“Dang Dang…” a sudden bell rang. Yao Xianwen walked out of the duty box and pulled up a slide rail fence. The passers-by had long been used to stopping outside the fence and waiting. Three or four minutes later, the 36358 train roared past, the long whistle was still echoing, the fences on both sides were opened again, and there was a constant flow of vehicles and pedestrians.

At the dingjiayuan crossing of Nanjing bridge section of Nanjing Wuhu line, the same scene will be repeated dozens of times a day, day and night. Yao Xianwen is a crossing operator who has worked here for more than 30 years. “I’ll retire in two years. It’s estimated that I can’t wait for the opening of the new line.” The emotion between words is slightly “complex”.

For more Nanjing citizens, this “boot” that has been hanging for a long time has finally landed - on December 8, the mobilization meeting for the expansion and reconstruction of Ningwu railway was held in Nanjing, announcing that the expansion and reconstruction of Ningwu railway will be started in 2022, and strive to achieve the smooth completion of the project through about four years of efforts.

Finally started! The netizen “Zhu Pei 7Y” posted a post and exclaimed: “when my child was in primary school, he said he would move. My child’s children are in primary school. This time, they really want to move!”

The curtain of capacity expansion and transformation of Nanjing Wuhu Railway opens. What will Nanjing people and the city usher in?

I’d rather “circle” than cross the road

Daming Road, Nanjing, is a street of famous automobile 4S shop. In the morning rush hour, people would rather stay close and seek the far, go around for a few kilometers, and even “break through” the viaduct of Yingtian street, but also “dare not” walk the Zhonghe bridge.

Why? Block!

Why is it blocked? Because Ningwu railway!

Not long ago, a hot post joked: “people all over the country know that there is a natural graben in Nanjing, which is called the Yangtze River. In fact, with the opening of many bridges, tunnels and subway lines, the Yangtze River has long been tamed by the people of Nanjing. It is at this time that another ‘natural graben’ in Nanjing has finally been fully and thoroughly exposed to everyone’s vision. It is called the Ningwu railway.”

The reporter drove to the north of Qiaoji Road on August 8, and the more vehicles drove to the south of Qiaoji road. The bell rang, the four electric gates closed slowly, and all cars, electric vehicles and pedestrians were stopped and looked forward to it. A few minutes later, a freight train passed from west to East, and dozens of carriages rumbled away slowly. As the whistle went away, waiting for the crowd to start agitating, someone shouted, “open the gate!”

From closing to opening, the whole process takes about 10 minutes, and the vehicles on both sides of the crossing have been overstocked for hundreds of meters. After the traffic started, the flow of vehicles and people surged in both directions like a tide. When passing the track, the car body will bump and shake. They are in a hurry. Who cares about this fluctuation of the road.

“That’s good. Sometimes there’s a car coming from the East. It’s almost half an hour after a traffic jam. No matter how urgent you are and what kind of car you are, you have to wait. You can’t even turn around.” Wang Yuquan, a salesperson at a nearby tire store, said that the crossing was like a hand and stuck the “neck” of Daming Road.

Looking west along the railway track, there is another crossing less than one kilometer away - dingjiayuan crossing in Wuding new village community, Qinhuai District. Yang Jie, who lives in kangdingli in the south of the railway, has a child in grade five in Wuding Xincun primary school in the north of the railway. Pick up and drop off three times in the morning, noon and evening. Ride an electric car across the railway crossing. On average, you will encounter a train passing once a day. In this area, there are many families like him who live at the end of the railway and the school is at the end of the railway. The straight-line distance is only a few hundred meters. But if there’s something urgent, you have to circle around from the outside.

Blocking is normal. Ningwu railway line is a ground line, passing through Qinhuai District, Yuhuatai District, Xuanwu District, Qixia District and Jiangning District of Nanjing, forming many level crossings that rely on signal lights and manual supervision, and a large number of crossings are located in densely populated residential areas. In particular, the line from Zhonghua Gate to Yingtian street to Guanghua gate almost “choked” the only way to pass north and South in Nanjing.

In Nanjing, every “change” of Nanjing Wuhu railway has attracted strong attention. On January 10, 2019, the “flat to vertical” project of Banqiao section of Yuhuatai District of Nanjing Wuhu railway was completed and opened to traffic. At 10:00 that night, many residents spontaneously came to the scene to witness the historical moment when crossing 203, which has been in service for nearly 60 years, was officially closed. Previously, the crossing was often heavily congested during morning and evening peak periods. After the change from flat to vertical, the train rumbled overhead, pedestrians and vehicles crossed the culvert and walked smoothly in two-way four lanes, and tens of thousands of pedestrians and vehicles nearby bid farewell to the problem of congestion.

Blocking makes people “Crazy” and blocks out “feelings”. Yao Xianwen, a crossing worker, said that after receiving the notice of the coming car, he closed the fence manually “holding the second” to prevent pedestrians from waiting too much. The surrounding residents are also familiar faces, and they will greet with a smile during the waiting process. Every time I opened and closed the gate for five minutes, there was no rush, let alone breaking through the road, and everything was in order. “We all understand that after all, there are railways before roads.” Yao Xianwen said.

The train whistled at least 21 times through the city

“You must whistle at the aisle, or you’ll have to deduct money.” Yao Xianwen said word by word, “this is the rule!”

Beside the train track, about 100 meters away from the crossing, there is usually a sign with the word “Ming” written on it. When the train driver sees this sign, he needs to pull the siren to remind the pedestrians at the crossing to pay attention.

Auditory signal is an important command for train operation and operation. When approaching the station, whistle sign, curve, crossing, bridge, tunnel, pedestrian, construction site, yellow signal, guidance signal, allowable signal or bad weather, the length of train whistle represents different meanings, with a long sound of 3 seconds, a short sound of 1 second and an interval of 1 second… There are 21 crossings on Nanjing Wuhu railway line, This means that a train must whistle at least 21 times when it passes through Nanjing city through Nanjing Wuhu railway.

“When I first came to Nanjing, I couldn’t sleep at night!” Small nonsense of foreign college students living in Youfang bridge said that the Ningwu railway was only a few hundred meters away from their residence. When the train came, it was first “rumbling” and then a deafening “beep”. Especially late at night, wearing headphones can’t stop the sound. When the trains are crowded, they will “beep” every less than half an hour. You should go to sleep as soon as this train passes, or you will be woken up by the next train.

Trains roar day and night, rain or wind, all year round. The staff of xishanqiao sub district office in Yuhuatai District and Qinhong sub district office in Qinhuai District, which are closest to the Ningwu railway, told reporters that they could not hear face-to-face talk when they met the train whistle during the meeting, so they had to wait for the bus to pass