Building the Future: The Construction Boom of China's High-Speed Rail Network

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In the previous video on Railways Explained, from the series Railway Nation, we talked about the Chinese Railways. We covered its history starting from imperialist China all the way to the opening of China to the world after 1978.
We covered China railways' complex management and administration system, and eventually, discussed facts and figures about this incredibly huge railway and transportation system.
In today's video, our focus was more on the staggering construction of an extensive high-speed railway network in China, including beginnings, planning framework, and current state, but also we tried to present the market effects of HSR introduction in China and the changes it brought to the immense transportation system of China.
In the end, we talked about the investment costs of the construction Chinese HSR network, the financing schemes which made it happen, and the famous Chinese railways debt problem.
In the third video in this small series, we will cover the evolution of high-speed trains in China.
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#China #railways #highspeed

[@randomchannel-px6ho]

What's staggering is the sheer amount of civil engineering prowess on display. A lot of the terrain crossed by these lines is not simple, there's so many bridges over gorges, tunnels through mountains, and construction through seismically active zones and China seems to have conquered both finding the engineering solutions to these problems and the logistics of such building in difficult construction sites. In a fact a big part of the B&R Initiative seems to simply be exporting China's extraordinary construction industry since they have more capacity then they know what do with and don't want to downscale. Of course it's not all rosy, but damn is it impressive.

[@qqnqqpart]

Yes exactly, I was looking for videos online about this civil engineering feat! Like their bridge span erectors and so on are very interesting! Do you have any resouces to share?

[@randowdude6847]

Honestly, for a country as big as China the HSR being on the red is no big deal, the overall economic growth it creates more than pays for it

[@GeoMeridium]

This HSR system may appear to be in the red, but when you consider the passenger mile cost alone, it's more than 4 times cheaper than driving, and about 50% cheaper than a typical airplane fare. When you consider the time savings (reduced opportunity cost of travel), health benefits (reduced car accidents, less pollution, improved walkability), and environmental benefits (reduced airline/automobile emissions), it's probably even more valuable.

[@brazensmusings2738]

Exactly, governments all should consider public well being and national economics above profit.

[@thisiskevin1000]

Public transportation is a PUBLIC GOOD, including railways.

[@thisiskevin1000]

@@GeoMeridiumWhile China also has the world’s most extensive highway network. China Railways Group is also modernizing the existing standard railway lines in addition to building more.

[@never4ever386]

Public infrastructure are not supposed to be profitable. The purpose of such infrastructure and connectivity is to facilitate business and economic growth but more importantly a better travel experience for its people.

[@MyKharli]

Yet UK 6th richest country is letting its once excellent rail coverage shrink and decline , The rail industry (and all other private services ) are more a cash cow for investors than actual interest in railways .(or other services )

[@williamhumes7332]

Yes. It's very sad.

[@William-Morey-Baker]

once excellent... when? like 120 years ago? its been shit all century.

[@realpainediaz7473]

@@William-Morey-Baker 🔥

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

HS2 cost around £200M per kilometre. and China is only 21M usd perkilometer

[@bubba842]

@@carkawalakhatulistiwa there's a big difference in land ownership in China. State owns all the land. This makes construction of infrastructure projects alot cheaper.

[@creaturexxii]

Not sure if you've covered this topic before, but a video covering slab tracks and other ballastless tracks would be interesting as it's relevant to the subject of High Speed Rail. Side Note: My favourite type of track gotta be embedded rails as it's smooth and flushed with the surface and is more aesthetically pleasing compare to other ballastless tracks in my eyes.

[@fhs7838]

ballastless tracks are quick and easy to build and near 0 cost of maintain in short term period. No one knows what's the cost when the ballastless tracks beds needed to be swapped in the future. Also the reason why China mostly use ballastless tracks for HSR is: China cant produce high quality ballast. Unlike France who has pretty decent rocks for HSR.

[@alexanderivkin7086]

@@fhs7838 Germany invented this of course. Who else.

[@dominoaffabatelal6731]

Wow I like Chinese High-Speed Rail.

