Why China Is so Good at Building Railways

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  • čas přidán 12. 11. 2018
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    References:
    [1] www.economist.com/china/2017/...
    [2] datahelpdesk.worldbank.org/kn...
    [3] documents.worldbank.org/curate...
    [4] www.oag.com/on-time-performan...
    [5] www.export.gov/article?id=Chi...
    [6] translate.google.com.au/trans...
    [7] www.ft.com/content/ca28f58a-9...
    [8] www.hsr.ca.gov/docs/about/busi...
    [9] openknowledge.worldbank.org/b...
    [10] www.researchgate.net/profile/...
    [11] www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018...
    [12] www.economist.com/china/2017/...
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Komentáře • 25K

  • @youuummaa6450
    @youuummaa6450 Před 3 lety +2730

    it’s bizarre that the western medias would ask questions like “why does the government build a railway that is not profitable?”
    Public infrastructure are not meant to be profitable

    • @pandaotu
      @pandaotu Před 3 lety +119

      Except Urumqi-Lanshou is INSANELY unprofitable. There’s barely any demand so there’s no point in wasting taxpayers money except politics

    • @youuummaa6450
      @youuummaa6450 Před 3 lety +482

      @@pandaotu Governments does not build public infrastructures to make profits. And how come a domestic railway be ‘political’ anyway. Even if somehow it is, 140B usd is a not a bad investment to solve terrorism in Xinjiang, considering that US spent 2 trillion in Afghanistan on troops, missiles, and drones.

    • @yonniiisan
      @yonniiisan Před 2 lety +193

      @@pandaotu china is heavily investing in it's western provinces today's non profitable train is tomorrow's profitable, this is how Chinese government think

    • @bobbyswanson3498
      @bobbyswanson3498 Před 2 lety +69

      @@youuummaa6450 i see what you’re saying about not caring for profit but then u had to ruin it by saying committing genocide is just them trying to stop terrorism…

    • @FistSaidToTheFace
      @FistSaidToTheFace Před 2 lety +38

      I personally think, as an opinion, that america just doesnt have the demand for something such as this. a huge portion of usa is just stay at home backwoods country folk that dont feel the need to go anywhere. china has billions of people that can steadily use the rail system. population density plays a huge role in infrastructure.

  • @azhofang201
    @azhofang201 Před 4 lety +3344

    China might just built another 20 miles while you were talking about this

    • @jeffreysetapak
      @jeffreysetapak Před 4 lety +159

      This year, China is going to add another 2900++miles=4000 km of high speed rail.

    • @jk3jk35
      @jk3jk35 Před 4 lety +176

      California canceled theirs in the mean time...

    • @paulritchie5868
      @paulritchie5868 Před 4 lety +17

      Cheap workforce????... don’t have to buy the land to build on,lots of them to do it...stupid question really.

    • @lihihongan5289
      @lihihongan5289 Před 4 lety +10

      And how many people dead because of coronovirus while you,re talking about this

    • @chrisgarrett6305
      @chrisgarrett6305 Před 4 lety +121

      Lihi HonGan are you trying to blame China for coronavirus... you can’t blame a country for the appearance of disease

  • @majestic._
    @majestic._ Před 2 lety +308

    One of my favorite things about Chinese high speed rail is watching the beautiful rural landscapes flash-by. The scenery is often very beautiful. I hope to go back to China next year and ride more of the trains.

    • @salvadorvizcarra769
      @salvadorvizcarra769 Před 2 lety +27

      Okay... Yes Yes Yes. Chinese Trains are fast as a Bullet. They are Glittery. Beautiful. Modern. Hygienic as a bloody military OR. But, I prefer the US Trains. Yup. They are creepy fun. On a Chinese train you get from point A to point B in a sneeze. Instead on a US train, they are so slow that you can see how your clothes go out of style. On a US train, you can fall in love, have children and watch them grow up. On a US train you can read Tolstoy's "War and Peace" twice. On the US train you have time to learn another language. U see? US trains are exciting. They are Noisy. Stinky. Rusty. Smoky. Full of Graffiti. With vomits of all nationalities. From Mexican enchiladas to Japanese sushi. The US train is Thrilling like a horror movie and whitout "Beautiful" rural landscapes flash. On the other hand, on a Chinese train, you get on, you sit down and Nnnnñit! You have already reached your destination. What kind of shit is that? Did you pay a ticket and for what? Where are the murders, the harassing cops, the swindlers, the Addicts, the "International Spies", the Sadists, the Psychos, the Sex Pervs, de Locos, the Mormons, the Exhibitionists...? No. No. No. I rather to risk my life on a US train, but have something to tell my grandchildren. Traveling on a US train is a High-Risk Sport. In case the train derails... Excuse me. It's not "IF". The correct word is: "WHEN Derails". Mmh... Anyway:... blah, blah, blah...

    • @RexKo
      @RexKo Před 2 lety +3

      Should try Japan's bullet train instead.
      You'd get to enjoy the sceneries much more peacefully,
      w/o having to worry about sitting next to a bunch of loud Mando speakers
      yelling at each other right next to you.

    • @directorl4641
      @directorl4641 Před rokem

      @@salvadorvizcarra769 hahahahaha,You say that you have been to China. I haven't seen any abnormal murderers or drug addicts in the street in China. However, the streets of Manhattan and Philadelphia are full of drug addicts, like zombies. Hahahaha, your imagination is really rich. It's a pity that you are just a loser who has no money, no time, and only indulges in the Internet

    • @directorl4641
      @directorl4641 Před rokem

      @@salvadorvizcarra769 Keep imagining that the streets in China are as dirty and messy as those in the United States. That's the only thing you can do to comfort yourself

    • @RexKo
      @RexKo Před rokem

      @@ngananhbien lol, what US?
      Read carefully, I said Japanese bullet train.
      .
      btw, quality-wise, US trains last longer than most Chinese ones, there’s no need to trash them, and create more waste yet.

  • @mandalorian3246
    @mandalorian3246 Před 2 lety +364

    I am indian who lived in China for three years now I am working in Europe, from my experience I feel the trains and subways in Europe makes me feel Europe is five decades away from Chinese transportation

    • @MrWhite-ru3oz
      @MrWhite-ru3oz Před rokem +17

      What about India tho 💀. Our High speed and low speed trains travel at the same speed. Although gotta give our country props for moving the most people per day on trains

    • @tomli9793
      @tomli9793 Před rokem

      ​@@MrWhite-ru3oz What India needs is a strong and intelligent autocratic government to forcefully promote infrastructure construction and national education, rather than a weak and deluded pseudo-democracy government,who keep telling people to drink cow urine

    • @manwithstds7503
      @manwithstds7503 Před rokem +28

      ​@@MrWhite-ru3oz 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂 are you delusional? india is centuries behind both in terms of connectivity.

    • @manwithstds7503
      @manwithstds7503 Před rokem +6

      ​@@MrWhite-ru3oz yea, you'd need to move more people, because india has more people 😐

    • @captain_noodles
      @captain_noodles Před rokem +8

      ​@@MrWhite-ru3oz delhi metro is goated but the rest of the trains are not even c9mparable

  • @qingyunjian7
    @qingyunjian7 Před 4 lety +565

    relatively small city with a population of 3.5 million
    Toronto(Canada's largest city) - 3.2 million population -.-'

    • @finestfresh
      @finestfresh Před 3 lety +17

      Auckland has 3m which is the biggest city in NZ

    • @iain3713
      @iain3713 Před 3 lety +13

      finestfresh no it fucking doesn’t. It’s like 1.6 mil

    • @maxwellli7057
      @maxwellli7057 Před 3 lety +7

      @@iain3713 your name concerns me in more than a few ways

    • @xswl3085
      @xswl3085 Před 3 lety +4

      Yeah China has many people

    • @zeusman5195
      @zeusman5195 Před 3 lety

      Yeah if you didn't realise that's exactly what the word relative means. It is a relatively small city in this context you bot.

  • @theolich4384
    @theolich4384 Před 4 lety +385

    Traveled to Xinjiang last month on train. The 1,100 mile high speed rail portion between Lanzhou and Urumqi are mostly ballastless tracks built through the red, empty, searing Gobi desert. The engineering was dazzling to watch.

    • @CaiZhongwen2023
      @CaiZhongwen2023 Před 2 lety +15

      中国基建确实牛逼

    • @zyn8109
      @zyn8109 Před 2 lety +2

      @@CaiZhongwen2023 那必须的

    • @FallingToU
      @FallingToU Před rokem

      @@CaiZhongwen2023 抛开意识形态,基建速度没几个国家比得过

  • @operatorlink
    @operatorlink Před 2 lety +120

    Having a rail to rural areas helps the rural area develop faster than an airport. Having a rail system in rural areas, you can easily export regional goods/minerals and import construction materials/ tools to those areas. To do it by plane it is really expensive long term. So sure building a rural rail line might not be profitable passenger wise, but long term it is easier to develop the country.

    • @reappermen
      @reappermen Před rokem +3

      Plus, rural train stations are fairly cheap to build and operate compared to an airport. So once a rail line is build from A to B through rural areas, if a ton or collection of villages along the route grows enought, you can always decide to add a new station there for cheap and in fairly short time for infrastructure.

    • @raymae60
      @raymae60 Před rokem

      I guess that depends on what you mean by "develop", I am a native Californian. My blue-collar ancestry lived semi-rural lives in quiet neighborhoods and small acreage. Today, most central Californians see high-speed rail as a political boondoggle to infill the Central Valley with blue coastal and Sacramento city immigrants. I smell in your comment a hint of this mindset. I get it. Your lives are rife with overcrowding and pollution,(which blows our way). You are urbanites. I recently visited SF, an urban jewel which locks its park bathrooms, forcing its homeless citizens to go pee and poo...well, outdoors. Most of us over here hope your lifestyle stays over there. Meanwhile, high speed rail plods along In political denial. I doubt I will live long enough to ride it, but even if, I will lament the conversion of farms to crowded developments for the politically blue and their ways. Oh, if you really like what you see in China....move there.

    • @sappicfire
      @sappicfire Před 3 měsíci

      @@raymae60 you talk like China would just about welcome any "I Love China" fan to live there. I too smell a hint of lament California would EVER complete her High Speed Rail.
      For the IQ-challenged American; your paid-by-oil Senator or Congressman would throw California's HS train under the wheels of a bus at the twitch of their masters in Huston.
      I wont hold my breadth for California's High Speed Train to come to life.

  • @lindafinch1520
    @lindafinch1520 Před rokem +23

    My son and his wife both worked at the U.S. Embassy in Guangzhou for a few years and they took trains everywhere they wanted or needed to go.

    • @Jsy577
      @Jsy577 Před 7 měsíci

      那是领事馆,不是大使馆!大使馆在北京❤

    • @Rick2k25
      @Rick2k25 Před 6 měsíci

      ​@@Jsy577Are you from Beijing?

    • @Jsy577
      @Jsy577 Před 6 měsíci

      No.

    • @Jsy577
      @Jsy577 Před 6 měsíci

      @@Rick2k25兄弟要来中国玩吗?欢迎你的到来!

  • @FSXNOOB
    @FSXNOOB Před 5 lety +3597

    Small town - 3.5m, my whole country Croatia.. 3.5million...
    Damn...

    • @Starfire_Storm
      @Starfire_Storm Před 5 lety +322

      It's all relative, when seeing that China has some of the world's largest cities at over 20 million people; 3.5 million isn't much.

    • @xiaominqian1114
      @xiaominqian1114 Před 5 lety +285

      3.5 million is definitely not a small town, even in China...And if you think the other way around, some of the "small towns" might even have a bigger area than your country...

