Two railway stations stood about two kilometres apart from 1907, one run by Russia and one by Japan, because the 1905 Treaty of Portsmouth had divided control of the railway between the two empires at Changchun.
一九零七年起,有两座火车站相距约两公里,一座归俄国所有,一座归日本所有,原因是一九零五年的《朴茨茅斯条约》使这条铁路在长春由俄日两国分段控制。
Russia’s Kuanchengzi station, built in 1899 on its broad-gauge line from Harbin, stayed Russian after Moscow paid about 560,000 roubles in 1907 for Japan’s share of it. Japan built its own Changchun station some two kilometres to the south for trains running down the former Russian line, which it renamed the South Manchuria Railway and converted to standard gauge by 1908; a connecting line between the two stations opened in 1909.
俄国的宽城子站始建于一八九九年,位于其从哈尔滨南下的宽轨铁路上;一九零七年,俄国向日本支付约五十六万卢布,买下日方在该站的共有权,车站遂仍归俄国所有。日本则在宽城子站以南约两公里处另建长春站,供原俄国铁路南段的列车使用,这段铁路被改称南满铁路,并于一九零八年前改为标准轨;一九零九年,连接两站的联络线通车。
According to China Jilin Network, Changchun sat where the two railways met, and travellers had to change trains there. Japan bought the northern line from the Soviet Union in 1935 and converted it to standard gauge, and the Russian station closed in 1936.
据中国吉林网介绍,长春正处在两条铁路的交会处,往来旅客都要在这里换乘。一九三五年,日本从苏联手中购得北段铁路并将其改为标准轨,俄国的宽城子站于一九三六年关闭。
A Planned Capital and a Plague along the Line
一座规划中的”国都”,与沿铁路蔓延的瘟疫
In March 1932 Japan made Changchun the capital of its puppet state of Manchukuo and renamed it Xinjing, a name that lasted until August 1945. The Greater Xinjing City Plan drawn up that year covered 200 square kilometres for a planned population of 500,000, modelled on garden-city theory and on Paris, Canberra and Washington, according to The Paper.
一九三二年三月,日本将长春定为其扶植的伪满洲国”国都”,并改称”新京”,这一名称一直沿用到一九四五年八月。据澎湃新闻介绍,当年制定的《大新京都市计划》规划范围二百平方公里,规划人口五十万,参照了花园城市理论,以及巴黎、堪培拉和华盛顿的规划模式。
The same railways had carried the Manchurian plague of 1910–11. A guest at an inn in Manzhouli died on 25 October 1910, the disease reached Harbin on 8 November and Changchun in early January, according to a Sichuan provincial gazetteer account, and by spring pneumonic plague had killed about 60,000 people.
同样的铁路,早在一九一零至一九一一年间便载来了东北鼠疫。一九一零年十月二十五日,满洲里一家客栈的一名旅客死亡;疫情十一月八日传到哈尔滨,据四川省情网的一篇记述,次年一月初蔓延至长春;到开春时,肺鼠疫已夺去约六万人的生命。
Wu Lien-teh, a 31-year-old Penang-born doctor, reached Harbin on 24 December 1910 with one assistant and a microscope, concluded that the disease was pneumonic plague passing from person to person, and introduced measures including gauze masks, quarantine and the cremation of plague victims. The International Plague Conference held in Mukden in April 1911, with 34 delegates from 11 countries, is described by the Chinese Medical Association as the first truly international medical conference held in China.
三十一岁、出生于槟城的医生伍连德,于一九一零年十二月二十四日仅带一名助手、一台显微镜抵达哈尔滨,断定这是人传人的肺鼠疫,并推行了包括佩戴纱布口罩、隔离以及火化疫病死者在内的一系列措施。一九一一年四月在奉天召开的万国鼠疫研究会,有来自十一个国家的三十四名代表参加,据中华医学会介绍,这是中国历史上第一次真正意义的国际医学学术会议。
The City of Automobiles
汽车之城
Changchun is known as China’s City of Automobiles, and has sometimes been called its Detroit. Mao Zedong inscribed the foundation stone of the First Automobile Works on 15 July 1953, with Soviet help and a plan to finish in three years, and builders thawed the frozen ground in winter by turning locomotives into giant heaters, spraying steam on the earth and covering it with straw mats, according to Xinhua.
长春被称为中国的”汽车城”,有时也被称作”中国的底特律”。一九五三年七月十五日,毛泽东为第一汽车制造厂题写了奠基词,工厂在苏联帮助下兴建,目标是三年建成;据新华社报道,冬季施工时,建设者把火车头变成超大暖风机,一边往地上喷蒸汽,一边用草帘子盖住,以化开冻土。
The first 12 Jiefang CA10 trucks came off the line in July 1956. In 1958 the works built the Hongqi, China’s first high-grade limousine; in 2025 FAW sold 3.302 million vehicles, up 3.2 percent and fourth among China’s domestic car groups, and Hongqi sold more than 460,000, its eighth straight year of growth.
首批十二辆解放牌CA10卡车于一九五六年七月下线。一九五八年,该厂造出中国第一款高级轿车——红旗;二零二五年,中国一汽整车销量达三百三十点二万辆,同比增长百分之三点二,在国内汽车集团中位居第四,其中红旗品牌销量超过四十六万辆,连续第八年增长。
A Science City with a Natural Population Decline
一座科研重镇,人口却在自然减少
Changchun ranked 24th among the world’s science cities in the 2025 Nature Index, up six places, while Jilin University jumped from 42nd to 19th in the Nature Index’s 2024 institutional ranking, according to The Paper and the Nature Index.
据澎湃新闻和自然指数介绍,长春在二零二五年自然指数科研城市排名中位列全球第24位,上升六位;吉林大学在自然指数二零二四年的机构排名中,则从第42位跃升至第19位。
According to Changchun’s 2025 statistical communiqué, GDP reached ¥800.559 billion, up 4.9 percent, and automobile manufacturing value added rose 3.4 percent. The year-end population was 9.105 million, with 33,300 births against 77,600 deaths, a natural decline of 4.87 per thousand, partly offset by a net inflow of 64,200 people from other cities.
据长春市二零二五年统计公报显示,全年GDP达八千零五点五九亿元,同比增长百分之四点九,汽车制造业增加值增长百分之三点四;年末人口九百一十点五万人,全年出生三点三三万人,死亡七点七六万人,自然增长率为千分之负四点八七,外市净流入六点四二万人,部分抵消了人口的自然减少。
Getting to Changchun means a Beijing–Harbin high-speed train that, since the July 2025 timetable, takes as little as 3 hours 36 minutes from Beijing. Changchun Longjia International Airport handled 17.6 million passengers in 2024.
前往长春,可乘坐京哈高铁列车;自二零二五年七月调图后,北京至长春最快仅需三小时三十六分钟。长春龙嘉国际机场二零二四年旅客吞吐量为一千七百六十万人次。
The Changchun Station that Japan opened in 1907 is still the city’s main railway station, while the site of the Russian one, two kilometres to the north, now lies inside the yard of the Changchun Locomotive Works, according to China Jilin Network.
据中国吉林网介绍,日本于一九零七年建成的长春站,至今仍是这座城市的主要火车站;而位于其以北两公里处的俄国宽城子站旧址,如今已在长春机车厂院内。