[@god6667]

I like the high-speed trains in the United States in my dream

[@mohitsharma8079]

Really great video and highly appreciate your research and quality of work 😊😊 Keep up the work 😊👍

[@richardblais5232]

yeah but America has Greyhound buses ...

[@qjtvaddict]

So what? HSR is superior

[@opticnurvy]

the government subudises the cost because its a public good, kind of like how in the USA the military is just used for creating jobs, in china rail does the same.

[@khein2204]

I'm humbly asking about when you will make videos about metro system from various countries, thank you, great video anyway

[@Dqtube]

I hope the RE guys and gals won't be mad at me, but you can try visiting @RMTransit or @realdronthego , maybe something will catch your eye.

[@jaksvlogs7195]

@@Dqtube seems RM guy never reviews any metro system from China :(

[@Dqtube]

@@jaksvlogs7195 He has mentioned their systems many times in various videos, so he has some knowledge of the situation, but he may have assumed that he would not get new viewers from this region, so this topic is not high on his to-do list.

[@AaronShenghao]

I found it quite funny with those computer-generated stock videos... especially the plane with British Airways tail with a giant Chinese flag on it... To be honest it subtracted from the video, making it feel less fact based. 5:10 And a clip of Shinkansen mixed in doesn't help. 5:51 - 6:01 The Chinese (with exception of HongKong) drive on the right side of the road like American and EU... not on the left. The trains are ran on the left side because the Chinese used a version of the European train control system. Their traditional railway run on the right side, Shanghai subway also run on the right side instead of left.

[@mdhazeldine]

Yeah the British China Airways 747 was pretty hilarious.

[@krayton5952]

Also strange when the video talk about fares it use the footage of Hong Kong MTR using Octopus Card, which is the exact opposite of how the fare payment system work in CR. All seats reserved and check in using id card

[@tonysofla]

The Grand Finale will be the Taiwan strait train tunnel, a 30minute train travel. With 3x lengths euro channel is still very possible due to ocean floor is even and hard, they got geo lucky.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

and 50% cheaper per kilometer than the eurotunnel

[@KMonRails]

Not happening lmao

[@tonysofla]

@@KMonRails "pursuit of common development across the Straits… It's just a matter of time, and it's not something the pro-secessionist Taiwan authorities can obstruct"

[@tonysofla]

Building two permanent air shaft e.g artificial islands is needed and probably possible with the 75meter depts. build them large enough to lower drilling rigs down you so can start from 4 ends at the same time.

[@KMonRails]

​@@tonysofla and why do that when widebody planes are enough for actual trips between China & Taiwan?

[@valerievankerckhove9325]