    • @Starfire_Storm
      @Starfire_Storm Před 5 lety +113

      @@xiaominqian1114 My country is Mexico, so no, there isn't a city with a larger area than my country.
      I know that a city with 3.5 million people isn't a small town, it would easily be the 2nd most populated city here in Mexico. But then again, when you look at the cities in China, a 3.5 million people one isn't that impressive since there's quite a lot of cities in China that have that ammount of people and more.

    • @59DGO59
      @59DGO59 Před 5 lety +158

      You have a small country but you are great at sports :)

    • @aussieboy4090
      @aussieboy4090 Před 5 lety +136

      Shanghai itself is as big as my country Australia in population.

  • @stevenpeng3
    @stevenpeng3 Před 3 lety +2130

    The western ignore one thing, train is a public service in China to some degree, we can not always consider of making money in every thing

    • @fcfhkmelb
      @fcfhkmelb Před 3 lety +41

      Train is a public service in the west as well.

    • @jackm9317
      @jackm9317 Před 3 lety +291

      @@fcfhkmelb no not in the same way. Public transport loses money alot of the time in China but the government supplements them

    • @davidz7858
      @davidz7858 Před 3 lety +160

      @@fcfhkmelb but, most owned by private companies, that is why you can see America railroad infrastructure was built more than a half century ago and not updated. it is slow, noisy, uncomfortable and not safe.

    • @jimmybyau910able
      @jimmybyau910able Před 3 lety +11

      DAVID Z because most US citizen can afford air tickey fly over the countries in cheaper price and faster time than railway

    • @Elfangorlanzhou
      @Elfangorlanzhou Před 3 lety +15

      socialism tho technically the rail network is profitable too as it brings in tourism to regional centres and are very popular for transport so it's actually capitalism lol

  • @keithrodgers1030
    @keithrodgers1030 Před 3 lety +33

    They had the foresight to realise that tiny tin cans filling up roads will cause a major problem. I have been on the high speed train network and the maglev train. Hurtling along at 350km/hour is amazing. State expenditure on developing is the way to go. It's a massive project and benefits China.

  • @B3FMandCProductions
    @B3FMandCProductions Před 2 lety +30

    Last week, I took Amtrak from Washington to Roanoke and it took about 4.5 hrs despite the cities only being ~230 miles apart. 9 hours from DC to Dallas is incredible to me

    • @tomli9793
      @tomli9793 Před rokem

      And how much you paln for the fly

  • @marien3521
    @marien3521 Před 5 lety +3087

    I was in China a few weeks ago and I went from Wuhan to Shanghai with the G high-speed train (the G one it's the fastest but there K,T and Z trains as well I think). I am from Germany and pretty used to our "high-speed trains" (ICE), however traveling by train through China is insanely comfortable and pretty cheap. The distance from Wuhan to Shanghai is somewhat between 1000 and 1200km and took 4 hours. I highly recommend the trains!

    • @huajie666liu8
      @huajie666liu8 Před 5 lety +134

      yes. G means 高铁, fast train. i like German cars and zeiss camera though. (*^ω^*)

    • @marien3521
      @marien3521 Před 5 lety +129

      @@huajie666liu8 but you won't like going by train in Germany 😂

    • @zhizhouhe7517
      @zhizhouhe7517 Před 5 lety +61

      I am from wuhan and drive in wuhan is painfully, I have a driver license in China and USA, can I drive in Germany,I believe drive in Germany will be fun like take G train in China! I love driving but not drive with stupid drivers in China!

    • @denglinzhiniao
      @denglinzhiniao Před 5 lety +36

      G and D trains are high speed,K and Z trains are normal speed

    • @wen87n
      @wen87n Před 5 lety +111

      Thanks for complements, we Chinese love German Cars and Cameras, the absolute precision craftsmanship is what we need to learn from German.

  • @treelee6527
    @treelee6527 Před 5 lety +2434

    There is a proverb in China:"To get rich, build roads first"

    • @lovellacanen5354
      @lovellacanen5354 Před 4 lety +36

      But said, it is but rails.

    • @treelee6527
      @treelee6527 Před 4 lety +451

      @@fladave99 Are you really living in 21th century?

    • @treelee6527
      @treelee6527 Před 4 lety +29

      @@lovellacanen5354 haha

    • @user-pw7kj2pj7w
      @user-pw7kj2pj7w Před 4 lety +112

      @@fladave99 u stupid

    • @gordonchao3074
      @gordonchao3074 Před 4 lety +224

      @@fladave99 I have never seen a slave in China, and I have live there for 16 years

  • @DailyIndia1999
    @DailyIndia1999 Před rokem +38

    Traveling 1200 km in just 4 hours is like sci fi future kind of thing , It amazes me 😳

  • @troy5094
    @troy5094 Před 2 lety +13

    I would like to add that the line to Urumqi does pass through quite a few strategically important cities, namely Wuwei, Zhangye, Jiuquan, Hami, and Turpan starting from Lanzhou (and remember, pretty much ANY Chinese city of second-level administrative division is populous by most other countries’ standards). Furthermore, since the line passes through mostly rural areas in difficult terrain, trains don’t run nearly as fast, but operate more like an intercity service, which reduces ticket prices even further and allows even more people, many of whom are of lower socioeconomic statuses, to travel as necessary in a reasonable amount of time.

  • @cysiu4174
    @cysiu4174 Před 3 lety +244

    In ancient Chinese history, governments already knew that you want to build your economy, you build the road first. Low cost public transport helps to increase people movement and then business follows.

  • @wizardmix
    @wizardmix Před 5 lety +2772

    I've experienced the Chinese rail system first hand and the convenience is like nothing anyone in the US could comprehend. Imagine needing to travel between Columbus Ohio and Chicago at a moment's notice and being able to go to a high speed rail station where there are trains coming to and from Chicago every 15 minutes. What is close to a 6-hour drive without traffic will take you under 2 hours one way and the round trip will be under $30. Now imagine that same convenience exists between nearly every major city in the US and imagine this entire network was built in UNDER A DECADE. That's China. In the US, traveling between two big cities can be a real hassle -- especially ones that are too close for a flight to be economically viable but too far away to consider driving -- not to mention your loss of productivity during the drive. In China, there's really very little thought into it. If you have to go from the equivalent of Columbus Ohio to Chicago, you just go. Is it the most luxurious experience? No but it's more comfortable than flying and seeing the ground flash by at 200+ MPH is something else. You can't perceive that speed in a plane but you sure do on the ground.

    • @sz8670
      @sz8670 Před 5 lety +544

      Well said. When we come to North America, it feels like a major downgrade to the infrastructure we had in China, not just the railway, but also the highway system, public transit, cell phone signal coverage, etc. However, many Americans find it very hard to believe. They thought they had the best in the world.

    • @cameronhoward99
      @cameronhoward99 Před 5 lety +49

      Yeah except basically no one in the US regularly travels between big cities... You just buy a house 10 minutes drive from your work. Why in the name of heaven would I get a job an hour away by high speed rail? It's vastly more efficient to live close to your work.

    • @mmdday
      @mmdday Před 5 lety +677

      @@cameronhoward99 you're being incredibly shortsighted, and is exactly what Evan is talking about when he says "nothing anyone in the US could comprehend." The reason why people buy a house 10 min away from work is because there is no convenient method of transportation for a daily commute other than the car. Better transportation opens up immense opportunities for everyone. Suppose I did buy a house 10min away from work, am I forever limited to companies that are 10 min away or do I have to buy a new house every time I change jobs? Better transportation makes this all easier. My spouse and I can work in different cities and still live at the same address. I can be a photographer, and all of the sudden I can take on photo shoots hundreds of miles away in an easy day trip, giving me a much larger customer base. Would it be better if everyone lived close to work? Absolutely, but in reality, many people have many good reasons not to (cost, for example). The examples are endless.

    • @cameronhoward99
      @cameronhoward99 Před 5 lety +19

      @@mmdday No, they buy a house 10 minutes from work because it's more convenient than bus, plane, or train. And yes, if you get a job far away, it's better for everyone if you move. The amount of energy it takes to commute 200 miles away to go to work is wasteful. Just live close and bike to work. Or drive an economical vehicle. Still more efficient than any other method.
      Also, air travel is just superior to rail in every conceivable way (cheaper and faster) and will continue to get better in the future with supersonic air travel making a comeback. The new supersonic commercial jets they're making now will finally be able to make domestic routes over land because they're much quieter than older planes like the Concord.
      Lastly those Chinese trains weren't making any money, thus they don't deserve to exist. It's government subsidies that get it by. And even with government subsidies, Chinese rail is still more expensive then non-subsidized Western air travel. It's really a terrible idea to sink that money into an antiquated technology like rail.

    • @darrenh5745
      @darrenh5745 Před 5 lety +253

      @@cameronhoward99 First of all, why you compare Chinese train to the west airlines? Aren't you suppose to compare Chinese trains to Chinese airlines? So... In China, the train tickets are usually much cheaper than flights. Also, they never gets delayed, can you say the same for flights? There are also smaller stations in between big cities, which is convenient for people who wants to travel to the smaller cities beside with a much cheaper rate. Here in Canada, trains are slow, the tickets are expensive, travel from a small city beside Toronto to dt Toronto cost more than $150 and takes 4 hours. Let's say if you don't have a car and you want to go to Toronto, taxi or train are the only two options but both expensive, and flights are not available due to short distance. However in China, this is not a problem, a short distance train ride only cost approximately $20 and it's faster than taxi or the slower train here. I can go on and on with real examples. Plus, out of curiosity, how do you know they are not making any money? Could you give me some official/reliable resources/links can indicate that?

  • @xiaoqiuzhu1881
    @xiaoqiuzhu1881 Před 2 lety +12

    In China the highspeed network has been connecting almost every tier 4 cities in China and connect every Chinese together, the highspeed train network has reduce greatly the logistics cost, even a farmer in the remote rurual areas can sell his/her farming output online via 5G network and smart phone and finish delivery in 3 days at most throught cheap express companies( even the distance is up to 5,000 kms sometimes from remote Xingjiang Uygure area in the west to Shanghai in the east). Obiviously the benifets of a highspeed train can not be judged by the railway companies's profits, it should be judged by whether it bring significant changes to the remote rurual areas and improve most of citizens 's life standard.

  • @Yalla_Habibi_Cat1
    @Yalla_Habibi_Cat1 Před 3 lety +23

    Love China from India.❤

  • @Nilguiri
    @Nilguiri Před 5 lety +1858

    Rumour has it that by the 23rd century, the US will have trains that will reach speeds of up to 160 kph.

    • @barryeylle9760
      @barryeylle9760 Před 5 lety +78

      Nilguiri +metric system

    • @WelshGuitarDude
      @WelshGuitarDude Před 5 lety +107

      @mondayfool The trains is what gives them an economy, people can travel into the big cities to work, trains would be the last thing to go.

    • @shanerooney7288
      @shanerooney7288 Před 5 lety +73

      Mondayfool, stop talking nonsense.
      The *Lanzhou ~ Urumqi* line is unprofitable financially, but _profitable politically._
      Other lines, such as the *Guangzhou ~ Shenzhen ~ Hong Kong* line work at a substantial profit. HK$671 million yearly income vs HK$472 million yearly operating costs.
      As for communing: the factor to consider is time, not distance.
      Driving a car from home to your work's parking lot is really no different then taking a taxi to your work's parking lot.
      If you want to judge by distance, then consider the _benefits_ of a long commute. You get to work in the really expensive down town while living in the much cheaper suburbs. For HSR you even get the option of living in the next town over! But again, it is about the *_time_* needed to commute those distances, not the distance itself.

