China's high-speed rail network is probably the world's most ambitious public-works project, a 21st-century equivalent of America's Interstate highway system. Officials crow at each new speed milestone and each dramatic reduction in intercity-travel times. But after the disgrace and sacking of the railways minister and a series of other corruption investigations, the construction of the system itself may be shunted onto the slow track. In 2008 China had only 649km of highspeed railway. It now has nearly 8,400km, four times as much as the next-largest network (Japan's).
展开▼