I'm sure all the "white elephant" people will be coming out soon, so I'd like to share my own analysis on why this is in fact, a great decision. 1. Long-term costs. China's population is aging, the number of people willing to work in construction is plummeting, and salaries are rising. Not only that, although the Chinese government can force the people to get out of the way, they nonetheless Do need to compensate the people. The longer they wait the more expensive buildings would have been built there in the meantime. In other words, if they wait too long, labor costs would double, land prices would triple and headaches would quadruple in the meantime. This isn't theory, just look at how hard it is to push ahead the California rail. Even if a few lines turn out to be useless later on, the overall savings by building them early would still be worth it. 2. Effect of inflation. When I was living in Beijing, within a few years the price of a standard public transportation fare suddenly rose from RMB 0.1 (about 1 cent) to RMB 2 (about 20 cents)! What the heck, a x20 price increase, this is highway robbery! Once I calmed down I realized that the fares were still pretty cheap. You see, in the US, the transcontinental railroad cost USD 60 million and forever changed the development of the US. The fixed costs of the HSR in China will eventually be a distant memory thanks to inflation, but the ticket costs can always be increased later once living standards have improved. 3. Social impact. Every year, during the Spring festival, China is home to the world's largest human migration: migrant workers returning home for the holidays. You see, to develop, China encouraged poor inland workers to work in the big coastal cities. It is upon the backs of these migrant workers that the Chinese economy was built. These people work far away from their homes for most of the year, and only return to see their relatives back in the countryside once a year during the Spring Festival. Long ago, I've seen one of these migrant workers try to log into the website to book a ticket home. Because of high traffic, she had to repeatedly try until she managed to get into the system only to find that the tickets had already been sold out. Can you imagine the heartache? China owes these people its current prosperity, the least it could do is make it a bit easier for them to go home. 4. Urban planning. As this point it is obvious that house prices in large coastal cities are not coming down, and you can't stuff a billion+ Chinese into just the few big coastal cities. I think the Chinese government chose the extremely smart option to instead build up alternatives. China now has over 100 cities with over a million inhabitants. Salaries are lower in these cities, but houses are much cheaper and life is less stressful. The thing is, for a city to be viable, it needs to be connected via infrastructure to other cities, hence the HSR among others. 5. Pollution. HSR is powered by electricity. Right now most energy in China is coal-generated, but China is working hard to develop alternatives. Once that's taken care of you have a massive reduction in pollution, made better when considering... 6. Energy independence. If you're not traveling by train then you're traveling by plane or by car. Electric cars are still sort of in their infancy, especially for long-range travel, so now we're talking petroleum. Petroleum is one of the world's most critical resources, and China is a net importer. This makes it vulnerable to all sorts of geopolitical issues that could occur in say, Russia and the Middle-East, not to mention a lot of oil is imported via the hotly contested South China seas. The less dependent it is on petroleum for something as critical as transportation, the better. 7. Technology independence and security. The US decided not to export chips to China. What next, planes? What if the EU follows suit? Well then China would Really be in trouble. Better not be Too dependent on planes, right? Total independence is not possible, but mitigating the damage is always good. Even if we don't consider this, money from buying foreign planes is going into someone else's pockets, while HSR money is benefiting domestic workers. 8. Long-term economic benefits. The HSR is infrastructure, just like schools it is not supposed to make money by itself, its benefits are much more far-ranging. For example, China's domestic tourism is already over half a trillion dollars per year, and growing fast. HSR also facilitates business interactions. Not only that, the positive effects should be especially salient in the less developed interior regions. 9. Economies of scale + export. This is what China does best. The more it builds something the cheaper it is to build, and then they can even export the technology! 10. But what about slow/freight rail? With HSR, slower lines can be converted to freight. What's more, the HSR is actually used for express freight. That said, slower freight lines don't have all the constraints of HSR: it doesn't need to be in a straight line, it probably can avoid expensive populated lands, etc. So there is less urgency to build them compared to HSR.

[@EastofVictoriaPark]

Their rebuttal: Chinabad. Great post, though.

[@realpainediaz7473]

As a USA person, good post.

[@Hastdupech8509]

I hope slow lines won't be used only as freight but as commuter/local lines to connect towns and communities with the outer world. Often overlooked, slow railway is the backbone of a country

[@AFlyingCookieLOL]

1. Even if it is powered by coal, it would still be far more efficient than driving a car due to lower rolling resistance by a large margin. In addition to that, taking cars off the road reduces traffic which also reduces cost for businesses 2. Actually that has been planned as well with things like air cans that are typically used in aircraft for loading. In addition to that, the more extensive it is the more subways that it is connected to gets used as the main mode of transport. A much more decent video than those created by "real engineering" or some of those guys that mass produce. I hope the standardization and rail is better covered. I don't think too many people get in depth into what went into the ballestless tracks and how much load they can take. no video has done that or have shown the physical and simulated tests. That one was quite detailed and good and wish I still had the paper on it.

[@AFlyingCookieLOL]

@@Hastdupech8509 China has a significant amount of subways. It is good that the government is supporting the people as it lowers daily living costs.

[@jermainetrainallen6416]

Great video. It's amazing how quickly the Chinese HSR network has grown in such a short space of time. I would love to travel on it. Keep it up👍

[@rasmulde]

Hey RE! A high but realistic number for fuel pr plane is 100 metric tonnes. With that, you are about a factor 10 off in fuel usage for flights. 1.1million flights = 100 million tonnes of jet fuel.

