China has the world’s largest high-speed railway. Known as an “infrastructure monster”, it only took about 20 years for the country to develop the 45,000km (28,000-mile) network.
It is also an example of the sort of development that has benefited China's political system.
China's HSR connects 33 out of the 34 provinces, making it the world's longest and most extensively used network.
The country also exports railway technology as a key part of the Belt and Road Initiative, the central government’s plan to link economies into a China-centred trading network.
The scope of the infrastructure project was hailed as an example of the sort of development that was only possible thanks to China’s central planning and top-down leadership.
However, the rapid development of the high-speed transport system has also raised some environmental concerns which the government has said many times that it has never endangered such issues.
First launched in 2008, the network is considered essential to the world’s second-largest economy and its 1.4 billion population.
And with the return of high-volume transport to post-Covid levels, China has resumed its plans to link the country via high-speed railway.
How did China’s railway network perform over the summer?
The 62-day summer transport season in July and August concluded with China’s railway network having transported 887 million passengers, with a daily average of 14.31 million, the China State Railway Group reported last month.
The total passenger number represented a 6.7 per cent increase from the same period last year.
At the start of the summer season from July 1 to July 24, the national railway network had transported 423 million passengers.
What new infrastructure is China introducing?
At the start of August, Shenzhen approved the building of the Xili Transportation Hub, which would integrate different train lines. The mega hub is intended to become one of the largest transport junctions in China, and will be completed in 2026.
It is being built in an effort to alleviate the overcrowding at Shenzhen’s North station, and it will combine four high-speed lines, two intercity lines, as well as four subway lines.
The Shenzhen subway line 13 will link the hub to the Shenzhen Bay checkpoint, which is a major route to Hong Kong.
The hub plans to handle 1.3 million people a day, following a total investment of 17.7 billion yuan (US$$2.5 million).
New railways being built in China
The southern cities of Guangzhou and Shenzhen will also be linked via subway next year, adding to the existing high-speed rail connection.
Tunnels will connect the new Nansha-Zhuhai intercity line, that starts at Nansha’s Wanqingsha station and ends at Zhongshan’s Xingzhong station, to the existing Shenzhen–Zhongshan intercity line.
The construction would connect the Shenzhen and Guangzhou subway systems, allowing connections from anywhere from downtown Guangzhou to the city centres of Zhongshan, Zhuhai, and Shenzhen within around 50 minutes, 60 minutes and 75 minutes, respectively, said a representative from the Guangzhou Metro, according to the That’s online news portal.
What other new measures are being introduced?
In an effort to enhance the domestic travel experience, the China Railway Shanghai Group introduced three new high-speed rail passes at the end of August that will allow travellers the convenience of “one purchase, three destinations, valid for seven days”, according to the Hangzhou government site.
The three routes introduced are Shanghai-Dongtai-Yangzhou, Hangzhou-Qiandao lake-Yellow Mountain and Nanjing-Huai’an-Yancheng.
Tickets are available via ticket machines or the 12306 app and website, which is the only official online ticketing platform for China Railway.
Passengers must provide an eligible form of identification, which includes a passport for foreign travellers.
A seven-day pass on the Hangzhou-Qiandao Lake-Yellow Mountain route would cost 210 yuan (US$29.6) – significantly cheaper than buying individual tickets along the same routes.
What is the outlook for China’s railway network?
China is the third largest country in the world in terms of land mass, but it plans to achieve a three-hour travel time between all major cities by 2035 under its national comprehensive three-dimensional transport network.
The plan was introduced in 2021, and also intends to shorten the commuting time within a city to one hour and between two cities in a city cluster to two hours.
It will also look to guarantee delivery of goods within China within one day, and two-days to neighbouring countries, as part of its Global 123 Logistics Circle.
China’s three-dimensional transport system, which aims to unite the country via transport, aims to use the “railways as the backbone”.
By 2035, China is seeking to expand its overall railway network to 200,000km, including 70,000km of high-speed rail. - SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST
