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Until 2019, the railway only ran as far as east as Nantong East railway station. On January 5, 2019, the line was extended to Qidong and it is now 351 kilometres (218 mi) long. It runs along the northern bank of the Yangtze River, serving cities such as Yangzhou, Taizhou, and Hai'an. Passenger service was formerly operated between Nanjing railway station and Nantong railway station only. A frequent service is now operated on the whole route from Nanjing to Qidong.
History
Planning for a railway along the north bank of the Yangtze River began as early as 1958. In 1977, the government of Jiangsu province designated the railway from Nanjing to Nantong as a project for completion within the next 10 years. Due to funding shortage and disagreement over route, the project was not built for 20 years. The project was revived in the late 1990s with the onset of construction on the Xinyi–Changxing railway, which was the first railway to be built in Jiangsu province north of the Yangtze River. In 2001, the Ministry of Railways approved plans for the Ningqi railway, and construction was built in two phases. The Nanjing to Hai'an section was built from March 1, 2002, to December 2003. The Haian to Yangzhou and Nantong sections were completed by July 2005.
A major upgrade project on the Nanjing–Qidong railway was completed on December 20, 2015. This involved the electrification of the railway line and building a second track. This was expected to halve the travel time from Nantong to Nanjing from the previous 3 hours 50 min to 1 hour 50 min. The electrification is designed to permit operation of double-stack container trains but no such services are currently being operated. EMU trains entered trial operation on May 6, 2016 and started revenue service from May 15, 2016.
Passenger service on an eastern single-track extension to Qidong (via Haimen) began on 5 January 2019. A further freight-only extension north towards Lusigang was also constructed.
Plans were approved in 2012 for a cross-river connection from Nantong to the Shanghai metropolitan area (the Shanghai–Nantong railway). It connects to the Nanjing–Qidong railway at Zhaodian station (planning name: Pingdong) on the northwestern outskirts of Nantong's urban core. Construction work on the Hutong Yangtze River bridge started on March 1, 2014. The line was expected to open at the end of 2018, but it was opened on July 1, 2020.
宁启铁路明年底改造完工; 南通至南京仅需两小时Archived 2013-11-03 at the Wayback Machine (Ning–Qi railway upgrade to be completed by the end of the next year. Nantong to Nanjing in 2 hours.) 江海明珠网, 2013-10-27
宁启铁路复线明年完工 南通到南京1小时50分钟Archived 2014-01-10 at the Wayback Machine (Double-tracking of the Qi–Ning railway will be completed by the end of the next year. Nantong to Nanjing in 1 hour 50 min), 2013-11-13
沪通铁路2013年正式开建 南通到上海仅需一小时 [Construction work on the Hu-Tong Railway will officially start in 2013. It will take just an hour to travel from Nantong to Shanghai] (in Chinese). December 24, 2012. Archived from the original on May 15, 2013. Retrieved December 25, 2012.
A train arrives at Yangzhou railway station.
