Work on the high-speed railway between Beijing and Shanghai appears to have been delayed as the original budget
underestimated the cost of construction by more than 50 percent, reported the
China Business Times on Thursday.
Originally expected to require an
investment of 130 billion yuan (16.6 billion U.S. dollars) the Shanghai-Beijing
Express Railway is now expected to cost 200 billion yuan (25.64 billion U.S.
dollars), reported the newspaper.
Construction was expected to begin in
2006 but the project has not yet received State Council approval, said the
newspaper.
The Ministry of Railways had planned to complete construction
within five years and have high-speed trains running by 2010.
The
newspaper said the higher cost estimate means the project may need to be
approved by the National People's Congress.
At the beginning of 2006,
Ministry of Railways engineer, He Huawu,estimated the railway would cost 100
million yuan per kilometer, only a third of the cost of a similar railway built
in the Republic of Korea.
According to the ministry, trains on the
Beijing-Shanghai Express Railway will reach speeds of 350 kilometers per hour,
shortening the trip by nine hours to five hours.
Trains now running
between China's two largest cities have a speed limit of between 140 and 160
kilometers per hour.
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