Guangdong aims at a high-speed rail covering all its cities by 2020

GUANGDONG province plans to accelerate high-speed railway construction to cover all cities in the province by the year of 2020, it was revealed at a recent provincial government press conference

Today rail connections are limited to Guangdong's eastern, western and northern regions to the developed centres in the Pearl River Delta.

By 2020, transit time from major cities in eastern, western and northern Guangdong to the metropolises of Guangzhou and Shenzhen will be shortened to under two and a half hours, Xinhua reports.

By 2015, operating rail lines will increase 2,612 kilometres, said Li Chunhong, director of Guangdong Provincial Reform and Development Commission, adding that high-speed trackage will reach 714 kilometres.

Expressways will increase to 3,100 kilometres, integrating with a network connecting road, rail, airport and harbour facilities.

By 2020, the inter-provincial transport routes from eastern, western and northern Guangdong will increase from seven to 16. Guangdong will also build more railways connecting ports in eastern and western province to the hinterland regions to secure more cargo to feed the ports, a net network that will be completed by 2017.

Investment in the five railway projects in the east, west and the north has reached CNY70.4 billion (US$11.5 billion) as of July. The Xiamen-Shenzhen Railway and Maoming-Zhanjiang Railway are scheduled to be finished by the end of 2014, while the Guiyang-Guangzhou, Nanning-Guangzhou and Shaoguan-Ganzhou Railway are expected to be completed in 2014.

From 2013 to 2020, there will be 15 new projects launched in eastern, western and northern Guangdong, totalling 2,053 kilometres and costing CNY207.1 billion. Twelve projects totalling 1,443 kilometres in distance and CNY146.1 billion in investment will be launched in 2013, 2014 and 2015.

Among the new projects, six will be inter-provincial routes, from Meizhou to Jiangxi province's Yingtan, from Meizhou to Fujian province's Pucheng, from Zhanjiang to Guangxi Autonomous Region's Hepu, from Zhaoqing to Guangxi's Liuzhou, from Shenzhen to Jiangxi's Ganzhou, and from Shaoguan to Lliuzhou.

Another four will connect ports, including the Zhanjiang Donghai Island railway, Shantou's Jieyang Port Railway, Maoming's Bohe Port Railway and Chaozhou's Port Railway.

The remaining five will be national major railways, the Shenzhen-Maoming Railway, the Meizhou-Chaoshan Railway, the Guangzhou-Shanwei Railway, the Longchuan-Shanwei Railway and the second track to the Guangzhou-Meizhou-Shantou Railway's Longhu South-to-Shantou section.