[@mohitsharma8079]

Can you make a video on rrts system being implemented on Delhi Meerut corridor and gonna begin operation in 2023 partially.😊

[@AaronShenghao]

You probably should also mention the domestic airways in China was very congested, the average on time rate before Covid is only about 43%... Reasons are two fold. Chinese is like US, but with all West coast cities stuffed into East coast to Central, then multiply population by 5-fold, too many people concentrated together. The other is all Chinese airspace is controlled by military, you are pretty much restricted to the published airways. Hence you see almost all planes fly like cars in a city, only fly direct on the big arc curve once out of China.

[@reis1185]

@AaronSenghao I went to China 5 months ago, I think that's already been fixed because of newly built Beijing Airport and domestic made C919 airplanes are now in service to meet the huge demand

[@redhongkong]

well when u live in a nation of 1.4bil population, u should expect everything to be congested, highway rail, subway, bus, ferry, airplane etc thats why everything are so massive. airport , subway, train station or even ferry station are huge. thats why transportation is important. delaying in travel means lost in money for businessman.

[@jaeslow6347]

Not sure if you aware, you have a streamer called forsen who has watched a Railways Explained video on his channel pretty much everyday for a long time, hes very passionate about trains and is promoting your channel, he has a very passionate fanbase that would be thrilled if you shouted him out one day.

[@RailwaysExplained]

Really! Thanks for the info. How can we get in touch with him?

[@RazielKainus]

I know China is a vastly different regime... but... here is a big middle finger to those saying US is too big and has too much rail for HSR and electrification :D

[@jxmai7687]

Keep US petrol dollars running one of the biggest reasons.

[@KrishDesai1307]

While I agree USA really shits the bed on public transport, this isnt exactly fair to the US either. You have to keep in mind that China has 5x the population of the US with around 1-2x the habitable land. The external societal economic growth for China is huge since the demand for HSR is huge. In the US, the external societal profits won't be that much as the demand for these rail lines would be much lower. Also the construction costs would be a lot higher than China due to land acquisition and labor costs being significantly higher. All in all, while there could be some good HSR lines and upgradable normal rail routes in the US, I don't think a full coverage of the country like China should be expected, or even good, as Air travel is much better for super long distances as even shown in the video.

[@thisiskevin1000]

Figures are agnostic. Asian societies, especially in China’s case, value collectivism in order to achieve national goals. They think long term. But you still need to remember that this is still a developing country with an upper-middle income status measured by GDP per capital (think of major Latin American countries such as Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Uruguay, Venezuela, Peru, Ecuador and even Cuba, or some Eastern European countries like Romania, Bulgaria and Poland, even Turkiye, South Africa or Malaysia). The series of 5 year economic plans, first introduced by the USSR/Russia since the 1950s, laid the foundation and framework necessary.

[@roberthamilton1301]

Love them used fast train a few times on China now... Amazing fast and comfortable... The Best

[@RailwaysExplained]

Yes indeed!

[@vittoriogriva2930]

We need a video about Italian HSR

[@LuisMendoza-pp9qi]

It's a shame that California 's high speed rail has cost almost 20 BILLION DOLLARS without having even having any segment finished

[@Mars-ev7qg]

I hope to see an episode about Indian national railways soon. It's pretty amazing what India has done with its railway system.

[@ArchsStanton]

*I don't know what "india railway" YOU are talking about but the one I know is technologically backwards, decrepit and dangerous and a shiiiiiiiithoole.*

[@Mars-ev7qg]

