New high speed rail lines are speeding ahead in Asia. The bullet train in Taiwan opened last year, and China started the construction of the high speed rail link between Beijing and Shanghai last week. Now, Hong Kong and mainland China are planning to build a high speed rail between Hong Kongand Guangzhou (Canton).

Called the Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong Express Rail Link, the line will reduce the travel time in half to travel between Guangzhou and Hong Kong to 48 minutes. The time to travel between Shenzhen and Hong Kong will be 14 minutes.

Hong Kong and mainland China, especially in Shenzhen, have close economic ties. By building this rail line, governments hope to see a major boost to the region's economy.

The Hong Kong Government has chosen the MTR Corporation, a private company that runs the city's subway system, to design and plan the Hong Kong section of the line. This 26-km section will include a tunnel through the New Territories. The line will then connect into the current Airport Express tracks, but later branch off to a planned terminus in West Kowloon.

The $39.5 billion Hong Kong ($5 billion US) project will start construction in 2009 and finish by 2015. The estimated ridership is 120,000 daily passengers by 2030.

Photo by Flickr user Tom@HK. Used under Creative Commons License 2.0.