People are seen on a path through dense trees in urban Golmud, northwest China's Qinghai Province, April 2, 2011. [Photo/Xinhua]

Golmud, founded in the Qaidam Basin in 1954, with an average altitude of around 3,000 meters, nowadays has grown up to a traffic hub and freight station for railways and roads traveling between Qinghai and its neiboring Tibet Automous Region. After the rapid development since 2006 when the Qinghai-Tibet railway was opened, the emerging city has become the third largest city on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, with a population of 270,000, ranking behind Xining and Lhasa.