China Opens World's Longest High-Speed Rail Line
China officially launched the world's longest high-speed train connection.
The trains travel between Beijing and Guangzhou over a distance of 1,428 miles at speeds up to 186 MPH. The total travel time is about 8 hours, down from more than 20 hours before. In comparison, the distance compares to the track between New York and Key West. Amtrak covers a shorter distance between New York and Miami in about 30 hours.
China's high-speed rail system covers 5,809 miles of tracks today. The construction of the network has come at a high cost. China apparently has assumed debt of nearly $640 billion to create the network, which employed about 100,000 workers per line during the construction.
China plans additional lines which will include four East-West connections as well as four North-East connections by 2020.
China : Okay, let's just push the debt to America. Huehue.
China : Okay, let's just push the debt to America. Huehue.
What? you couldn't give us metric considering that you guys KNOW that a large chunk of us are canadian? Come on toms. No canadian contests and this, we want our own canadian site.
You do know that we owe China money right? Not good for any of us if China is in debt as well.
What a joke of a system.
Oh and wow, hopefully its cheaper than a plane
i have to say with that track record i would never get in a moving train in china.
Except when you blow up a train it is a lot more disruptive and takes a lot longer to repair than when a plane is taken out. When a plane goes down it is a terrible tragedy, but you simply redistribute the routes on other flights to acomodate for the change. When a train is blown sky high then the physical route is gone, and must be repaired before things can get moving again.
Still, I would love to see more high speed rail here in the states (or any high speed rail). It can be a much more convenient way to travel (especially with kids), and in theory should cost less than flying as there are way less fuel and maintenance costs involved.
However, here in the States I think it would make more sense to work with our current highway system. I read a few articles about a system where you could have a center 'lane' for electric cars where your car would dock to some sort of pulley system. Once docked you could sleep/work/watch a movie while your car is recharged, then when you get close to your destination you would be ejected from the system in the city you wanted to travel to, and you would be fresh and ready to go. Trains and other forms of mass transit simply do not fit the American lifestyle very well (for better or worse), and a system like this would make much more sense here.
Poetic justice if they had Americans as the workers.
Even in China, with their lax safety laws have proven that this is one of the safest methods of transport possible. I think High speed rail can very well fit into the american lifestyle. Public transit is used extensively in high density areas like new york, and to get across the country, people are using planes. HS trains could be used to replace some of the planes as a cheaper alternative. And for the safety, a collision between HS Trains is almost unheard of, There aren't even enough incidents to fill a hand in the world history of high speed rail.
It's ok, with the workers at Foxconn being underpaid, they'll catch up in no time.
8 hours on a train compared to 3 hours in the air is competitive? Even factoring in check in and security, which is about an hour, you're looking at half the time going by air.
Just look at the pollution in the photo. Yum.