Chinese trains will travel faster by October, Railways Minister
Liu Zhijun announced over the weekend at an annual work
conference.
The speed increases, scheduled for last year, were held back for
technical reasons.
According to this year's plan, China will have more than 22,000
kilometers of railways which handle speeds of above 120 kilometers.
It will be the sixth time that rail speeds would be raised.
Of the total, 5,300 kilometers of railways will allow speeds of
200 kilometers per hour, including passenger lines such as Beijing
to Shanghai, Beijing to Harbin and Lanzhou to Lianyungang.
The last increase was on April 18, 2004, when the speed on major
lines was raised to 160 kilometers per hour. The travel time
between Beijing and Shanghai was cut from 14 hours to 12 hours.
Compared with the fifth speed-improvement project, the sixth
involves more complicated technology.
According to the minister, China plans to spend 160 billion yuan
(US$19.8 billion) for building railways this year but the nation is
still likely to face problems with transportation bottlenecks over
the next five years.
"There will be a boom in building in the next five years," Liu
said. "But shortages in transportation capacity will remain and the
development of the transport market is not mature."
The rail network is also braced for massive passenger flows
during the Chinese Lunar New Year, or Spring Festival, which falls
on January 29 this year, when millions of migrant workers, college
students and others travel home.
(China Daily January 9, 2006)