China Railway completes tests on high-speed trains at speeds up to 453 km/h, the fastest in the world

By Global Times
Published: Jul 01, 2023 06:38 PM

China Railway said on Saturday that it has successfully completed performance tests of new high-tech components critical to CR450 high-speed trains at speeds exceeding 400 kilometers per hour (km/h), said to be the fastest in the world, marking another milestone in China's world-leading high-speed rail technology.

In an effort to accelerate the development of a new generation of high-speed trains that are faster, safer, more environmentally friendly, energy-efficient and intelligent, China Railway conducted testing along a section of the railway from Fuqing to Qianzhou in East China's Fujian Province, the Global Times learned from China Railway on Saturday.

On Wednesday, the test train successfully ran on the Meizhou Bay cross-sea bridge at a single-train speed of 453 km/h and a relative velocity of 891 km/h. On Thursday, the test train operated in the Haiwei Tunnel at a single-train speed of 420 km/h and a relative velocity of 840 km/h.

The new technology components underwent effective performance tests, demonstrating excellent performance across various indicators. This achievement marks a significant milestone in the development of the CR450 high-speed train, laying a solid foundation for the implementation of the CR450 Technology Innovation Project, China Railway said.

CR450 represents a train designed with an operating speed of 400 km/h. Currently, the fastest operating speed of high-speed trains in China is 350 km/h, which is also the highest high-speed rail operating speed in the world. The fastest operating speeds for high-speed trains in Japan and France are set at 320 km/h, according to media reports.

At a speed of 400 km/h, the train would shorten the trip from Beijing to Shanghai to 2.5 hours. At such a speed, the journey from New York to Washington DC in the US could be cut to just under 55 minutes, which takes three to four hours by car or train.

Unlike the six times major speed increases which occurred between 1997 and 2007 when China was still striving to catch up with global frontrunners, more recent speed raises, including the current CR450 project, have helped maintain China's advantage in operating the world's fastest trains, Sun Zhang, a railway expert from Shanghai Tongji University, told the Global Times on Saturday.

Sun recalled vividly that the sixth speed raise which happened on April 18, 2007, when China raised its national train speeds from the 160 km/h to 200 km/h. After China put into operation of its high-speed trains into use in 2008, the country quickly took the lead with trains running at a current 350 km/h.

After reaching a certain speed, any further speed raise is not going to be an easy task, Sun said, noting that by adding 50 km/h, the CR450 will represent another leap in quality and a milestone in the development of China's high-speed rail.