CHINA INDUSTRY ATLAS八纵八横 · High-speed rail
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How people move · across China

The people layer八纵八横 · 高铁

50,000 km
HSR network — largest on Earth
350 km/h
Top service speed (CR450: 400)
97%
of cities over 500k now connected
01

Knitting the country together

The 'eight vertical, eight horizontal' grid. Teal lines run north-south (纵); brass lines run east-west (横). Big dots are the crossroads where trunk lines meet. Toggle to isolate a direction.

High-speed rail trunk grid · 高铁hover a line · drag to pan

The 8 + 8 grid

Where it changes the map

02

The corridors and the crossroads

A representative set of the trunk corridors, and the junctions they create.

Trunk corridors (八纵八横)
The great crossroads
03

Field notes

Why moving people is its own kind of infrastructure.