@Arch Stanton the British empire, left India totally bankrupt and stuck with a complete disaster of a railroad. Over the last 75 years, India has done a remarkable job picking up the pieces. Yes, it still has work to be done, but they built a system that moves enough food to feed over a billion people and moves more people than any other transportation company in the world. Now, the Indian government has started an ambitious modernization campaign across the whole network. India actually has more high-speed rail lines than the US and Canada combined with plans for massive expansion of service in the coming years. India is also working to eliminate diesel power on the entire network with an ambitious program of electrification of its lines. Nearly all the technology India is using in the modernization program is entirely domestically produced. Fire from spilled diesel fuel is one of the most dangerous parts of a train crash. Switching to electric trains will eliminate this hazard. Sure Indian trains aren't as upscale as British trains, but England wasn't blead completely dry by centuries of ruthless colonial exploitation either. Another thing worth considering is that during the Indian freedom struggle, many Indians saw the railroads as the ultimate symbol of their oppression at the hands of the British. After independence, India ripped up the old British railroads that only served British interests and built its own. They made the railroads their own. Today Indian national railways is the pride of the nation. Vanishingly, few Indians even want to think about getting rid of them. These are just a few things to think about. Regardless of what you think about the quality of Indian railroads, it's a fascinating topic that would make a great video.

[@0.0LEE-n8i]

It is no exaggeration to say that no country has public transportation comparable to China, and you can even take buses (not long-distance buses) and subways to communicate and travel the city💤

[@SpotterCrazyperson]

That is awesome!

[@jevgenijliogkij7849]

3:50 min on top China wants connect to Mongolia/Russia border on north east with Russian border east next to Russian port Vladivostok

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

Moskow to bejing 7000 km HSR .

[@jevgenijliogkij7849]

@@carkawalakhatulistiwa ithink its more for coal importing from Russia but maybe you right

[@saas-cl4on]

hey can you make a video about new railway construction of KRG ?

[@112313]

Ppl must remember that the chinese hsr network does not intend to make money...its a public infrastructure akin to national highway networks. Who would really expect the tolled or toll-less highway network to make money?

[@joefothergill6303]

The intro music us too loud compared to the rest of the video

[@pahatpahat9566]

The real gain by China as a society based on rail is seldom appreciated by those who think merely on ROI!

[@skysthelimitrai7590]

10:05 lol. 😂.

[@AaronShenghao]

7:03 That is rare footage of the 500 km/h test train built by the Chinese... but seem like it disappeared from public eyes? Not much news after its debut... guess they weren't able to reach 500?

[@the_retag]

You mean the Transrapid clone?

[@krayton5952]

It is now a test train for inspecting the track, and train lovers are still tracking it during its operations. You can search 青铜剑 (bronze sowrd) to find its photo/video

[@shaozhihao]

现有铁路，并不能满足500kmh的列车，所以目前500kmh的列车更多是实验。 视频里那个青铜剑，每天都在跑，你觉得从视野里消失了，只是因为你并不在中文圈里。

[@morganangel340]

900 billion in debt to build all this... 🥺😔 Much smarter to get over a trillion in debt to replace The Taliban with... The Taliban. 🤠😎

[@tonysofla]

yea, USA is in $33T debt and it only got 80km length of 200km/h mid-speed train track to show for some of that money.

[@morganangel340]

@@tonysofla Actually that track was built like 40 or 50 years ago, when the debt was minimum.

[@reis1185]

@@morganangel340 and the debt is internal and guaranteed for long term investment it's external taxes due to economic activity will paid it in few years

[@AFlyingCookieLOL]

@@reis1185 Probably already paid for considering the rapid growth and the asset value just keeps increasing the more connections are made, especially those massive subways in China.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

The cost of the war in Afghanistan was over $2 trillion, nearly $300 million a day

[@hape3862]

10:05 Ouch!

[@tonysofla]

Still counting but one day they will be done, what will they now do with that money instead? to become #1 in the world at being best in everything, that is what 50year plans do.

[@carlitosleonidas3029]

China number 1!🥰

[@3eye451]

Every where china is no 1

[@couchtaming23]

Why you always saying that you're no 1? In fact in most cases you're not, try to learn not be so arrogant.

