A comprehensive transportation system that includes highways, airlines, railways and pipelines is gradually improving. Completion of the Qinghai-Tibetan railway in 2006 ended Tibetan's history without railways. The Qinghai-Tibet railway runs 1,956 kilometers from Xining, Qinghai to Lasa, Tibet. The section between Xining and Golmud was completed in 1979 and put into operation in 1984.