    • @titansmashproductions5001
      @titansmashproductions5001 Před 5 lety +4

      We really don’t care we say just get your own car why do you think it’s so easy to get a drivers license here (compared to other countries)

    • @8749236
      @8749236 Před 5 lety +56

      @@shanerooney7288 You are absolutely right if you view railway as a single investment and ignores its long term benefits. Except in China we use aggregate approach. We plan for the future, in every aspect, including dynamics - how development of one aspect influence others. If we tunnel vision to just railway itself, your conclusion is holy grail and we cannot possibly reject that; except we just don't view this problem from same perspective.
      One thing to make clear, there is no "other's money" or "other's has to pay for it". Its all our money, and we pay for it. We paid for it not for profit (profit is just a bonus) but to invest in future and introduce more options into our life.
      (one simple example, live in small county, take 1 hour HSR to Shanghai for work then return home via HSR as well; avoiding expensive house price and most of the traffic congestion; and this is just one tiny tinny part of benefits that HSR has brought)

  • @Marc_0v0
    @Marc_0v0 Před 4 lety +927

    4:36 “small cities”
    “3,5 Million People”

    • @patzkierizardo6725
      @patzkierizardo6725 Před 4 lety +205

      "Small cities by China standards"

    • @vincentdesun
      @vincentdesun Před 4 lety +144

      3.5 million city wouldn't even make into the top 30 list in China.

    • @yuhangkwok1291
      @yuhangkwok1291 Před 4 lety +47

      Surface Yes, it's really a small city for China

    • @HD-fy2wu
      @HD-fy2wu Před 4 lety +79

      ​@@vincentdesun Well it is not even in the top 100.
      Actually to be exact it is ranked the 146th largest city in China, by population.

    • @shenliu8269
      @shenliu8269 Před 4 lety +9

      our normal, just get used to it lol

  • @BaneHydra
    @BaneHydra Před 2 lety +132

    China seems to be the only nation capable of thinking long-term. Yeah, trains are not immediately profitable, but clearly whatever it is they're doing is working.
    Selling cars makes boatloads of money short-term, but in the long-term you're going to run into serious problems, as is becoming apparent.

    • @doctortuan
      @doctortuan Před 2 lety +14

      you can't think too long term if the elections are a couple of years.......

    • @ivanam.1613
      @ivanam.1613 Před 2 lety +8

      @@doctortuanwhy would the majority vote against the party that improved the standard of living for millions?

    • @dominusnoobus1589
      @dominusnoobus1589 Před rokem +1

      @@ivanam.1613 because that same party is controlling how they think and have no freedoms to speak up against that said party

    • @Bisquick
      @Bisquick Před rokem

      Not to mention, taking a look at the specific history of that Fordist industrial mode of production and its corresponding infrastructural development reveals a much more rigidly cultivated class divide culturally reinforced into a pretty thorough additional layer of cattle-slavery justifying racism, not a coincidence Ford himself was a literal nazi (offering massive financial support for the nazi party, proudly propagandizing his politics directly through his factory's freely available literature "The International Jew"), _the traditions of all dead generations weighing like a nightmare of the brains of the living_ indeed...
      I mean my god, considering it even more broadly in our entirely unclear but no doubt wholly inadequate "green" transition vision of the future...from car -> _electric_ car (ie putting freaking charging stations for Teslas in random gas stations nationwide...cool...) , now consider the historical reality that we already _had_ these freaking electric cars, as in like fully produced and everything, in the late 19th century, such things of course lobbied/influenced out of existence ie regulatory capture by oil monopolies and car manufacturers wielding their unrestricted "divine right". Robert Moses alone personally responsible for a lot of that through explicit policy making the short range of such electric vehicles implicitly impractical via zoning/highways/etc, spurring things like suburb construction premised implicitly by the desire for racial segregation of populations, shocker, additionally constantly lobbying for austerity/privatization policies to mount a proper counterattack to any current/future New Deal-esque public infrastructure that may arise, as limited as that was with occasional bus routes/subways if lucky (more granular details of Moses' policy/motivations/life contained in The Power Broker by Robert Caro).
      I think LBJ once explained the functionality from the conscious (key word) ruling class perspective pretty explicitly, ye olde divide and conquer,:
      _“If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you.”_
      These must be those conveniently vague "western values" I keep hearing about...I mean surely such exceptional "moral clarity/conviction" constantly appealed to justify anything/everything wasn't just...performative platitudes and usefully ambiguous cultural shibboleths the whole time?! lol...

    • @Reotha
      @Reotha Před rokem +3

      ​@@dominusnoobus1589typical westerner

  • @hamanakohamaneko7028
    @hamanakohamaneko7028 Před 3 lety +129

    2:00 "Poorest country in the world to have any high speed rail."
    That aged like milk REALLY QUICKLY. 2 days after the uploading of the video, Morocco opened its high speed rail line.
    Edit: I forgot that Uzbekistan had bullet trains too, 2011 opened.

    • @usedtoberyanpoopnownormal8822
      @usedtoberyanpoopnownormal8822 Před 3 lety +2

      My boy Morocco packing doe

    • @squiglemcsquigle8414
      @squiglemcsquigle8414 Před 2 lety +3

      He refers to gdp. China is extremely rich but have very low gdp. Morroco and Uzbekistan are poorer but due to the smaller populations the gdp gets lifted

    • @hamanakohamaneko7028
      @hamanakohamaneko7028 Před 2 lety +13

      @@squiglemcsquigle8414 in terms of GDP per capita PPP, China is $18000, Morocco is $3,200, Uzbekistan is $1,724. So China is richer either way

    • @squiglemcsquigle8414
      @squiglemcsquigle8414 Před 2 lety

      @@hamanakohamaneko7028 hmmm fair enough. Didnt know that tbh. Shouldve looked it up. He probably means a highspeed rail network. Or he just made a mistake. Either way comparatively to other nations with high investment in high speed rail china has a low gdp per capita

    • @hamanakohamaneko7028
      @hamanakohamaneko7028 Před 2 lety +1

      @@squiglemcsquigle8414 True. But I wonder how much is considered a network. China definitely has a large network, Morocco has only one line, while Uzbekistan has a line branching off from the mainline. You could technically call it a really small network.

  • @kokofisher
    @kokofisher Před 5 lety +673

    China's political of will for high-speed trains does not match Wendover's political will for commercial airliners

  • @OWAIS843
    @OWAIS843 Před 5 lety +355

    I have been to China recently and their high speed train system is truely impressive, Beijing to wuhan 1200Km and only 4 hours from train

    • @conambenvanon5664
      @conambenvanon5664 Před 4 lety +5

      It takes only 2 hours to travel by airplane from Beijing to Wuhan. You can even hop a plane to travel across Atlantic for about 4 hours! However, it's impossible for any high speed train to travel across Atlantic. To describe an impossible thing to do, a popular joke said, I would board a high speed train traveling across the ocean from Beijing to New York! Even the fastest high speed train technology in the world is still inferior to the airplane technology Americans had. This explained why the US unlike China, won't waste billions of dollars on inferior technologies like high speed train system. However, to solve the traffic bottleneck problem of some big cities like Los Angeles and New York, Americans focus on developing underground Hyperloop transportation, which is much better than high speed train system.

    • @rickw.5204
      @rickw.5204 Před 4 lety +26

      @@conambenvanon5664 Mainly because of the lobbyists of huge car manufacturers and gas companies push both parties and convince American people that USA USA USA runs on wheels.

    • @conambenvanon5664
      @conambenvanon5664 Před 4 lety +2

      Rick W. I personally think it's more to do with the technology than with the lobbyists. Who needs the most modern high speed rail that takes up to 20 hours to travel from NY to LA or from coast to coast of America, while traveling by airplane takes only 4 hours for the same distance! Who needs the most modern high speed rail that cannot even travel across the Atlantic Ocean, while it takes only 7 hours by airplane to cross the ocean! American airplane technology is still superior to the fastest high speed rail in the world. Why would Americans waste billions of dollars on such inferior technology like high speed rail? Not a chance!

    • @josephwang9713
      @josephwang9713 Před 4 lety +28

      MarkuSATTO taking 2 hours from Beijing to wuhan is right. But it also take time to airport and security check. The total time is almost same. But plane have to face potential delay too. Also on the high speed railway everybody has enough space to sit and walk around. But airplane cannot or you have to pay more money. High speed railways ticket price is 1/2 - 2/3 compared with airplane ticket price. Train station can build in downtown. But airport cannot. The reason why China choose high speed railway is China has way more much population than USA. And China is lack of oil. So it’s impossible to let Chines government transport 2 billion people by using airplane and import that much oil from outside world. But China has enough coal. So China has ability to generate enough electricity. Based on what I know in China. People would prefer high speed rail way under 800km. Then it’s airplane .

    • @conambenvanon5664
      @conambenvanon5664 Před 4 lety

      Joseph Wang Personally, I think waiting to board a high speed train or airplane is part of the process like any other transportation. Similarly, bad weathers affect all kind of transportations including high speed trains and airplanes. You're right. High speed trains are totally appropriate for China's population, while airplanes are quite practical for Americans. Your experience in China is truly totally different from mine in the US. About 90% of the US population owned at least one car, so travelling short distances from town to town is no problem for Americans. For long distances, airports are everywhere in the US. traveling by airplane is affordable, convenient and comfortable. I can hop a plane to New York from San Francisco or from coast to coast for just 5 hours. I can even hop a plane to Paris from New York while crossing Atlantic Ocean for about 6 hours! What I meant is that even the fastest high speed rail in the world cannot do what an airplane can.

  • @joey3291
    @joey3291 Před 2 lety +23

    Not every big project in China is made for profit, some are purely for making a better society.

    • @lingy74
      @lingy74 Před 6 měsíci +1

      This concept is so foreign to the Western mind that they are immediately suspicious lol.

  • @SThrillz
    @SThrillz Před 2 lety +9

    The role of high speed network contribution to China's development cannot be overstated, the high speed rail means economic progress is not congested and can easily overflow to other cities even if those cities are under developed and that's the same plan to link with other Asian countries. America was building understood the importance of railroads earlier on and then completely abandoned its infrastructure which is quite sad.

  • @valentinewang745
    @valentinewang745 Před 3 lety +3378

    My girlfriend lives in Shanghai and I’m from Beijing, without high speed train we will break up. Now we married 😂

  • @user-dv8ki8nh7e
    @user-dv8ki8nh7e Před 4 lety +548

    an old saying in China
    “you want to be rich?,build the road first”

    • @zhenghaogong6051
      @zhenghaogong6051 Před 4 lety +38

      想致富,先修路

    • @navnit3978
      @navnit3978 Před 3 lety +1

      In the near future people will be flying in drones to travel not by roads ,so dont build too many very costly roads

    • @maxwellli7057
      @maxwellli7057 Před 3 lety +6

      @@navnit3978 the only safe way to transport people in the air with "drones" is to use helicopters. Yea not cheap or for the average Joe.
      Probably a Wall Street Stock Bot who got lost on yt.

    • @lintang1009
      @lintang1009 Před 3 lety +1

      要致富,先修路。

    • @DacLMK
      @DacLMK Před 3 lety +1

      @@navnit3978 I think you missed the point.

