In May I had the opportunity to spend a month travelling around China. Many things caught my attention while I was there. In general, I came away with some strong and clear impressions, from what I observed, from interactions with people there and from things guides and others said.
The first is that the infrastructure that has been built in the last thirty years or less is simply amazing, not just impressive but jaw-dropping. Most spectacular is the network of high-speed railway lines built since roughly 2005. Currently there are 30,000 miles of such lines, all built in the last twenty years. The total railway network, which has also been massively expanded, stands at 96,000 miles including the HSR lines with the plan being to extend it to 170,000 miles by 2050. According to the best estimates by outside observers, the return on this investment is between six and eight per cent. Since the system has largely been built from scratch, it features enormous brand-new stations the size of airport terminals. The trains, which run at 200 mph, are comfortable and clean and the ride is so smooth that the speed is almost unnoticeable.
In May I had the opportunity to spend a month travelling around China. Many things caught my attention while I was there. In general, I came away with some strong and clear impressions, from what I observed, from interactions with people there and from things guides and others said.
The first is that the infrastructure that has been built in the last thirty years or less is simply amazing, not just impressive but jaw-dropping. Most spectacular is the network of high-speed railway lines built since roughly 2005. Currently there are 30,000 miles of such lines, all built in the last twenty years. The total railway network, which has also been massively expanded, stands at 96,000 miles including the HSR lines with the plan being to extend it to 170,000 miles by 2050. According to the best estimates by outside observers, the return on this investment is between six and eight per cent. Since the system has largely been built from scratch, it features enormous brand-new stations the size of airport terminals. The trains, which run at 200 mph, are comfortable and clean and the ride is so smooth that the speed is almost unnoticeable.