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Guangzhou to Open New Metro Connection to High-Speed Rail Line

Posted: 08/8/2014 11:30 am

qingsheng station guangzhou metroBy late next year, you’ll be able to take Guangzhou’s Metro Line 4 to hop on the high-speed rail.

After the transportation lines are connected and Qingsheng Station is finished, a trip on Guangzhou’s Metro Line 4 from University Town to the high-speed rail will take only half an hour, reports Guangzhou Daily.

Qingsheng Station on Line 4 is currently Guangzhou’s first operational metro station to undergo the necessary modifications, and is expected to be fully operational by December 2015. The station will be the second high-speed rail interchange, after Guangzhou South Railway Station.

The fare from Qingsheng Station to Shenzhen will be RMB 49.5, and the trip is expected to take only 28 minutes under optimal conditions.

There are currently 13 high-speed trains traveling between Guangzhou South Railway station and Shenzhen. The plans for an inter-provincial high-speed rail connecting Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Hong Kong were recently delayed.

Related:

Photo: gzmtr

Haohao

PRD Megacity Emerges: Subway to Connect Guangzhou, Dongguan, and Shenzhen

Posted: 07/4/2014 3:59 pm

tricity subway guangzhou shenzhen dongguan pearl river delta megacity subwayAs Beijing makes plans to develop itself into a megacity of the north, the long-standing intention to integrate the three cities of the Pearl River Delta is coming to fruition.

Details of the tri-city subway system that will interconnect the public transportation networks of Guangzhou, Dongguan, and Shenzhen have been announced, reports Yangcheng Evening Report.

The subway line will extend from Xintang, Baiyun Airport to Guangzhou North station.

Costing RMB 3.44 billion, the subway line will consist of 13 subways stations, including: Xintang Station, Zengcheng Development District Station, Lihu City Station, Zhenlong Station, Pinggang Station, Folang Village Station, Matouzhuang Station, Healthy Industrial City Station, Zhuliao Station, Airport Terminal 3 Station, Airport Terminal 2 Station, Airport Terminal 1 Station, Huashan, Tiangui Road, and Guangzhou North Station.

In other subway developments, plans are being discussed to connect Guangzhou Metro Line 5 to Dongguan Metro Line 1.

With a terminal station at Huangpu Passenger Ferry Terminal, the extended subway line will intersect with the Dongguan Metro at Mayong Station. It is expected to be completed in 2020.

tricity subway guangzhou shenzhen dongguan pearl river delta megacity subway

Photos: Yangcheng Evening Report

Haohao

Knife Attack Rumor Launches Stampede on Guangzhou Metro

Posted: 06/9/2014 2:42 pm

guangzhou subway stampede terrorism panic attack knife Six people were injured when passengers aboard a Guangzhou Metro Line 3 subway train panicked and began a stampede, reports Sina News Video.

A passenger called out, “There’s a knife attack!” as the subway train pulled into Meihuayuan Station at around 1pm. This caused a surge of people to come from the back of the train, leading to an immediate evacuation onto the subway platform.

The cause of the stampede may be due to a person who had fainted aboard the train.

READ: Knife Attack at Guangzhou Train Station Injures Six People
Suspect “Acted Alone” in Knife Attack At Guangzhou Railway Station

Ever since a number of knife and bomb attacks throughout the country earlier this year, public anxiety has been high as crowds have panicked while the threat of terrorism remains a hot topic in the media.

One person has been charged with spreading rumors online after Shenzhen crowds panicked when a shelf was pushed down in a subway plaza mall near the Dongmen pedestrian walkway, causing a stampede captured on video.

READ: Guangzhou Jittery After False Reports of Knife, Bomb Attacks

Commuters ran for their lives from the Guomao Subway Station on Beijing Metro’s Line 1 on June 5, reports Want China Times. The chaotic stampede was later attributed to a fight between two passengers.

Passengers on the Beijing Metro also experienced another panic attack on April 16 when a dispute between two commuters at the Huixinxijie Nankou Station on Line 5 caused a stampede when panicked passengers tried to get off the train too quickly, reports iFeng.

