On September 24th, the Hong Kong section of the Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong Express Rail Link (XRL) opened to the public. Now, it only needs 14 to 19 minutes to travel between Shenzhen North Railway Station and Hong Kong West Kowloon Railway Station.
The bullet trains also departed on September 24th from Beijing and Shanghai, to Hong Kong. The travel time is about 9 hours now from Beijing to Hong Kong. The travel time used to exceed 24 hours. The XRL is available to reach 44 mainland stations from Hong Kong, including Beijing, Shanghai, Shijiazhuang, Zhengzhou, Wuhan, Changsha, Hangzhou, Guilin, Kunming, etc.
There is no doubt that the XRL will bring more convenience to people. "The XRL train has slashed my commuting time to one hour from three hours," said Alex Leung, a Hong Kong entrepreneur working in Shenzhen who is considering moving his office closer to the high-speed railway station. The XRL will cut travel time from Hong Kong to many inland tourist attractions too.
The total length of China's high-speed rail network has been 25,000 kilometers by the end of 2017, the longest of its kind in the world. The high-speed trains depart every 10 minutes from the stations on XRL network.