Beijing Railway Station

Beijing Railway Station (Hanyu Pinyin: Beijing Zhan) is Beijing's first railway station, opened in the 1950s, as can be seen from its architecture (which merges traditional architecture with 50s-design). It is located in an extremely central location, just next to Jianguomen, and is within the confines of the city's 2nd Ring Road. Trains enter and leave to the scenery of an old Beijing city gate at Dongbianmen.

The traffic load on Beijing Railway Station has lessened somewhat with the operation of the Beijing West Railway Station. Still, it remains a busy railway station. Some international lines (notably the railway line linking Beijing to Pyongyang in North Korea, amongst others), depart from this station.

The Beijing Metro system began with Beijing Railway Station back in the 1960s and 1970s. This underground station still exists to this day, and forms part of the Beijing Subway Line 2.

Numerous bus and trolleybus lines pass through Beijing Railway Station.

History
Beijing Railway Station was opened in 1959. It was designed for a daily passenger flow of 50,000.

On March 24, 2005, the building authorities for the railway station announced CNY 4 million for a complete revision of the lift services. In addition to adding two new lifts, four existing lifts which ran a "going up only" service will be reworked to add functions which would enable them to be used for journeys both going up and downstairs. The entire revision would be complete before May 1, 2005. The incessant surge of railway travellers -- as many as 160,000 per day -- is the main reason for the forced addition and modification of lifts. At the same time, public conveniences (lavatories) would be improved, and 13 "moving lavatories" are to be taken away.