RELATED: 11,000 Extra Police on Patrol in Guangzhou This Labor Day Holiday

Other instances of stampedes causing injury or death not related to terrorism have previously occurred in China. Four elementary school children died when an iron gate failed to open at the bottom of a stairwell after the end of classes. Eight people died and 26 were injured at the Yucai Middle School in Hunan after the end of classes.

Related:

Photo: Sina News Video via Weibo

Haohao

Guangzhou to Deploy More Trains During Rush Hour [UPDATED]

Posted: 05/28/2014 10:45 am

crowd metro subwayGuangzhou Metro Lines 2, 3, and 5 will receive seven new subway trains in order to improve service by the end of the year, reports the Guangzhou Daily.

At present, Lines 2, 3 and 5 exceed passenger capacity at rush hour, while Lines 1, 3, and 5 are the most busy lines.

As explained by the Guangzhou Metro, waiting times on Line 2 are expected to be reduced to 2 minutes 10 seconds from the current waiting time of 2 minutes 20 seconds after the addition of three new trains. Two trains will be added to Line 5 to shorten wait times for commuters to 2 minutes 20 seconds from 2 minutes 30 seconds.

Meanwhile, subway use during the upcoming Dragon Boat Festival this weekend is expected to hit 7.2 million passengers. The Guangzhou Metro will be operating on a weekend schedule during this time.

UPDATE 11:26am May 29, 2014. We should also mention that the Guangzhou Metro will now start limiting commuters from entering 25 stations across the network that are already operating beyond capacity

Stations along Lines 1, 3, 4, 5 and 8 will now restrict the flow of commuters into the transit system starting at the end of this month.

Photo: itxinwen

Haohao

Work to start on extension of Guangzhou Metro line 8

Posted: 10/22/2013 7:00 am

Work is set to start on the northward extension of Guangzhou Metro line 8, also known as the Pazhou Line (琶洲线) by the end of this year. The 13 new stations on the extended line, reaching from Cultural Park (文化公园) to Baiyun Lake, will be open by the end of 2014, the State Environmental Protection Department announced last week.

Construction on the Guangzhou Metro, image courtesy of Sina Weibo

When it is completed, the line will stretch from Wanshengwei (万胜围)in Haizhu District through six stations in Liwan District and terminate at Baiyun Lake.

Four of the new stations will be transfer stations. Cultural Park will be an intersection with line 6. Chen Clan Academy (陈家祠) in Liwan will be an intersection with line 1. Xicun (西村), also in Liwan, will connect with line 5. And Julong(聚龙)in Baiyun will connect with line 12.

Haohao

Watch: Argument on Guangzhou metro comes to blows

Posted: 08/28/2013 7:00 am

Subway trains in China’s major cities are a constant source of drama.

When uncivilised behaviour on the Metro is not making the headlines, a fight is.

Last year, a fight over a seat on the Guangzhou Metro led to bloodshed while other passengers just stood and watched.

Then recently, two middle-aged women were filmed fighting over a seat in Shanghai.

Yesterday, Sina Weibo was abuzz with news of another fight on the Guangzhou Metro, this time between a middle-aged man and a younger man. However, on this occasion, one of the scrappers had some moves, meaning the fight ended relatively quickly. Watch:

As you can see, bystanders once again behaved less than heroically, allowing the fight to escalate while filming it.

It started when some angry words led the middle-aged man to give the younger man a clip round the ear. But then the younger man swiftly responded with a quick combination of a left uppercut and a right uppercut.

The older man, by then bleeding, managed a few feeble responses, but he wisely got off at the next stop, Baiyun Culture Square.

Haohao

Guangzhou subway trains to have free Wi-Fi this year that’s 20x faster than 4G

Posted: 07/17/2013 7:00 am

Passengers on the Guangzhou subway will be able to enjoy free Wi-Fi that is 20 times faster than 4G, meaning they won’t have to wait for videos to stream, by the end of this year. This was a claim made by 30 year-old scientist and dean of Shenzhen KPS Higher Polytechnic Institute Liu Ruopeng, Guangzhou Daily reports.

Liu Ruopeng, courtesy of Guangzhou Daily

Liu did his PhD at Duke University and has co-authored a book on meta-materials, the technology that is expected to be key to making this happen. Guangzhou Metro has said it is in the early stages of applying Liu’s knowledge to introduce free Wi-Fi and will try to make it available as soon as possible. The metro company was decidedly less bullish in tone than Liu himself.

