On September 28, 2026, the Xi'an-Ankang high-speed railway officially began operations. That day, an intelligent Fuxing EMU train departed Xi'an East Station, cut through the Qinling Mountains, and reached Ankang West Station in Shaanxi's Ankang city in just 45 minutes — a sharp reduction from the roughly three hours required on the existing conventional line. It should be clarified here that the "Kang" in "Xikang" (西康) railway does not refer to Kangding in Sichuan's Garze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, but is short for Ankang, the Shaanxi city. This new line connects Xi'an, the provincial capital, with Ankang, the central city of southern Shaanxi, and forms part of the Baotou-Yinchuan-Haikou corridor and the Hohhot-Nanning corridor within China's national "eight vertical, eight horizontal" high-speed rail network plan — not a Xi'an-to-Kangding route as had circulated elsewhere. The opening also marks the basic formation of Shaanxi's "米"-shaped (rice-character-shaped) high-speed rail network.

In terms of the engineering, the newly built main line of the Xi'an-Ankang high-speed railway runs about 171 kilometers and is designed for speeds of 350 km/h. The line has five passenger stations in total — Xi'an East, Niubeiliang, Zhashui West, Zhen'an West, and Ankang West — of which only Xi'an East is a renovated existing station, while the other four are entirely new builds. At the start of operations, railway authorities scheduled up to 20 EMU trains per day; the inaugural train, with a capacity of 577 passengers, sold out quickly, reflecting strong anticipation among residents along the line. According to local media, the inaugural train G9997 departed Xi'an East Station at 9:16 a.m. and arrived at Ankang West Station at 10:01 a.m., a journey of about 45 minutes. After opening, the fastest travel time between Xi'an and Ankang dropped to about 45 minutes, and Qinba mountain counties such as Zhashui and Zhen'an entered the high-speed rail era for the first time, making weekend trips to Xi'an far more convenient for local residents.

A major reason this line has drawn attention is the engineering difficulty of crossing the Qinling Mountains. Public reports show the line has 20 tunnels in total, the longest being the Taixingshan Tunnel at 18.83 kilometers — a twin-bore single-track tunnel with a maximum depth of 1,298 meters. Construction had to pass through 13.4 kilometers of moderate rockburst-risk zones, four major deep faults and ten secondary faults, with ground temperatures reaching as high as 33 degrees Celsius at the deepest point. Another tunnel, Jiutianshan, also contains multiple fractured geological zones, with 5.9 kilometers of rockburst risk and 3 kilometers of karst risk. Construction crews worked through roughly 1,270 days and nights to complete the Taixingshan Tunnel. In May 2025, all tunnels along the line were holed through, laying the groundwork for the line's opening within the year. These figures illustrate that this is genuinely an "underground high-speed railway cutting through the Qinling Mountains," with builders overcoming the formidable challenges posed by complex geology.

Beyond the engineering itself, the architectural design of stations along the Xi'an-Ankang line also incorporates strong regional cultural characteristics, fully showcasing the historical and cultural heritage of the Qinba region. Zhen'an West Station, for instance, was designed around the concept of "Tang-dynasty charm in Zhen'an, expressing a flourishing age anew," incorporating Tang-style architectural elements into the station's form. Niubeiliang Station was built along a mountain ridge, with a roof shaped like a bird spreading its wings, echoing the natural scenery of the Niubeiliang National Nature Reserve. The terminal, Ankang West Station, blends the imagery of Qinba mountain forms with the rippling waters of the Han River, translating the local geography of "one mountain, one river" into architectural language. This "one station, one view; one station, one rhythm" design approach means these high-speed rail stations are no longer purely transport hubs but also important vehicles for showcasing and passing on local culture.

In terms of the regional rail network pattern, the opening of the Xi'an-Ankang railway further cements Xi'an's status as a national comprehensive transport hub. With this key vertical stroke of the "米"-shaped network — linking the Guanzhong plain with the mountainous south of the province — now complete, Xi'an has become the third city nationwide, and the first in western China, to form a "米"-shaped high-speed rail network, following a small number of cities such as Hefei and Zhengzhou that had already formed similar radial high-speed rail patterns. For Shaanxi, this means the time-and-space distance between the Guanzhong plain and the mountainous south has been drastically shortened, and southern Shaanxi — long cut off by the Qinling Mountains and relatively closed off in terms of transport — has, for the first time in a real sense, been brought into the provincial capital's one-hour travel circle.

More importantly, this high-speed line is widely seen as a "fast lane" for rural revitalization and county-level economic development in the Qinba mountain region. Ankang sits deep within the Qinba mountains and had long been constrained by its terrain, with poor circulation of resources and quality products that remained, as the saying goes, "hidden deep in the boudoir, unknown to the world." With the railway now open, Ankang's selenium-rich tea and traditional Chinese medicinal herbs are expected to reach broader markets via more convenient logistics, while the city's sizeable plush-toy light industry will also benefit from improved transport efficiency and gain more opportunities for outside cooperation. At the same time, the railway links together scenic spots including Niubeiliang, the Zhongnanshan mountain village, Zhashui karst caves, Zhen'an's Tayunshan mountain, and Ankang's Yinghu Lake, while the route passes numerous nationally and provincially protected cultural heritage sites, ancient ruins, historic buildings and revolutionary-era historical sites. The railway's opening creates the conditions to "string these scattered cultural and tourism resources together like pearls," with the potential to drive tourism and cultural industry development all along the corridor.

Viewed within the broader context of national rail network development, the Xi'an-Ankang railway is an important component of the "eight vertical, eight horizontal" high-speed rail trunk network, and its completion echoes China's policy direction in recent years of accelerating high-speed rail network construction in western regions to narrow regional development gaps. At the same time, another major high-speed line passing through Shaanxi — the Xi'an-Shiyan railway — is also being accelerated, and the scheduling of the two lines has previously drawn attention, reflecting Shaanxi's overall approach during the 14th and 15th Five-Year Plan periods of continuing to densify its high-speed rail network and raise its hub-level capacity. With the Xi'an-Ankang line now in operation, Shaanxi's "米"-shaped high-speed rail network has basically taken shape, providing stronger infrastructure support for regional connectivity and integrated economic development.

Overall, the opening of the Xi'an-Ankang high-speed railway is not merely the completion of a transport infrastructure project, but also reflects China's approach to combining major engineering construction with the protection and transmission of local culture amid coordinated regional development. Stations are no longer merely cold transport nodes, but public spaces carrying local cultural memory — whether the charm of Tang-dynasty architecture or the imagery of Qinba mountains and rivers. For residents who have long lived in the Qinba mountain region, this railway, distilled from over a thousand days and nights of builders' effort and forged through formidable geological obstacles, has truly changed how people travel — and behind that, it has narrowed the distance between mountains and cities, between tradition and modernity.