[@moyler6600]

高铁是民生项目，就像地铁或者公交一样，其实很多城市的地铁公交都不盈利，政府用纳税人的钱来补贴这些民生项目，取之于民，用之于民，这就是中国人说的民主😅盈利当然最好，但盈利不是民生项目的主要目标，让人们出行更便捷，让物流运输更高效，让国内各行各业从中获利才是主要目标

[@渡海-q2w]

As of 2023 42,000 kms of hsr lines are finished! Please update your video its outdated by china's terms xD

[@afizi1213]

well china is have strong money and rich they also can bring hsr to any country like indonesia ,vietnam malaysia thailand laos already have it ,pakistan ,and afrika

[@ryan225360]

As many issues as I have with China, their rail system is fucking INSANE. props to them.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

fast train California for 125 M usd per kilometer. while the Chinese fast train averages 21 M usd per kilometer

[@termitedome]

@@carkawalakhatulistiwa the China State Railway Group has had a debt of around $900 billion USD, According to an analysis conducted in 2019, only five out of 15 fast 350 kilometers-per-hour high-speed railway lines in China could cover all costs, including operating and capital costs.

[@qjtvaddict]

@@termitedome keep coping

[@qjtvaddict]

Yes you are trained well by media

[@chestnutridge4187]

@@termitedome US interstate highways sucks tons of money every year, should US abolish them?

[@mbphari8865]

13000 km network only above 300kmph remaining are upgraded for 200kmph

[@humorpalanta]

Couple of things worth to mention: 1: The cheap cost comes from : cheap labour, basically no private prpoperty (the government takes any land it wants and be happy if you get something in return... meanwhile the US is struggling because of US ownership laws). Also most of the building is done in rural areas where they only had to worry about farmlands. One more thing: environmental ministry and laws are not a thing there. 2: High debt is not an issue as long as you are capable of paying it back. Evergrande's problem was that they couldn't make enough profits to cover their debts. Meanwhile here the losses can be written down on capital and the debts still can be paid. Therefore no issues with the huge debt. Also there are lines making a profit so they are somewhat capable of covering for the rest. And these projects are still in baby age. Their usage will go up heavily in the next 15 years so not really in issue either. 3: Most of the lines conect extreme sized cities which makes the investments worthy and will make returns. Just needs a few years for the people to get used to it and see the possibilities.

[@termitedome]

High debt is not an issue ? Who will pay 900 m ? Government ? On borrowed money. They can't even cover debt repairment. 900 is official number and china lies all the time so this number way higher .Same as Wuhan virus lies

[@brazensmusings2738]

1 is partially false. All Chinese get compensated immensely for the land. Additionally, if they have a home over it, they get a home constructed. If there was a village, the whole village will be reconstructed with additional compensation for movement and starting life anew. Its a dream for every Chinese that something gets built on their land by the government so they can be compensated. You cannot imagine how they struggle and the power games, just so to make the officials take their leased land instead of their neighbours'. Environmental laws are a thing, they were not a decade ago, but they are very important now.

[@louisr6560]

Proud to say that the first 50sec are not relevant to me!

[@thomasauslander3757]

California Homeless are looking anxiously for the completion of the High-Speed rails they can Poop in San Francisco and be back in Los Angeles homeless shelter for complimentary cocktails by afternoon.. 🍹

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

The cost of the war in Afghanistan was over $2 trillion, nearly $300 million a day

[@slomo4672]

They can't afford the tickets

[@サブカルおじさん-t3s]

I would like to add something important about construction that is missing. The biggest problem is eminent domain. In China, it is not allowed to hold land as personal property, and in a democratic country, the problem of land tenure during construction is the biggest bottleneck.

[@junrenong8576]

Yes and No. Theres some examples in China that some homeowners decided not to move out and they have to build roads around it. And they have an excellent buy back land scheme, where the government pays you to buy back yr property, and oftern its a huge sum of money, and in China the joke is often that people that can afford luxury cars have their property boughr back by the government and developers.

[@lvjinbin28]

why China built 70% high speed railways in one decade? because China need to bail out herself from 2008 wallstreet crisis though 2008-09 Chinese economic stimulus infrastructure plan, that's very important reason why China was so much in hurry, but most people don't know the political reason.