  • @bobbyswanson3498
    @bobbyswanson3498 Před 2 lety +17

    considering they’re planning to double the massive network they already have id say the long distance routes that don’t make a lot are going to eventually become profitable

  • @jeremywp123
    @jeremywp123 Před 3 lety +606

    I've been visiting France for a few months and I love having the option of trains... But now I want to go to china and check those out.

    • @defencebangladesh4068
      @defencebangladesh4068 Před 3 lety +2

      👍

    • @rockysu7661
      @rockysu7661 Před 3 lety +18

      Welcome to China!

    • @avril55100
      @avril55100 Před 3 lety +15

      it's too expensive in europe

    • @uwanttono4012
      @uwanttono4012 Před 3 lety +21

      I have been on the Chinese high speed trains (中国高铁) many times since 2010 as I lived there for 15 years. Awesome experience and a great way to travel, especially the BJ-SH route.

    • @yadisfhaddad722
      @yadisfhaddad722 Před 3 lety +24

      Oh man, they don't even compare. I've been in both, and the french one is just very expensive, and not as fast, nor as comfortable. The biggest difference is train stations: Chinese train stations are MASSIVE. Although, since some of those trains pass through smaller cities, you may encounter people with, let's say, less social etiquette. French stations are located in more convenient places though.

  • @LaSanya2001
    @LaSanya2001 Před 5 lety +1979

    Transportation: (exists)
    Wendover Productions: *N U T*

    • @gwacstore5406
      @gwacstore5406 Před 5 lety +20

      legit laughed out loud at this, you made my day and have a great mind

    • @LaSanya2001
      @LaSanya2001 Před 5 lety +23

      @@Mr Purple He travelled back to October so he can nut without failing NNN.

    • @djangolebeau3718
      @djangolebeau3718 Před 5 lety +41

      Wendover Productions: (exists)
      Aspiring Pilots: N U T

    • @Cjnw
      @Cjnw Před 5 lety +3

      No Nut November ¶:

    • @AP-yx1mm
      @AP-yx1mm Před 5 lety +1

      NUT= Nuclear Use Theory? it is together with MAD= Mutual Assured Destruction the two theoretical frameworks in the international relations.

  • @williamaidoo2
    @williamaidoo2 Před rokem +8

    They are very, very smart people.They also produce the most computers, cars, & many electronic devices in the world

  • @tyn6211
    @tyn6211 Před 3 lety +7

    From what I understand, the HSR from places like Lanzhou to Urumqui are just as much for the rural villagers in between the cities, for day workers or for farmers selling products in commercial areas. HSR connecting rural areas in the US to commerce cities would definitely alleviate some of the labor shortages caused by housing gentrification that we're seeing here.

  • @j.r.regenold9094
    @j.r.regenold9094 Před 5 lety +776

    If you try to build a train in USA you'll get about 1 lawsuit for every track section you lay.

    • @BrogeKilrain
      @BrogeKilrain Před 5 lety +58

      and you will lose $$billions as even the largest commuter rail AMTRAK continually loses money. People in NY metro area still choose driving in horrendous traffic over taking train.

    • @j.r.regenold9094
      @j.r.regenold9094 Před 5 lety +20

      @@BrogeKilrain I think it's because public transportation seems to work better where persons can use inexpensive public transportation from "front door" to destination. Philippines does this with their trike, jeepney and buses for example.

    • @BrogeKilrain
      @BrogeKilrain Před 5 lety +8

      J.R. Regenold I’m in philippines all the time 😆 yes it works if traffic is moving and you don’t mind sweating your tail off . Love the place

    • @j.r.regenold9094
      @j.r.regenold9094 Před 5 lety +3

      @@BrogeKilrain That's great, I was there 6 years ... have moved on. Am in Saigon now. Just started a CZcams channel "The Texpat in Saigon" a few months ago mostly as a newsletter to my USA friends.
      Here you have to have personal transportation. I have a scooter. Trains here are abysmal, but domestic air travel is getting reasonable.

    • @BrogeKilrain
      @BrogeKilrain Před 5 lety +1

      J.R. Regenold been there only once. Crossing road was an experience 😃 been importer 25 years . Mostly Thailand .

  • @pegeonpera
    @pegeonpera Před 5 lety +3340

    Indian railways on the other hand....
    Labels 60kmph trains as 'superfast'

    • @koverpy426
      @koverpy426 Před 5 lety +102

      Yes it's a joke but "express" can be used on services on conventional speed lines.

    • @rishabh2885
      @rishabh2885 Před 5 lety +280

      I know man Indian railways sucks and there cleanliness is so bad.

    • @kodecoder
      @kodecoder Před 5 lety +130

      Well, the high speed rail mentioned costs 80 usd (4200 RS), runs at monumental losses, on land that is not always acquired with owners willing. Imagine the turmoil that'd create. I prefer pragmatic progress as opposed to show off progress.

    • @sanilkhurana3991
      @sanilkhurana3991 Před 5 lety +91

      Rishabh I feel it's more about the people who travel on the trains

    • @luluskywo
      @luluskywo Před 5 lety +114

      To be fair the Geography of Indian doesn't help. It's hard to built high speed tracks when you have to cross mountains like there are in the middle of India.

  • @LucasRodmo
    @LucasRodmo Před rokem +3

    Here in Brazil, even if the distance between the destinies are small, the time you spend to check in, waiting on the airport, renting a car or waiting for Uber, boarding and disembarking the plane it's like 4 hours total.

  • @jackeylee5012
    @jackeylee5012 Před 3 lety +25

    Chines are simply amazing. They can build just about anything faster. There is very little bureaucracy in the process, no legal blockade in the way and no union contract to follow etc.

    • @LK-pc4sq
      @LK-pc4sq Před 2 lety

      That is because they own the land and who ever lives on it has no say. That is going to save the company "if the co2 is lower over china" then the united States from fires.

    • @sabersz
      @sabersz Před 2 lety

      That's because it's an authoritarian shithole

  • @lance3635
    @lance3635 Před 5 lety +1672

    China just laid 1200 miles of track while you were watching this video

    • @adiputrajaya3877
      @adiputrajaya3877 Před 5 lety +55

      Yeah. As of today, China has about 30,000 km length of high-speed rail

    • @user-tx4dn6ms1r
      @user-tx4dn6ms1r Před 5 lety +26

      Lance Arthur Torres 没错,壮哉我大中国

    • @cbbblue8348
      @cbbblue8348 Před 5 lety +74

      @Chan P Imagine being so salty that you have to make shit from the ground up.

    • @dongxuzhou4661
      @dongxuzhou4661 Před 5 lety +40

      Chan P 🤔 Do I have to answer that moronic question?

    • @user-yg6yt4vr9x
      @user-yg6yt4vr9x Před 5 lety +7

      Chan P ho baby boy~

  • @shankynarmada138
    @shankynarmada138 Před 4 lety +642

    High speed train is not about only long routes, it is also beneficial for smaller routes as well. For example, I had a conference in He Chuan (合川), which is 138 km from Chongqing(重庆). I took the train from Chongqing, the ticket price was around 4 dollars and I reached to Hechuan in 28 minutes, cheaper, comfortable and convenient. It is one of the best mode of transportation , not only for longer routes but for shorter routes as well.

    • @dianapennepacker6854
      @dianapennepacker6854 Před rokem

      Problem is two fold. Can they keep up on it and with their debt overblowing especially for their rail lines (nearing a trillion I guess) it remains to be seen. Yet they have the population density to really make it work.

    • @Ilovecruise
      @Ilovecruise Před rokem +5

      @@dianapennepacker6854 definitely yes if their are no pandemic, after all the debt loaned are just from left hand to right hand (both state owned) additionally, if it weren’t the investment spent in expanding the network, (before pandemic) they have a PROFIT (not revenue) of about 100 billion RMB annually.

    • @koklisharontan263
      @koklisharontan263 Před rokem +16

      It is worth to spend this huge sum of money for high speed rail, rather than speed trillions of dollars in war!!

    • @daniel11111
      @daniel11111 Před rokem +1

      @@dianapennepacker6854 how far can the US continue to fund the military complex without chasing profits? Similarly other countries can fund public infrastructure without chasing profits.

    • @dianapennepacker6854
      @dianapennepacker6854 Před rokem +2

      @@daniel11111 You're talking about two different things.
      Military spending definitely has a lot of benefits. Creates high paying jobs, security, protects global US and *allied* interests, and more importantly a lot of the technology gets kick backed into modern life.
      In a perfect world we would do both but for whatever reason the US is garbage at large scale infrastructure projects especially when it starts crossing state lines. I blame politics personally.
      Our government has some serious flaws. It is slow to move and we can't just bulldoze houses and kick people out to create them either.

  • @sharose04
    @sharose04 Před 3 lety +11

    3:37: I instantly stared because apparently a flight from Paris to Barcelona is cheaper than a flash game called The Henry Stickmin Collection..... Which is $15..

  • @aquamarine8904
    @aquamarine8904 Před 3 lety +10

    China is so good at building railways is because they really built a lot along the way all over china, they studied almost all kinds of ground conditions and difficulties that may happen...experienced

  • @KeretaDensha
    @KeretaDensha Před 3 lety +2088

    China is so good at building railways is because they have Political will for high speed trains

    • @TonboIV
      @TonboIV Před 3 lety +114

      Rather than political will, more like they're a totalitarian state that likes to control everything. The trains are meant to help control ethnic minorities by tying them more closely to the central government and the majority population, and they also nicely distract the world from all the "re-education" centres and intimidation of the press/political opposition and all the other horrible shit they're doing. Don't get fooled.

    • @rohitkashyap7476
      @rohitkashyap7476 Před 3 lety +39

      No obstructions.
      No one to question-
      Environment issues.
      Acquiring land from private owners.
      The government can do anything. No questions asked.
      Effeciency sure....

    • @rinyorusora9862
      @rinyorusora9862 Před 3 lety +31

      @Paul58 lol poor guy...I don't know if I should feel offended for being compared to hitler or feel sorry for your biased mindset haha. You've never been to China have you

    • @rinyorusora9862
      @rinyorusora9862 Před 3 lety +109

      @@rohitkashyap7476 what obstructions are you talking about? We Chinses people want high speed trains as well, much cheaper than flights and much faster than cars. What envirnoment issues are you talking about? High speed trains use electricity, which is much more enviroment friendly than planes and cars. Land in China is not privately owned, and if people own houses located on the route, they would be paid and relocated if they give consent. Like dude (or girl idk) you don't know anything about China other than to hate the Chinese government for everything. And please don't tell me I'm brainwashed, I've been studying in the US for six years. I guess I am not the only one who needed to open the eyes.

    • @rohitkashyap7476
      @rohitkashyap7476 Před 3 lety +8

      @@rinyorusora9862 concent for what if land is not privately owned. When a government decides for the "greater good" like in China and the people who are directly affected have no option/ voice but to do as the government has decided like in China ...where is concent required.
      I can give you concerns like we face in India:-
      Here in India say we need a railway line to go through a forest then it may be the case that the forest dwelling tribals( living there from centuries ) may get displaced(the culture is lost)
      When a dam is built a large part of land is submerged and the environment is lost. The humans and animals that live there are required to be moved.
      There is a human and environment cost to everything. No ones doubts the efficiency of the Chinese government.
      I know too little about China to hate China. But it does not matter. My view as a non -Chinese is as good as your view as a Chinese citizen. It has zero value to the Chinese government.

  • @raywhittington1368
    @raywhittington1368 Před 5 lety +3132

    Because they build them instead of talking or thinking about building them.

