The 129-kilometer high-speed rail between downtown Shenzhen and the Shenshan Special Cooperation Zone will have six stations: Xili, Luohu North and Pingshan stations in Shenzhen, Huizhou South and Huidong stations in Huizhou and Shenshan Station in the Shenshan Special Cooperation Zone, according to a release by Shenzhen Metro Group yesterday.

Xili and Huidong stations are ground-level stations, Luohu North and Huizhou South stations are underground stations, and Pingshan and Shenshan stations will be on elevated bridges.

Construction workers at the inauguration ceremony of the Shenzhen-Shenshan High-speed Rail project in Xili, Nanshan District, yesterday. Courtesy of Shenzhen Metro Group

A single trip to the Shenshan Special Cooperation Zone will be cut to 30 minutes when the rail is put into operation, scheduled for 2025.

The rail will run 55 kilometers in Shenzhen, 57 kilometers in Huizhou and 17 kilometers in Shenshan. It will be connected with the Guangzhou-Shanwei Railway at Shenshan Station and become part of the future coastal high-speed rail corridor.

The speed of the Shenzhen-Shenshan High-speed Rail between Xili Station and Luohu North Station is designed at 250 kilometers per hour, and the rest of the rail line is designed for operation at 350 kilometers per hour, according to the release.

This is the second high-speed rail project that is under construction since the kickoff of the Airport-Qianhai section of the Guangzhou-Dongguan-Shenzhen Intercity Rail in June of last year.

The city has planned five rails to boost the connectivity within the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.

A computer-generated image of the Shenzhen-Shenshan High-speed Rail. Lin Jianping

The other rails are the Longgang-Dapeng spur line of the Shenzhen-Huizhou Intercity Rail, the Shenzhen-Huizhou Intercity Rail and the Shenzhen-Daya Bay Intercity Rail.

The Shenzhen-Daya Bay Intercity Rail will run 86.83 kilometers from Terminal 4 of Shenzhen Bao’an International Airport to Daya Bay Economic and Technological Development Zone in Huizhou, passing through Bao’an, Long-hua, Longgang and Pingshan districts in Shenzhen.

The Shenzhen-Huizhou Intercity Rail will run 141.92 kilometers. The Longgang-Dapeng spur line is expected to enhance the connectivity of Dapeng with the rest of Shenzhen through connections with the Shenzhen-Huizhou Intercity Rail and Shenzhen-Daya Bay Intercity Rail.

The rail lines cover a total length of 410 kilometers and are estimated to cost over 200 billion yuan (US$28.99 billion).