China is building BULLET TRAINS at Breakneck Speed

China is building BULLET TRAINS
at Breakneck Speed

With more than 50% of the world's HSR Track in China, they have 19,000 km as of 2014.

During our 2.5 year stay in China, I served as the Chief Site Engineer (CSE) over engineering and construction for a 70 km section of the new China High Speed Rail (HSR) connecting a 380 km/h electric train from the huge city of Beijing to the huge city of Shenyang in northern China (a distance of 700 km).  Beijing–Shenyang Section  京哈高速铁路京沈段

Beijing to Shenyang HSR Project

That train is not in service yet (still have to get the trains installed and stations finished out).  In the following video I show our 320 km trip from Chongqing to Chengdu, China, at high speed.  Video taken in 2014 is a little over two years old.  This train has been in service a while and is not as fast as the newer HSR train construction I was working on (they go 230 mph), but this still went about 140 mph. 

video © 2014 Enoch Media, Grant Johnson

China has the world's longest HSR network with over 19,000 km (12,000 mi) of track in service as of January 2014, which is more than the rest of the world's high-speed rail tracks combined, and a network length of 30,000 km (19,000 mi) is planned for 2020.
Since HSR started in China on April 18, 2007, DAILY ridership has grown from 237,000 to 2.49 million in 2014, the most heavily used in the world.
The nationwide HSR network extends to 28 of the country's 33 provinces and regions.

Nearly all high-speed rail lines and rolling stock are owned and operated by the China Railway Corporation, the state enterprise formerly known as the Railway Ministry.

Over the past decade, the country has undergone an HSR building boom with generous funding from the Chinese government's economic stimulus program. The pace of high-speed rail expansion slowed for a period in 2011 after the removal of Chinese Railways Minister Liu Zhijun for corruption and a fatal high-speed railway accident near Wenzhou, but has since rebounded. Concerns about HSR safety, high ticket prices, low ridership, financial sustainability of high-speed rail projects and environmental impact have drawn greater scrutiny from the Chinese press.
The fastest trains can reach operational speeds of up to 380 km/h (240 mph).

China's 19,000 km HSR track.  More than 50% of the world's HSR track.

China is roughly equivalent to USA in size, but in USA there is currently no HSR track.