    • @ahmedhajwani8980
      @ahmedhajwani8980 Před 5 lety +68

      Are u taunting Indian PM ?Dont u dare

    • @greebo7857
      @greebo7857 Před 5 lety +38

      Australian, are you? I am, and I know what you mean. VFT schemes have been trotted out prior to elections for at least 25 years here. It'll be Hyperloops next.

    • @raywhittington1368
      @raywhittington1368 Před 5 lety +37

      Greebo. Still waiting for progress to be made on a California high speed train project on the shelf for financing.

    • @LuckyDuckie115
      @LuckyDuckie115 Před 5 lety +44

      +Ray Whittington
      Nothing to do with that...Airline lobbyist will kill any bill/progress that leads to bullet trains in the U.S. Lobbyist in California are still trying to kill the LA to SF speed train.

    • @cannonfodder4812
      @cannonfodder4812 Před 5 lety +18

      @@LuckyDuckie115 Airline lobbiests aren't really needed when the cost of the rail line is equal to about 900,000,000 tickets to SF from LA. Face it CA is just great at shoveling cash into the fire.

  • @yournightmare...3328
    @yournightmare...3328 Před 3 lety +4

    THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS VIDEO 💙

  • @ArthurB26
    @ArthurB26 Před 3 měsíci +1

    As a Canadian who lives in a city where city bus fair is $3 it's unbelievable a plane ticket from two major European cities could cost $12.
    Canadian also has some of the highest (if not the highest) costs of flights too so it's even more crazy to me.

  • @ziqiangyuan234
    @ziqiangyuan234 Před 5 lety +592

    I think he missed a fact. 60% of China's oil is imported. It's hard to imagine if the Chinese drove between cities like the Americans. The average fuel consumed by the aircraft is even more. Trains use electricity, and China does not need to import coal or uranium for power generation.

    • @NoxStream
      @NoxStream Před 5 lety +70

      ziqiang yuan China is also largely mountaineous, which makes driving rather difficult.

    • @davidlazarus67
      @davidlazarus67 Před 5 lety +67

      ziqiang yuan Also they have significant renewable energy production. Which can make a huge difference.

    • @tuele4302
      @tuele4302 Před 5 lety +16

      Yes, indeed. This is the same reason why Japan has such an admirable passenger high-speed rail infrastructure.

    • @SMCITW
      @SMCITW Před 5 lety +6

      and to talk about how fast Chinese high speed rails are is merely telling one side of the story, years ago highspeed lines (350km/h +) has to run slower because of the huge energy consumption.

    • @fetchstixRHD
      @fetchstixRHD Před 5 lety +18

      Knowing a little bit what China is like, it isn’t surprising that they’d go for trains, and that’s without thinking about the environment. It allows them to depend less on other countries, which for them is probably a good thing.

  • @coconutboy8198
    @coconutboy8198 Před 4 lety +428

    I am from China, and I highly recommend CRH(Chinese railway high speed). The speed is fast, comfortable seats, nice view of the countryside. The first-class and business class have tv's

    • @williamdavis9471
      @williamdavis9471 Před 4 lety +24

      Ricky (Ruiqi) Li (STG) I have, absolutely stunning train. Went from Beijing to Shanghai, and hit avg speeds of 350km

    • @coconutboy8198
      @coconutboy8198 Před 4 lety +5

      @@williamdavis9471 cheers!

    • @mishakedr476
      @mishakedr476 Před 4 lety +5

      Vpn?

    • @coconutboy8198
      @coconutboy8198 Před 4 lety +27

      @@mishakedr476 yep dude, I use vpn. Actually I have school at Hong Kong

    • @MashiachTheReal1
      @MashiachTheReal1 Před 4 lety +2

      TV? WA!! Wo bu zhidao le!!

  • @fortherepublic9878
    @fortherepublic9878 Před 2 lety +3

    American here.
    The High Speed rail does have another benefit. Outside of profit. IF it’s in Schengen Europe, China, or India.
    For example, the Paris to Barcelona route has several cities in between that have at least 100,000 people (eg. Dijon, Lyon, Montpellier). Maybe it’s more practical to just take the plane between Paris & Barcelona. But it’s much more practical to take the train from say, Lyon to Montpelier. The point is, the HSR is beneficial for all the people living in between the destinations.
    BUT…
    That’s not usually the case in the United States. Between the Los Angeles metropolitan area and Las Vegas, there’s only one city that has 100,000 people in between. Victorville. And the distance between Victorville and Las Vegas is MASSIVE (same as Paris to Dijon, so imagine that distance with absolute nothingness). So much so, that whatever social benefits may come from having a HSR serving a very popular route just isn’t worth it compared to the amount it would cost to cover the construction of such a distance. Almost everyone who takes this ride would just get on at LA, and get off at Las Vegas. Barely anyone in between.
    I wouldn’t call our attitude towards it as money-hungry. Just efficient.

    • @shreyvaghela3963
      @shreyvaghela3963 Před 2 lety +1

      No i don't think America has done anything wrong. You see America is extremely privellege country which has lots of empty land compared to population size. That's why Americans can afford to have more cars over public transport. Other countries don't have that luxury because most countries are smaller.

  • @jamescurtin4412
    @jamescurtin4412 Před rokem +3

    High quality production. Interesting and I confess the narrator has a wonderful voice God bless.

  • @rootz1623
    @rootz1623 Před 5 lety +2608

    Chinese government always do more and talk less.

    • @lindafukuyu5767
      @lindafukuyu5767 Před 5 lety +497

      The US government always talk more and do less. hahaha

    • @yichenjin5661
      @yichenjin5661 Před 4 lety +42

      Linda Fukuyu lol

    • @hakeemsd70m
      @hakeemsd70m Před 4 lety +177

      Single-party states know how to get things done! No bickering and arguing over made-up political bullcrap like here in the U.S. The USA will always trail behind in other countries when it comes to politics, poverty, and many other things on a mass scale. This is the truth, from a U.S. citizen.

    • @fladave99
      @fladave99 Před 4 lety +96

      China is lining up the troops to start MURDERING citizens in HONG KONG who thought they were FREE. If living under the barrel of a military gun is not SLAVERY what is? But enjoy your train ride to hell.

    • @gabrielcollstefoni7765
      @gabrielcollstefoni7765 Před 4 lety +141

      @@fladave99 there is only ONE China.

  • @Ratplague707
    @Ratplague707 Před 3 lety +835

    In the US we have this obsession with extracting a profit from every facet of society. A high speed rail line will never be built in the US until we realize that some things have a societal benefit even if they don't pull in revenue. After all, we realized this in the '50s and '60s when we built the interstate highway system - a socialized road network operated at a loss that provides enormous benefit to society (but was also a handout to oil and auto companies).

    • @feather563
      @feather563 Před 3 lety +64

      Corporate rampant capitalism is literally ruining the country for their own profit :/

    • @ovencake523
      @ovencake523 Před 2 lety +20

      but the interstate highways support all of those trucks shipping goods back and forth. That made a profit. Each dollar spent on the highways returned 6, according to a video from this channel i think.

    • @dbclass4075
      @dbclass4075 Před 2 lety +10

      @@ovencake523 This video is older than the video you are referring to. czcams.com/video/SR7BA3xEmDo/video.html
      Granted, USA's low density makes it difficult for high-speed rail to work on a national level. So, how about on areas where it will work, such as Northeast Corridor?

    • @LK-pc4sq
      @LK-pc4sq Před 2 lety +2

      @@feather563 These trains will LOWER the co2 emissions by the countries cars that are now causing more fires and droughts.

    • @LK-pc4sq
      @LK-pc4sq Před 2 lety +6

      @@dbclass4075 no true. Japan started high speed trains in the 1960s. Initially its construction cost was high, but it also became very popullar. Second build the infrastructure around the train stations.

  • @kaanerdem2822
    @kaanerdem2822 Před rokem +2

    Here in Belgium i took a "direct line" train from Ghent to Genk which distance is approx. 150 kms, it took 3,5 hours to get there...

  • @1.123
    @1.123 Před 3 lety +6

    why do only i acknowledge this guy‘s effort he puts in the right pronounciation of chinese city names?

    • @loneranger4282
      @loneranger4282 Před 3 lety

      lol

    • @becsterbrisbane6275
      @becsterbrisbane6275 Před 3 lety +1

      Except that Xinjiang should be pronounced "Shinjung"......

    • @ik6non712
      @ik6non712 Před 3 lety

      @@becsterbrisbane6275 not a 'sh' sound, more of a 's' sound. X makes a 'sharper' s sound than an s. Eg. Xi would be pronounced as 'S-EE' and Si would be pronounced like a 'S-I', a soft 'i' sound thing

  • @CarFreeSegnitz
    @CarFreeSegnitz Před 4 lety +580

    1:25 writing from the future... China now has TWICE as much high-speed track as the rest of the world put together. 2/3rds of the global high-speed track is now in China.

    • @nsebast
      @nsebast Před 3 lety +3

      Probably. Not much countries are willing to build high speed track, the cost is very expensive.

    • @nsebast
      @nsebast Před 3 lety +95

      @@Supercool12345andy their "bullying" is mostly to protect themselves from USA and its allies. USA is much worse in their bullying. They sell weapons, they force regime change, political change and sanctions on countries whose actions they dont approve in the name of freedom and democracy.

    • @PneumaticFrog
      @PneumaticFrog Před 3 lety +10

      @@nsebast literally so does china, take a look at hong kong

    • @nsebast
      @nsebast Před 3 lety +58

      @@PneumaticFrog HK is China why shouldnt they govern it the way they want it governed.

    • @bernardjameswilson
      @bernardjameswilson Před 3 lety +33

      @@PneumaticFrog It's theirs to begin with though.

  • @vous2834
    @vous2834 Před 5 lety +533

    don't forget they built great wall 2000 years ago.

    • @Glorious_Kim_Jong_Un
      @Glorious_Kim_Jong_Un Před 5 lety +22

      Hard to forget when the Chinese remind us every 5 minutes as if it was the greatest achievement in all of human history

    • @Luna-ry8lv
      @Luna-ry8lv Před 5 lety +6

      @@Glorious_Kim_Jong_Un they live in their own world, forgive them

    • @Tucher97
      @Tucher97 Před 5 lety +27

      Also don't forget the chinese made gunpowder, guns, and even the first in human history to figure out mass production

    • @Tucher97
      @Tucher97 Před 5 lety +7

      and I believe the chinese also invented the system of obey the law or else and be a decent human being as well as the first to make modular weapons and inventing the repeating crossbow

    • @Luna-ry8lv
      @Luna-ry8lv Před 5 lety +6

      @@Tucher97 China also invented humans

  • @fahrankamili7931
    @fahrankamili7931 Před rokem +3

    The comment section is kind of missing the point. Yes public infra does not need to be "profitable". But, the funding has to come from SOMEWHERE. Chinese government taking lots of debt to build and to maintain the infra.
    The idea of public infra is that, in the future the infrastructure would (ideally) generate an economic activity in the area which then the government can tax. This tax income then is channeled into paying the debt (+ interest) and the cost to maintain the infra.
    So yes, the government, in a way, expect to have "profit", although not directly from the use of the train.
    Chinese government focus on building infra is great, but one may have to ponder whether this is a wise investment given that the demands for lots of the high speed rail is very low. This might mean the promised economic activity that is expected to be able to sustain the debt might not be there.

  • @CHMichael
    @CHMichael Před 2 lety +2

    9:00 social benefit - great way of measuring.

  • @IamJay
    @IamJay Před 5 lety +732

    Wendover like planes and trains. I like them too.

    • @RockSmithStudio
      @RockSmithStudio Před 5 lety +10

      but how does he feel about automobiles?

