CHINA: The 75th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic on October 1 saw three days of public holidays marked by the opening of several high speed lines.
On September 29 a section of the 350 km/h Chongqing – Kunming high-speed corridor opened between Chongqing Xi and Yibin Dong, with the fastest trains covering the 192 km in 48 min. The line serves five intermediate stops, with major civil engineering including the 4 973 m long Zhongliangshan tunnel and the 2 613 m Luzhou Tuojiang bridge. Beyond Yibin the route is under construction for 524 km southwest to Zhatong and Kunming.
In the northwest state of Ningxia Huizu, a 97 km section of 250 km/h line from Yinchuan north toward Huinong opened on October 1. This line will eventually form part of a route to Baotou in Nei Mongol. There is an initial service of 18 trains per day between Yinchuan and Huinong Nan station.
The 350 km/h Xuancheng – Jixi line in Anhui opened on October 11. This 112 km line has more than 45 km of bridges and nearly 53 km of tunnel; it forms part of the Nanjing – Nanping – Fuzhou north-south corridor.
Four weeks earlier a 98 km link from Longchuan to Meizhou in Guangdong province opened. This 350 km/h line will form part of a 290 km link to Wuping and Longyan in neighbouring Fujian province: Longyan to Wuping opened on December 26 2023 and Wuping to Meizhou is under construction.
Opening of the Longchuan – Meizhou line on September 14 lifted China’s total rail network above 160 000 route-km, with over 46 000 route-km being high speed lines built since 2005.
