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THE high-speed rail link connecting has finally been given official approval.
Travel time by rail between China's two major cities will be more than halved by 2010, from 12 hours to under five, as the new trains hit speeds of up to 350 kilometers an hour.
The project, the biggest investment in the nation's mid- and long-term railway development plan, has been estimated to cost about 200 billion yuan (US$26.63 billion).
The Ministry of Railways yesterday confirmed that the central government has officially approved the project.
The National Development and Reform Commission posed a notice on its Website on Tuesday saying that the State Council has accepted the report of building the 1,318-kilometer railway between the two cities.
In an telephone interview yesterday, Wang Yongping, a spokesperson of the Ministry of Railways, confirmed the government endorsement but said the ministry hasn't decided the exact date of starting the project.
He also did not offer a comment on the scale of residential relocation that will be required as the result of the project.
Early this year, Railways Minister Liu Zhijun said construction will begin by December.
The new Shanghai-Beijing line will have 21 possible stops in places such as Tianjin City, and Hebei, Shandong, Anhui and Jiangsu provinces.
About a quarter of the country's population lives along the railway between Shanghai and Beijing.
The high-speed railway project has been under discussion for more than a decade, mainly because of its prohibitive cost.
The mega project has attracted the attention of four international heavy hitters - Alstom from France, Canada's Bombardier, Japan's Kawasaki Heavy Industries and Germany's Siemens - all of whom want to provide technology.
It was not announced which technology will be selected but Liu said earlier that the ministry prefers using indigenous ingenuity.
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