    • @IamJay
      @IamJay Před 5 lety +17

      @@RockSmithStudio he love Toyota's

    • @InspectHistory
      @InspectHistory Před 5 lety +5

      Yeah, he like talking about transportation 😁

    • @jerbear3915
      @jerbear3915 Před 5 lety +1

      I kinda hope he does something about military stuff like air force, navy and army and other related things...

    • @zzgaming29
      @zzgaming29 Před 5 lety +1

      Same

  • @ivandaydream7734
    @ivandaydream7734 Před 5 lety +169

    When i was a kid it took me 4 hours to get to the city where my parents used to lived..now it only takes half an hour on a high speed train in way cheaper price.....i am so proud of my country

    • @patrickkoh1056
      @patrickkoh1056 Před 5 lety +11

      and far more comfortable too. sleek trains. i was most impressed.

    • @alexsemen898
      @alexsemen898 Před 5 lety +9

      yes you can be proud of, as long I as European I see not any reason to be proud of my government and political bandits, the Gods of Robbery !

    • @NeutralGenericUser
      @NeutralGenericUser Před 5 lety +12

      I'd love to live in China. Sometimes I wish I was Chinese :(

    • @benlex5672
      @benlex5672 Před 5 lety +15

      @@NeutralGenericUser Oh you won't.

    • @doejoan2542
      @doejoan2542 Před 5 lety +5

      林鼎鈞 hmmm, you made decision for others? Who are you lol

  • @leaningright4534
    @leaningright4534 Před 2 lety +3

    Sydney to Melbourne is about 800km and Lanzhou to Urumqi is about 1,900 km. They both take 11 hours on train 🤯🤯🤯

  • @nickplosiveli4927
    @nickplosiveli4927 Před 2 lety +3

    One side of my family lives in Guangzhou, whilst the other lives in Beijing. Having tried taking high speed rail and flying between both cities, I can say with confidence that high speed rail is the cheaper, more comfortable and more convenient mode of transport, despite taking 4 hours longer than flying. Unlike planes, Chinese high speed rail is a turn up and go service, that meshes with the extensive public transport in Guangzhou and Beijing. A 2000 km trip on one fast train.

  • @onewhoisanonymous
    @onewhoisanonymous Před 5 lety +340

    I live in Shenzhen. We are above in Hong Kong. If I took the bus then metro into Hong Kong, it would take 2 hours. Now with the high speed rail connecting the major cities of Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and HK, the trip takes 17 minutes. A train ride from Beijing to Shenzhen takes about 12 hours or less. AND IT IS CHEAP

    • @rajaoctober14
      @rajaoctober14 Před 5 lety +4

      how cheap?

    • @tehStarcubed
      @tehStarcubed Před 5 lety +17

      @@rajaoctober14 only about like $15 for second class and $25 for first class. I've timed it and it only takes 12 minutes to Futian station (near the HK-shenzhen border)

    • @samcwm524
      @samcwm524 Před 5 lety +22

      I live in Hong Kong. I would say that the new high speed train form Hong Kong to Beijing is not that decidable. The train leaves HK everyday 8am, takes 9 hours to get to Beijing, cost about 1000HKD (2000HKD round trip). But if you go by plane, round trip normally costs around 1700HKD (1300HKD is the cheapest I have seen). Plane takes around 3.5hr. And if you fly to Beijing before noon, the chance of getting delayed is a lot smaller. So leaving at the same time in the morning, yet I can get to Beijing faster and cheaper by plane, then why not just fly. I would recommend the train leaves Hong Kong in the afternoon, so it would arrive at Beijing at night. That would be more competitive and decidable since it truly help to avoid being delayed.
      A little fun experience, once I had a 6pm flight from Beijing to HK, and it was delayed to 12:30 am. It was 3:30am when I arrived at Hong Kong. One suggestion to all of you flying from/to Beijing, remember to fly in the morning.

    • @iampetz
      @iampetz Před 5 lety +3

      ​@@rajaoctober14 About $30 from Guangzhou to Hong Kong, $10 from Shenzhen to HK. Beijing to Shenzhen $150~ (The distance is like from US east coast to the Rockies)

    • @dongliinusa6589
      @dongliinusa6589 Před 5 lety +6

      It is more political than economical

  • @tobaccopro7770
    @tobaccopro7770 Před 5 lety +622

    Because they don't have GM or Ford lobbying against it

    • @PaleBlueDot-bi9pm
      @PaleBlueDot-bi9pm Před 5 lety +34

      no gruop can challenge the party

    • @christianknuchel
      @christianknuchel Před 5 lety +7

      Just wait until China's large corporations get nice and cozy enough with the government. ;p

    • @Rickie53
      @Rickie53 Před 5 lety +3

      Just Me Don't sign papers agreeing to pay for college that you can not afford if you can not afford it.

    • @cowboybob7093
      @cowboybob7093 Před 5 lety +7

      Imminent domain is a lot easier to enforce under their system.
      They are building a new system with all the experience in the world. Late adopters benefit from lessons learned and new technology.
      Look at steel, the US after WWII was old compared to Europe rebuilding. Now China, Korea, new investment, equipment.

    • @saintsoldier5671
      @saintsoldier5671 Před 5 lety +1

      @@christianknuchel yes it's possible but communist don't care for anyone or anything ,they just crush whatever bothered them.

  • @qiongyao741
    @qiongyao741 Před 3 lety +2

    没想到提到了我的家乡衡阳。就在十年前我来北京上学的时候,到北京要么去长沙坐飞机去北京,要么坐一天一夜的火车到北京(尽管当时觉得还挺方便的)。现在从衡阳到北京每天有两趟往返的飞机,也有高铁直接到北京大概7个小时,确实是感觉出门遛弯一样就能到往返两地,太方便了。

  • @rileyk5228
    @rileyk5228 Před 2 lety +4

    Really wish Canada had it. But I'm sure they'd overprice it just like their airlines

  • @meixueyuan4143
    @meixueyuan4143 Před 5 lety +266

    I came from Jingmen, a small city in middle China. I've lived in the United States for almost 10 years. Traveling back to my hometown was a nightmare before my hometown was connected to the high-speed train system. I took a 17-hour flight from Chicago to Beijing, then a 1.5-hour transfer from Beijing International Airport to the train station, then a 5-hour bullet train to the provincial capital Wuhan, then a 3-hour SLOW train or BUS through high-way to my hometown. I lose 5 pounds for each travel. After my hometown connected to the system, I can take a 5.5 -hours bullet train from Beijing to my hometown directly after arriving at Beijing train station. This saves me lots of efforts.
    I heard that the new Beijing airport under construction is supposed to directly connect to the bullet train station. That means I can take the bullet train right after my flight. Also, I heard they are going to release a special bullet train with beds so people like me can rest after the long flight. I can't wait for that day to come!

    • @pegefounder
      @pegefounder Před 5 lety +40

      2014, I started with the joke "The 3rd Beijing airport will be finished before BER - new Berlin airport" The construction of BER started 2006. The opening should have been 2012.
      Now it seems my joke comes true: 3rd Beijing airport will be opened autumn 2019, while the opening of BER is uncertain even for 2020.

    • @user-hc3og6gn5x
      @user-hc3og6gn5x Před 5 lety +6

      荆门老乡?好感动,我是沙洋的,想不到在这里可以见到老乡 想哭,期盼你的回复

    • @chuckywang
      @chuckywang Před 5 lety +3

      The new Beijing airport will be served by China Eastern and China Southern, neither of which fly Beijing-Chicago route. You'll have to really seek out a route that goes to the new Beijing airport. Hainan, which currently serves Beijing-Chicago, will stay at Capital. Maybe AA will start up their Beijing route again when the new airport opens though.

    • @rickfeng4466
      @rickfeng4466 Před 5 lety +1

      @@pegefounder Well, still the 2nd airport to some extent. Because the small Nanyuan airport will close keeping the total at two. So BER will still open before Beijing have the 3rd airport.

    • @kmmmm5549
      @kmmmm5549 Před 5 lety

      Not maybe but has been 100% sure to open fights between new Beijing airport and US. And code share with China Southern Airlines for transferring domestic flights in China.

  • @wafflemanoobbss6459
    @wafflemanoobbss6459 Před 5 lety +772

    You forgot to mention that the high speed railway has much lower carbon footprint comparing with plane and cars. It is a more eco friendly way of travel.

    • @brittonramsey2463
      @brittonramsey2463 Před 5 lety +86

      Not to mention the much lower rate of accidental death that auto and work traffic have.

    • @Patrick5
      @Patrick5 Před 5 lety +11

      Offset for all the pollution made by all China's factory!

    • @RossWebsterSalter
      @RossWebsterSalter Před 5 lety +18

      9:33 (although using the California line study, it is making the argument)

    • @stochastic_rate
      @stochastic_rate Před 5 lety +9

      Well technically you have to consider where the electricity for the trains comes from. Not sure it's that eco-friendly.

    • @mrbump28
      @mrbump28 Před 5 lety +30

      @@stochastic_rate more efficient than cars or planes

  • @zheyuwan4879
    @zheyuwan4879 Před 5 měsíci +1

    In our country, long-distance high-speed rail is more expensive than airplanes. However, considering the reluctance of many elderly people to fly and the fact that only major cities have airports, high-speed rail becomes an excellent way of transportation.

  • @pritapp788
    @pritapp788 Před 2 lety +6

    I'd be curious to know how much their economy benefits from having such rail infrastructure - probably a big boost. Which is not properly understood by a number of countries (Australia, US) which just can't be bothered with developing high speed rail.

    • @tonysu8860
      @tonysu8860 Před 2 lety

      It's pretty easy to describe in general terms and not factual numbers...
      For anything that can benefit from face to face meeting, it's invaluable. Think of all the businesses and jobs that exist only because two people were able to meet in person that otherwise wouldn't have happened.
      On the other hand, because HSR doesn't support freight, zilch. Compared to for example the US system of railroad freight and that freight can be carried on aircraft, Chinese business is still hobbled by lack of transportation options. Much like the superhighway network in the US and to a lesser extent ordinary railroads, China transports much of their goods on roads and regular rail. I would guess the consequences then are that a place like Szenchen can appear only in a coastal city with access to a port with container ships and is nearly impossible far inland. Even cities like Wuhan can exist only because of their proximity to a major waterway.

  • @powerrising4933
    @powerrising4933 Před 4 lety +808

    USA oil companies and flight companies will try everything to stop the development of high speed railways in North America. Lobby.

    • @exratic5908
      @exratic5908 Před 3 lety +36

      Very sad, but there’s nothing you can do. You vote a new congressmen in and the companies just start lobbying to the new congressman.

    • @user-xb8hs4ru9q
      @user-xb8hs4ru9q Před 3 lety +31

      Perhaps America needs Mr Sanders

    • @grantcivyt
      @grantcivyt Před 3 lety +13

      High speed rail isn't very cost-effective in America. It isn't oil and airline companies that are preventing it. Basic economics and common sense will prevent you from building something that produces a net loss of your investment.

    • @exratic5908
      @exratic5908 Před 3 lety +50

      grantcivyt, rail is the only system that makes alot of money. Highways make no money and actually cost money. Planes have very small profit margins. High speed rail makes perfect economic sense *especially* in the states. Even if we just connected the north east corridor it would make the government a fuck load of money.
      And yes it is oil and air companies lobbying against it.

    • @bigefresh2
      @bigefresh2 Před 3 lety +7

      @@grantcivyt Sure a high speed rail between two far flung medium sized cities isn't profitable, but as this video shows it can be very profitable between dense urban corridors such as the ones you see on the East and West coast, as well as parts of the Midwest.