[@MrMopar413]

Well in China if they want to put a rail anywhere they just do it, where the locals like it or not, they have no say in the matter. Then in the USA excuse the expression Red Tape. Theirs right of way acquisition of private property, environmental impact studies , law suits by people or parties against the rail line this goes on and on. It can cost 1 billion dollars per US mile to build HSR. Then the wages of the workers, cost of equipment and materials. It goes on and on. Then theirs the requiring operational costs. I live in Portland, Oregon USA that built the first above ground lite rail system in the USA and is operated by Tri-Met the cost of a one way ticket a 2.5 hr pass is 2.50 US dollars. A all day pass is 5.00 dollars US. Then you can get a 7 day pass , 14 day pass , 30 day which are more. But the point is the fare doesn’t come close to make it self supporting. We have a Tri-Met payroll tax and it’s a percentage of the gross payroll of a business but I think it works out to 600.00 per year per employee to the employer which is past on to us consumers as higher costs of goods and services. The point I’m making is as a car guy, hot rod guy is the faster you want to go the more it’s going to cost you no matter your mode of transportation. Ask me how I know😂😂😂😂😂😂👍

[@abyyy490]

You don't know what China prioritises when building a railway, and it's definitely not like what you just stated "put a rail anyway they wanted".

[@MrMopar413]

@@abyyy490 in a way your right. They have their priorities but when it comes to the path they want to take they draw a line and it’s going here along this route and that’s it. If anyone doesn’t like , well so go pound dirt, we the government don’t care and we are going to build it anyway.

[@lightboi9752]

@@abyyy490 whatever they plan in the drawing room of the ccp is final.

[@williamhumes7332]

China gets it done, America tries, get protested against, and gives up.

[@tonysofla]

China has 70year land lease, the land was never for sale in the first place. Structure rights is stronger in China than even USA, but I guess they build above it or offer enough money for the structure to make them move.

[@couchtaming23]

The high speed railway is insane, the debt is also insane.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

fast train California for 125 M usd per kilometer. while the Chinese fast train averages 21 M usd per kilometer

[@couchtaming23]

@@carkawalakhatulistiwa It's not cheap in both countries.

[@stephenhill8790]

That debt is negated to the countrys growth and as such 0 the (debt) is by the country too the country so has no real meaning, you are looking at it from a individual corporate level, no comparison

[@redakteur3613]

While looking at railways in China people always forget “regular” rail that is crumbling because all the funds are in HSR. Freight rail traffic decreases year after year

[@desmondkwang5945]

Financially unsustainable. Easy to build but impossible to maintain.

[@jaykobwalson1941]

I like what they built but I hate HOW they built it.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

The cost of the war in Afghanistan was over $2 trillion, nearly $300 million a day

[@AndrewManook]

Why? You can't stand big machines?

[@jaykobwalson1941]

@@AndrewManook No, it's slave labor they used sadly.

[@R.-.]

It looks like China is in a rush to build it's HSR infrastructure before it plans to adopt the stricter and more costly environmental standards of a developed country. Look at global CO2 emissions in recent years, and how much China has contributed.

[@guzilayerken5013]

You should take a look at the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere now, whether they are emitted by the developed countries now. The amount of greenhouse gases emitted from the industrial revolution back then to today seems astronomical in existence today.

[@中国杨]

do you know the size of the population of China? If you look at per capita stats, the biggest contribution of carbon emission is definitely not China. If you don’t agree with using per capita, then are you suggesting that an average Chinese should not have the same quality of life as an average American (or Canadian or whatever Western citizen)? Also, i do think it’s cheating when you only count recent, instead of accumulated emissions since most developed countries have already made enough damage post Industrial Revolution

[@lupus7194]

China is the factory of the world. They emit CO2 that otherwise would be emitted elsewhere. Have you seen China's massive investment in wind farms, solar farms, hydroelectricity, re-greening of desert, nuclear power etc. On the other hand, what has the US done - very little other than drive large gas guzzlers. You need to sidestep your prejudices and look at reality.

