The Hindu : Front Page : China’s new bullet train is ready

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Saturday, Apr 12, 2008
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China’s new bullet train is ready

It will cut travel time on the Beijing-Tianjin route from 80 to 30 minutes

— Photo: Xinhua

Bullet train: “Hexie” or “harmony” rolls out of a factory in Hebei Province in China on Friday.

BEIJING: China’s first domestically made train, capable of reaching a speed of 350 km an hour, rolled off the production line on Friday. The train, the latest model in the China Railway high-speed series, was produced by the China Northern Locomotive and Rolling Stock Industry Corporation in Tangshan.

After a 2-km test run, Minister of Railways Liu Zhijun said it marked “a new, significant achievement in China’s railway equipment modernisation.” The eight-carriage train, with a streamlined body made of light aluminium alloy, can seat 557 passengers.

Three such trains will begin service on the new 120-km Beijing-Tianjin route before the Olympics in August, the manufacturer said. They will cut the travel time from the present 80 minutes to 30 minutes. In all, 57 such trains are expected to be in commercial operation by the end of 2009.

The train is based on the Siemens ICE 3 model.

China developed the bullet train with a view to “providing equipment support for the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway” and “becoming a front runner in world high-speed railway technology,” according to the Ministry of Railways.

China unveiled the first domestic 300-km-an-hour train in December 2007, becoming the fourth country — after France, Germany, and Japan — to make such trains.

The Beijing-Tianjin railway is considered a trial line for the 1,318-km Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway, which will be completed in another five years and have trains that run at 300 to 350 km an hour.

“China’s railway service has long fallen short of demand,” said Li Heping, a researcher at the China Academy of Railway Sciences. “There are two solutions: building more railways and raising the train speed.” China had raised train speeds six times as of April 2007, with railways allowing a speed of more than 200 km an hour totalling 6,227 km in length. By 2020, the total length of such railways will reach 18,000 km and express train services will cover 50,000 km, benefiting 90 per cent of the population, according to the government. — Xinhua

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