  • @marcosfarodrigues
    @marcosfarodrigues Před 5 lety +683

    Public transportation isn't about profitability. Good for China and the Chinese

    • @baronvonlimbourgh1716
      @baronvonlimbourgh1716 Před 5 lety +132

      At least one person that gets it.....

    • @Obscurai
      @Obscurai Před 5 lety +113

      Exactly, it's infrastructure for the entire nation and not everything needs a profit motive. The US interstate highway system was built with that exact understanding.

    • @ioanpena
      @ioanpena Před 5 lety +42

      They created good jobs by giving local people work and lift them out of poverty into tax paying people. When you lift out of the poverty hundreds of millions of people and stop paying them for doing nothing and start charge them through taxes it makes the country rich !!! They invest so much in technologies soon enough we will have to copy them in order to survive !!!

    • @dalibordvorak6528
      @dalibordvorak6528 Před 5 lety +25

      Profitability is actually the best way to measure whether projects like this are worth it or not.

    • @WeAreSMC96
      @WeAreSMC96 Před 5 lety +14

      true. but putting yourself into a huge debt for that doesn't make much sense either.. well not unless you're running a centralized government.

  • @stolendust
    @stolendust Před rokem +5

    Back in 2009, I drove from Beijing to Tianjin on the new second highway between the two cities, racing with the high speed train. My speed is 190 km per hour, but I've to admit that the train is faster and overtook me pretty easily. 😂

    • @weizhang2834
      @weizhang2834 Před 9 měsíci +1

      Did you get a traffic ticket from police? That’s very dangerous

  • @ronglou4911
    @ronglou4911 Před 2 lety +8

    A three-year-old video was suddenly in my feed, I wondered why until I see the Urumqi and Lanzhou train part. What I want to weigh in is that there must have been some political concerns, but it still mainly was just for the development of some rural areas. Build the road and they will come is still pretty applicable in many regions in China nad most of them worked.

    • @user-ll1fp8ot7k
      @user-ll1fp8ot7k Před 8 měsíci

      社会主义共同富裕的概念,他们很难理解的。。

  • @tech8222
    @tech8222 Před 3 lety +593

    China: "Stop bitchin' and get moving'"
    USA: "Stop moving and get bitchin' "

    • @chandrashekard.7543
      @chandrashekard.7543 Před 3 lety +50

      USA has a bigger problem of lobbying.
      There is a reason the public transport is shite and every owns a car. Companies basically payout Congress to not fund public transportation because they would lose money if people switch to public transport.
      The system is fucked, I don't see high speed rails or any competent public transport happening any time soon.

    • @ianstar7
      @ianstar7 Před 3 lety +34

      @@chandrashekard.7543 Things could change with a significant change in politics/policies.
      Currently you have Republican and Democrat party to choose from.... Let's face it, they are two cheeks of the same arse... 😉

    • @ednabirkdale7403
      @ednabirkdale7403 Před 3 lety +13

      @@ianstar7 thats one of the benefits of having a 1-party system like china does

    • @TonboIV
      @TonboIV Před 3 lety +8

      @@ednabirkdale7403 I'm very glad I don't live in the US, but even so, I would instantly choose the US over China. I'd choose almost any country over China.

    • @wahyuindrasto8307
      @wahyuindrasto8307 Před 3 lety

      @@TonboIV *IT'S BECUZ YOU LIVE IN RUSSIA. NO WONDER.*

  • @benjamino.7475
    @benjamino.7475 Před 5 lety +457

    those two „small“ China cities have about the same number of residents as some European countries (Austria/Switzerland both about 8 million)
    Probably also one of the reasons why it makes more sense there... more customers^^

    • @rajaoctober14
      @rajaoctober14 Před 5 lety +9

      Still it won't make sense coz not everyone can afford the tickets particularly without being subsidised. Even though they have higher population , their middle class is reasonably less.

    • @luihinwai1
      @luihinwai1 Před 5 lety +40

      @@rajaoctober14 Train lines are built for the next 50 - 100 years of course. The network as a whole is profitable.

    • @xeroxquantum
      @xeroxquantum Před 5 lety +17

      Schweiz 8,7 Mln
      Österreich 9,1 Mln
      Lanzhou = Ürümqi 3,5 Mln

    • @LeZylox
      @LeZylox Před 5 lety +5

      China is just so gigantic

    • @weiwang5426
      @weiwang5426 Před 5 lety +2

      raja believe it or not
      0.3billion midclass for now and will double in 10 years.check it

  • @jascam1
    @jascam1 Před rokem +5

    Chinese work for the greater good of the group unlike in the U.S where self is first and the goal is always profit. Good for China, the world should take lessons.

  • @MercuryDynasty
    @MercuryDynasty Před 2 lety +4

    If there were a train from California to like Georgia or Virginia, or maybe even a train from
    Georgia or Colorado to Toronto or British Colombia. I would absolutely utilize that more than planes. Flights are soo expensive most of the time or during moments when needed, so I would definitely be open to things like trains.

  • @davidetreni
    @davidetreni Před 5 lety +186

    In the 1960s a team of japanese engineers sat at a table and one said: "minnasama, the main line between Tokyo and Osaka is at the limit of it's capacity"
    "i know!" said an other, "let's build a dedicated line for express trains only!"
    60 years later, it's the Shinkansen, the world's most densly used and profitable high-speed railway in the world.
    In the 1970s a team of french engineers sat at a table and one said: "monsieurs, our railways are losing passengers to airlines"
    "i know!" said an other ", "let's make a train that runs at 300Km/h, double the speed of our fastest conventonal train!"
    50 years later, it's the TGV, wich still holds the record for the fastest train in the world.
    In the 1980s a team of italian engineers sat at a table and one said: "signori, our country is a rather mountainous one and our railways are rater tortuous, also we don't have the space for high-speed railways"
    "i know!" said an other ", "let's make a train capable of tilting in curves so it can travel at 270Km/h even on normal lines!"
    40 years later, it's the Pendolino, a revolutionary technology exported almost evrywhere in the world.
    In the 1990s a team of german engineers sat at a table and one said: "now that the east and west Germany are united politically, we need to unite them economically and socially."
    "i know!" said an other ", "let's run our ICE trains part on high-speed lines part on normal ones, we need to unite the country first, Ja? speed can and will come later."
    30 years later Germany is seamless one, united. and Berlin is linked to evry other major german cities in less than 3 hours.
    In the 2000s a team of chinese party officials sat at a table and one said: "comrades!, our economy is growing, and we need a development strategy that does not relies on foreign imports in the long term", "i know!" said an other ", "let's build high-speed lines, we lack in technology but we could import it from Japan, Italy, France and Germany and then learn to make our own!"
    20 years later it's the CRH, world's largest high speed network more than all the other high-speed railways combined.
    Then, in the 2010s, the american congress met in the US Capitol, and one said "our cities are choking with cars and pollution and our pubblic transport infrastructure is crumbling and inadequate, shouldn't we look to other countries to find a solution?", "nah" said an other, "we need more cars, because freedom. and indipendence. Let's rather spend hundreds of billions dollars on a plane that does not fly."
    10 years later, it's still at the starting point. and it looks like it won't move for a very long time.

    • @garrett6064
      @garrett6064 Před 5 lety +6

      Country. People/km2
      Japan. 336
      Germany. 230
      Italy. 201
      France. 120
      US. 35
      So yeah, we do things differently here.

    • @PseudoResonance
      @PseudoResonance Před 5 lety +1

      Fastest train is the French TGV? Not for long when the L0 series finally goes operational.

    • @davidetreni
      @davidetreni Před 5 lety +3

      @@PseudoResonance
      Fastest conventional steel-wheeled train. Maglevs are another matter.

    • @fredfrond6148
      @fredfrond6148 Před 5 lety +17

      Thomas Mc Loughlin China spends way more on Africa than the US. China built a high speed rail from Djibouti to dar es salam Tanzania. They have massive manufacturing plants there in Ethiopia. Africa’s economy is doing better than before. If the people in the DRC come around to seeing that business is win win and war is everybody loses Africa will really be a great trading partner for China.
      Unlike the places where young Americans are dying pumping out profits for the US military industrial complex run by old white men who have never faced a bullet. Places like Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Libya and if John Bolton has his way Iran. Irrespective of political party they all have blood on their hands. Cheney, Bush and Blair in Iraq; crooked Hillary and Obama in Syria and Libya; Reagan in Nicaragua and Panama; bush senior in the first Iraq war; Mr. bone saw MBS and trump in Yemen. All turned into 💩HOLES by the US military industrial complex.

    • @Victor-hy9ux
      @Victor-hy9ux Před 5 lety

      emmm, well, but the Shanghai Maglev train travels at 430km/h

  • @garrettliang4364
    @garrettliang4364 Před 4 lety +304

    I am living in New York City. Believe or not, I spend 2 hours on the train to my work place. And the rat is sitting next to me.

    • @lars7935
      @lars7935 Před 4 lety +36

      @OAT351 London had a subway over 150 years ago and today it's pretty clean.

    • @hwg5039
      @hwg5039 Před 4 lety +10

      Lars Wait are you saying London Underground is clean??? It’s still efficient for sure but some cabins and stations are dirty as hell

    • @mastersonogashira1796
      @mastersonogashira1796 Před 4 lety +6

      Y’all nee to be quite. At least your cities have subways and trains...

    • @pvksmaheeth8816
      @pvksmaheeth8816 Před 4 lety +1

      🐀🐀🐀🐀

    • @adenosinetp10
      @adenosinetp10 Před 4 lety +1

      A rat sitting next to you?!!

  • @wabio
    @wabio Před rokem +4

    What most people don't realize and was not mentioned by Wendover was high speed rail can be used to move more than just civilian passengers. It can also be used to move cargo, freight, or military around the country very quickly. This could be invaluable in the case of natural disasters or if you need to move troops across the country quickly.

  • @stefanocoppo3949
    @stefanocoppo3949 Před rokem +2

    i feel like the title should be "why is everyone else so bad at building railways"

  • @gjwagner1856
    @gjwagner1856 Před 4 lety +468

    i am speechless. Here in Britain, we are still struggling with signal failures, wrong type of weather, still running diesel trains, power failure, leaves on the line, wrong type of snow etc. So watching this is like alien technology. Maybe the Chinese can help out here in Britain. 😂

    • @mraeece
      @mraeece Před 4 lety +88

      G J Wagner China did offer to build the HS2 for way less under budget and in quicker time however everyone went crazy as they don’t want Chinese influences and the associated security issues In the U.K.

    • @johnstudd4245
      @johnstudd4245 Před 4 lety +21

      Wages are still a lot lower in China, their money goes a long way. Your unions in the UK would not put up with half the BS that probably goes on there.

    • @mattlandry8742
      @mattlandry8742 Před 4 lety +13

      John Studd don’t forget the land costs are much less because they pretty much force to take it from their citizens

    • @JackieMao
      @JackieMao Před 4 lety +41

      @@mattlandry8742 yes,they were forced, ccp slap millions on their face to force them leave

    • @samuelren3405
      @samuelren3405 Před 4 lety +8

      Sometimes I wonder what defines a developed country vs a developing country

  • @benwong119
    @benwong119 Před 4 lety +428

    Man,the economic benefits of high-speed rail are not only just “train tickets”

    • @mybitmix
      @mybitmix Před 3 lety +74

      @@bidhiprakashpani It's the productivity rate of all the people in the train. Railways will also make delivery of goods faster.