Liu’s institute was visited by Xi Jinping on his southern tour last year. His report, ‘The Creation and Development of Industrial Grade Meta-material Technology,’ claims that meta-materials can be used to introduce free Wi-Fi. But even if free Wi-Fi is successfully brought to Guangzhou’s subway passengers, it would be far from the most exciting thing Liu has ever worked on.

According to this 2009 report, Liu has been at the forefront of the race to create the world’s first invisibility cloak. This technology would have obvious military applications, and it is something that even Hogwarts would struggle to match.

Haohao

Foreigner who collapsed in the Guangzhou metro rescued by Chinese heroine

Posted: 03/12/2013 4:26 pm

We’ve all heard scary stories about people in China ignoring those who badly need help, leaving some of them to suffer alone in public. The topic seemed to hit a climax last year in the case of little Yueyue, who was hit by a car and ignored by more than a dozen pedestrians who stepped over.

But here’s a case which shows things are not as dire as they seem: a heroine by the name of Zhang Jie helped rescue a foreigner, who collapsed in the Guangzhou metro on February 9.  The foreigner, named James, collapsed at Liede Station on Line 5.

The station’s closed circuit television shows James and his partner walking onto the main metro concourse. He doesn’t get far as he pulls up and falls backwards, landing heavily on the concourse. That’s when an attendant arrived.

Beijing Cream tells us more:

A subway attendant, Zhang Jie, supported James’s head while her colleague rubbed his chest. He remained unresponsive for a minute, at which point, while waiting for rescue personnel to arrive, Ms. Zhang began performing CPR. She said he remained unresponsive until after her third attempt, when he let out a breath of air.

A few minutes later, James was breathing on his own. He was sent to hospital, where he made a full recovery.

James is all back to normal now, but no word on what caused him to collapse.

It’s nice that, occasionally, stories do have happy endings.

Haohao

No toilet, no problem: high-school student defecates into a trash can on the GZ metro

Posted: 03/2/2013 1:45 pm

Just no shame: A high school student in Guangzhou has been caught using a trash bin as a toilet, and probably having a poo. The picture of the kid is the latest to go viral on Sina Weibo.

As you can see in this picture, he’s not bothered that he’s taking his business in a very public place, in this case the Guangzhou metro. What’s worse is that the station staff has allowed him to carry on, raising his hand to stop a netizen taking a picture – to shame him.

Acutely aware of the incident, Guangzhou metro has gone to the trouble of posting a picture on Weibo making sure users are aware of the nearest toilet in their stations.

While it is a disgusting and shocking practice, this incident is not the first of it’s kind on the Guangzhou metro.

We reported last November how a boy was caught short on the train, and crouched down beside the door to relieve his bowel while his dad stood by.

However, in more recent times, we’ve had a mother letting her son poo in the middle of the airport terminal in Taiwan, and just two weeks ago, a child was having a poo in the middle of an airplane aisle mid-air.

This reporter has seen mothers burst off the train, holding their babies over trash cans, to stop their kids wetting themselves in an all too common occurrence.

Feel sorry for the cleaners who have to clean up this mess.

Source/Images: Will Crook/Beijing Cream and Guangzhou Metro

Haohao

Dog runs into Guangzhou subway tunnel forcing train delay

Posted: 02/19/2013 7:00 am

On Sunday morning, which for many was the first day of work after the Spring Festival holiday, Guangzhou Metro Line 3 was delayed for around 40 minutes after 7:20 a.m. when a dog ran into the tunnel, Yangcheng Evening News reports. The dog didn’t survive.

Initially, LED screens at stations along the line, which runs from Panyu Square to Tianhe Coach Terminal, said the delay had been caused by an “information failure,” but there was no subsequent announcement as many commuters returned to the surface to get a taxi.

One Panyu resident told Guangzhou Daily that his commute from Panyu Square to Xiajiao along the line usually takes 20 minutes. That morning it took over an hour, causing him to receive a fine for being late for work.

When the dog was found it had no collar and was feared dangerous. It was surrounded by Metro workers and beaten to death.

It is not yet known how the dog entered the tunnel, but a worker surnamed Ye said it was safe to say that it entered at one of the stations where the trains arrive on the surface rather than underground.

Haohao
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