Chinese rail hub beats Tokyo's shinkansen with a train every 40 seconds at peak
Guangzhou South Railway Station handled more than 1 million passenger trips on Oct. 1, a first for any Chinese station, with trains leaving 40 seconds apart at peak times.
On October 1st, Guangzhou South rail station in China broke records by handling an impressive 1,252 train services and accommodating 1.049 million passenger trips in a single day. This marked the first time a Chinese rail station had surpassed this milestone, according to the province's Communist Party Committee's publicity department. The station's peak train departure interval of 40 seconds was claimed to be faster than most people's short video-viewing time.
In comparison, Tokyo Station's Shinkansen trains arrive at a slower rate of one every 2.5 minutes during peak hours. Guangzhou South was built to handle such heavy traffic, with 15 platforms, 28 tracks, and five main rail hubs in Guangzhou, the provincial capital with 19.1 million residents. The station also operated 202 overnight high-speed services on the holiday, accounting for about one-sixth of its daily departures.
China State Railway Group anticipates 284 million passenger trips across the nation during the 16-day travel period, covering the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holiday. To cope with the surge, Guangzhou South enhanced its transfer areas, departure lanes, passenger information services, and added more trains based on ticket wait-list data.
This improved capacity enabled service to major cities like Shenzhen, Changsha, Nanning, Zhuhai, Zhengzhou, and Chongqing. The station connects to 196 cities, including Beijing and Hong Kong. Railway expert David Feng noted that Guangzhou South's bustling activity is no surprise given its extensive network and preparations for the holiday rush.
Written by urgent.news from VnExpress International's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