    • @grumpyrabbit1934
      @grumpyrabbit1934 Před 3 lety +51

      True, that’s why we can order anything and everything online from anywhere in China, most of it came to the next day if you live in east part China, usually it take three days in most part of China

    • @warren5037
      @warren5037 Před 3 lety +13

      In economics, we differentiate between private and external benefits and costs.
      Private benefits and costs, as the name suggests, are the benefits and costs that are incurred personally, so if you have a business, expenses like electricity are your private costs and your income is your private benefits.
      External benefits and costs are those benefits and costs that are enjoyed and borne by 3rd parties. So things like pollution are external costs. Meanwhile, things like you opening an antique store which may attract tourists from other areas and who will also spend money in your area (apart from your store) are considered external benefits.
      So, private plus external benefits and costs add up to become social benefits and costs.
      While you as an individual may only consider private benefits and costs, your government needs to consider social benefits and costs, hence why things like taxes and subsidies exist.

    • @passby8070
      @passby8070 Před 3 lety +14

      Yeah agree, The economic activities that it generates and opportunities it opens up to the surrending population a difficult to quantify if we just look at the pure in the profit and lost. If hsr rail improves the GDP by 1% pa for the towns and cities that it services its probably more than paying for it self.

    • @whoisheiforgothisname2103
      @whoisheiforgothisname2103 Před 3 lety +2

      @@bidhiprakashpani think about all the good carried on the back of trains but faster

  • @user-vy4fe8nj9d
    @user-vy4fe8nj9d Před rokem +1

    There are many ethnics in xinjiang. biggest is uyghur, 44.96%, and still growing up. Second is han, 42.24%. In xinjiang, most of the store boards r written in both chinese and uyghur language. Uyghur r also written in chinese paper money, which also includes chinese, mongol language, tibetan language, zhuang language.

  • @ZZZ-zl4mz
    @ZZZ-zl4mz Před 2 lety +2

    When you first consider profit of infrastructure like HSR, your are already doomed to fall behind.

  • @user-vv7ir1pl4j
    @user-vv7ir1pl4j Před 4 lety +683

    Meanwhile England take a decade to patch a road

    • @stevenm8970
      @stevenm8970 Před 4 lety +31

      Or, for a better comparison HS2 was conceived in 2010. 9 years later and we're still deciding whether we want it or not, having already built a 3rd.

    • @stevenm8970
      @stevenm8970 Před 4 lety +26

      Perhaps we should take a leaf out of china's book and build a HS3 to Edinburgh to promote ethnic unity, rein the scots in.

    • @zj7396
      @zj7396 Před 4 lety +3

      and the crossrail

    • @everything777
      @everything777 Před 4 lety +14

      China makes the decisions of what and where to build without consulting it's people. You can certainly make good progress building stuff with their style of government but I know where I'd rather live

    • @tronalddump6768
      @tronalddump6768 Před 4 lety +3

      East Asia is good in these types of things

  • @ultrascreens5206
    @ultrascreens5206 Před 4 lety +607

    I like how China despite all its problems just gets things done and fast forwards its infrastructure no matter the cost

    • @hotcornerthings6000
      @hotcornerthings6000 Před 4 lety +50

      OAT351 believe it or not but it’s gotten better

    • @hongdali7973
      @hongdali7973 Před 4 lety +64

      @OAT351 i don't deny that the air is terrible in many places of China ,but whether you like to see it or not, Green development is getting more and more Chinese people's hearts, development always needs a process ,China isn't excellent enough, but she is on the road

    • @seanmcdonald5859
      @seanmcdonald5859 Před 4 lety +2

      Yeah, thats kinda the problem though isnt it . . . . .full speed ahead and f*** the consequences is unsustainable and building high speed rail as a weapon . . . . . . It would be interesting to see how many of these lines would remain if the Chinese people were to one day lamp post their current government . . . . . . Maybe one day. . . .

    • @agnidiptahomroy8656
      @agnidiptahomroy8656 Před 4 lety +11

      @@hongdali7973 oh really, China isn't excellent enough, if China isn't excellent enough, then US is garbage.

    • @user-aw3dh6jxc3
      @user-aw3dh6jxc3 Před 4 lety +4

      @OAT351 it's just going through all these pollution problems the developed countries had in the past

  • @pirateofthesus8255
    @pirateofthesus8255 Před 2 lety +5

    +15 Social Credits

  • @jkuang
    @jkuang Před rokem +3

    China is good in building anything. They actually built a massive Green Great Wall that pushed desert back hundreds of kilometers. And they built a water channel that transport water from south to the north, over thousand miles of distance. Let's don't even talk about the massive highways, trains, bridges, and powerlines. People are amazed by the high speed train simply because they are more visible.

  • @SuperDahalo
    @SuperDahalo Před 4 lety +711

    Engineer: how many miles of high-speed railways do you want to build?
    Chinese Government: yes

    • @JAPANLOVESTAR
      @JAPANLOVESTAR Před 4 lety +4

      LOL..."engineer"...as if there is any such thing as a chinese engineer.

    • @kiwi.fruit.twitch.sensation
      @kiwi.fruit.twitch.sensation Před 4 lety +11

      how original is your comment
      no

    • @markuc
      @markuc Před 4 lety +106

      @@JAPANLOVESTAR what the hell are you taking about, something like 2 million of them graduates every year. Unlike Western nations, Chinese politicians are mostly engineers. That's why shit gets done in China as opposed to the bickering elsewhere.

    • @ezioauditore5616
      @ezioauditore5616 Před 4 lety

      @@markuc and their politician shits on their engineers

    • @tomj2817
      @tomj2817 Před 4 lety +8

      @OAT351 not rly but ok

  • @alexmcconnell101
    @alexmcconnell101 Před 4 lety +147

    It's incredibly smart of them to do this. They build it now while labour costs are still cheap which, if their economy continues to grow at the rate it has, won't be the case in 30 years. They're building future friendly infrastructure which absolutely makes sense when you thing about how oil depletion looms.

    • @paulritchie5868
      @paulritchie5868 Před 4 lety +4

      I lived in HK for two years some time ago,I can tell you this ,the Chinese people work hard ,are very friendly and extremely smart...

    • @anlasma7942
      @anlasma7942 Před 4 lety +2

      They control the value of their currency so no, labor always will be cheap

    • @matthewnickolas4706
      @matthewnickolas4706 Před 4 lety +3

      @@anlasma7942 Eventually they slowly allow it to rise in price. China is doing what the "Happiest Barrack in the camp" aka Communist Hungary did during the cold war (1960-1990), they improve living conditions on a yearly basis slowly to get the population to shut up about basicly living under tyranny. The only difference is China does it without severely indebting itself

  • @culture5679
    @culture5679 Před 3 lety +3

    The Lanzhou-Xinjiang high-speed railway has built a "high-speed railway economic corridor" between Xinjiang, Qinghai and Gansu provinces, playing an important role in promoting the economic development of cities along the route and the construction of the Silk Road Economic Belt. It has become a new engine for the development of the western region and display a new vitality in regional economic development.
    After the entire Lanzhou-Xinjiang high-speed railway line was put into operation, China's northwest railway network achieved a new leap, which not only realized the rapid transport between western China and the mainland, but also increased freight capacity by more than two times. The railway has an annual transport capacity of more than 400 million tons, alleviating the pressure of passenger and cargo transport, and greatly improving the comprehensive railway transport capacity in Northwest China. Together with the Lanzhou-Xinjiang Railway, Longhai Railway, Lanzhou-Chongqing Railway, Baolan-Lanzhou Railway, Qinghai-Tibet Railway and other railways, it forms a relatively complete western railway network, which improves the current situation of low transport capacity in Xinjiang, Qinghai and Gansu provinces and regions where is difficulty of buying a ticket. In addition, the railway also further expanded the transport channels of coal, cotton, melons and fruits in Xinjiang, Gansu and Qinghai provinces and regions, gradually transforming the resource advantages of the regions along the railway into economic advantages.
    The Lanzhou-Xinjiang high-speed railway has optimized the "economic map" of the cities along the Silk Road, stimulated the development potential of the cities, and brought more and more obvious economic driving and radiation effects along the Silk Road. An economic belt stretching for thousands of kilometers has emerged along the Silk Road.

  • @XnonXte
    @XnonXte Před 3 lety +8

    Love it or hate it, China are currently the Dragon on the east. And yes No one can doubt that

  • @sherriecao3491
    @sherriecao3491 Před 5 lety +111

    My mom's family is actually from Hengyang. That station 45 mins away from the city center is not only serving that city but also many towns around it. In many cases, a couple of cities share one station (but it might be named after the biggest one).

    • @sherriecao3491
      @sherriecao3491 Před 5 lety +8

      Plus the North of Hengyang is a Holy Mountain in Buddhism so... A lot of tourists and pilgrimage to that city.

    • @terminalile3296
      @terminalile3296 Před 5 lety

      @@sherriecao3491 衡阳老表

  • @macgradytracy9430
    @macgradytracy9430 Před 4 lety +749

    Have to mention that,the us railways were built by chinese 100years ago

    • @wenwenyo2840
      @wenwenyo2840 Před 4 lety +185

      That was human rights abuse, very poor condition and discrimination. Worked them like slaves.

    • @Mikasks
      @Mikasks Před 4 lety +45

      Wenwen Yo well they build those roads by basically enslaving their workers with minimal wage. And their minimal wage is so small, its laughable.

    • @homeofthemad3044
      @homeofthemad3044 Před 4 lety +14

      I mean some of them were built by Chinese immigrants about 150 years ago. But it wasn't as if every mile of track in the US was built by subcontracted Chinese workers.

    • @schievel6047
      @schievel6047 Před 4 lety +3

      Looks like some people just like to build railroads.
      And iPhones of course

    • @JuiceAddiction
      @JuiceAddiction Před 4 lety +6

      @@homeofthemad3044 mostly the western parts

  • @mildlydispleased3221
    @mildlydispleased3221 Před 2 lety +5

    The fact that the USA only has 54 KM of high speed rail is pathetic

    • @dimensioneight9361
      @dimensioneight9361 Před 2 lety +1

      The fact that china supports North Koreans dying from famine is pathetic

    • @mildlydispleased3221
      @mildlydispleased3221 Před 2 lety +1

      @@dimensioneight9361 Yes it is.

    • @bedlover9273
      @bedlover9273 Před 2 lety

      Atleast usa have high speed rail
      My country don't even have High speed rail

    • @paniniman6524
      @paniniman6524 Před 2 lety

      @@bedlover9273 a high speed rail that doesn't go anywhere serves no purpose. the us is on par with you country

  • @nerf9116
    @nerf9116 Před 2 lety +4

    "Why is China good with railways?"
    Cause they are fkin educated gawddamnit

  • @shookshibe
    @shookshibe Před 5 lety +238

    Did you know that the dutch program zondag met lubach on national tv used your video on how to solve traffic, and why we should pay for driving at busy hours on busy sections?

    • @McRaylie
      @McRaylie Před 5 lety +4

      Is there a link?

    • @KevinDeJong
      @KevinDeJong Před 5 lety +6

      @@McRaylie search for 'zondag met lubach' - files

    • @patrykurysek1707
      @patrykurysek1707 Před 5 lety +16

      @@McRaylie czcams.com/video/-8IgX8jascs/video.html 4:22

    • @shookshibe
      @shookshibe Před 5 lety +22

      @@McRaylie czcams.com/video/-8IgX8jascs/video.html
      It starts at 4:20

    • @sytze5
      @sytze5 Před 5 lety

      Ja ik zag het ook al ik dacht echt eindelijk!