged with the P'yŏngdŏk Line, but the line's name was not changed, while the Hyangjang–Changsangri section became the Changsang Line. Electrification of the line was completed in June 1979.
Route
A yellow background in the "Distance" box indicates that section of the line is not electrified.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Changsang Line
Railway lines in North Korea
Standard gauge railways in North Korea
Railway lines opened in 1945