It's reported that a high-speed railway opened on December 30th, 2019 between Beijing and Zhangjiakou, Hebei Province, construction (施工) of which started in April, 2016. According to China Railway (CR), the 174-km-long railway line, an important project for the 2022 Winter Olympic Games, will shorten the trip between the two host cities from over three hours to only 47 minutes.
It will be the world's first high-speed railway on which self-driving trains can reach a speed of up to 350 kilometers per hour. "Now, the drivers only need to push button and the system will independently speed up, slow down, stop and open the passenger doors," said Liu Chunyu, a high- speed train driver.
Known as China's first "intelligent high-speed railway line", the Beijing-Zhangjiakou line features not only self-driving, but also intelligent modules. "We want to connect the high-speed train with different new technologies, like cloud computing, big data and AI, making passengers feel at home," Zhang Bo, a researcher from China Academy of Railway Sciences, said. What's more, there is a mobile news center where passengers can watch live Olympic broadcasts on the train.
The line has 10 stations, five in Beijing and the others in Hebei Province, including one at the Badaling section of the Great Wall. All the stations are equipped (配备) with smart devices, robots and 5G networks for the convenience of passengers.
"Today, the line also begins to connect some cities in Inner Mongolia and Shanxi Province to the high-speed railway loop (环线) in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei," said Zhu Dianping, an officer from China Railway Beijing Group. The line will finally connect Beijing with most parts of northwest China together.