[@markvogel5872]

Little Xi's zoom zoom train!

[@mdhazeldine]

Well done for a well balanced video. I think it's great that China have invested so much in HSR and shown the world what is possible. Unfortunately I think they went too far and too fast with it. Not to mention they don't respect people's property rights and just bulldoze homes to make way for new lines. I think they should have built the network out a bit more slowly and probably not done the lines that go far out to the extremities to reduce the debt burden. HSR only really works over medium distances because trains aren't as fast as planes over long distances, so I don't know why they built some of those lines (was it vanity or was it trying to create a public service and help the environment? Not sure). Perhaps in 10 or 20 years it will make sense if ridership increases over time, but given that China's population is plateauing now, I'm not so sure.

[@valerievankerckhove9325]

The thing is, the trains are domestically built. The planes are imported from the US and EU, which have a beef against China right now. You think China dares to be too dependent on planes?

[@mdhazeldine]

@@valerievankerckhove9325 That's why Comac exists.

[@valerievankerckhove9325]

@@mdhazeldine Comac isn't widespread yet, and not all components are domestically made. What if the minute China really starts pushing Comac, the US launches the equivalent of chip war 2.0, and blocks all components needed by the Chinese aviation industry? With Russia, we've seen that US businesses were willing to block Russia. What if the US decides to completely deprive China of aviation technology? Even if China eventually manages, it will take time, and in the meantime people need to travel.

[@mdhazeldine]

@@valerievankerckhove9325 I think China has already considered this and will try to become less reliant on the US. They will have seen what's happened to Russia and wouldn't want the same thing to happen to them if they invaded Taiwan, so I see them continuing to lessen dependence on the West.

[@z_863]

people don't just travel from one extremity to another

[@mzanpure]

What about the fact that all these trains are running in debt. They have accumulated huge debt.

[@mdhazeldine]

That was literally in the video. Did you watch to the end?

[@rainx213]

I honestly never understood why these type of questions keep resurfacing. I'm neither from China nor the pro-western camp and I just want to ask you do you need to make all roads built to be profitable to be a 'good' road? Those 'trains' connected areas from rural, medium and rich provinces and cities. Peoples are able to travel. And with that, a lot of things could be promoted. Not everything must be measured with a direct profit. There are profits and losses that are not seen by those strings of data you use to measure the surface profits. You are definitely right that most 'trains' in China are in debt but if you look at the bigger picture, can you be sure that the it is still a loss or a gain? I'm honestly not sure either but it definitely isn't something so simple as to just saying it's a loss because the trains accumulate debts. Only time will tell.

[@theolich4384]

Better than having accumulated huge debt with absolutely nothing built anyway.

[@redhongkong]

its like public transportation in north america, its never ment to make money. its just like firefighting and police department. part of public services and if u look at the population, 1.4bil , chinese are getting rich and richer, if everyone start owning cars like american did, the road will be heavily congested. 350kph HSR reduce road congestion and its cleaner compare to 800-1000kph air travel, faster than 120kph car on highway. thats how mini electric cars starts to dominate chinese market. they only use it for in city travel most of the time. they rely on public transportation for cross country travel. for the debt part, if u look how fast china develops and grows, thats what a good reliable ease to use public transportation brings. its similiar to the reason why amazon built its own delivery system. cause public delivery system is expensive and slow and small business just can not grow here in north america.

[@reis1185]

Public transportation is not profitable and the debt is paid by external taxes through economic activities

[@tobygoodguy4032]

Its always cheaper when its built fascist. 🤠

[@richardblais5232]

Socialist ...

[@petrhajduk9955]

Meanwhile the US can not even cover the capitalist desert between LA and Las Vegas. And what do you think about Spain? France? Germany? Japan? All socialists?

[@richardblais5232]

@@petrhajduk9955 My reference to Socialists was to counter the fact that fascists can build it cheaper ... fascist usa can't even build sidewalks let alone HSR ...

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

Socialist

[@ensteffo]

Weird how the US have so shitty trains then.