Beijing bullet train set to scrap luxury suites
By Zha Minjie |
May 30, 2011, Monday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
LUXURY VIP suites on the forthcoming Shanghai-Beijing High Speed Railway are to be removed and more standard seats installed in their place.
The news came after the first phase of month-long trial runs on the route had been carried out, according to Legal Evening News over the weekend. Some luxury seats, similar to those on passenger planes, will remain in business-class carriages, the reports said.
The rail link is due to be in service by the end of June.
On May 11, when the trial runs began, carriages believed to contain VIP facilities had their curtains drawn at Shanghai's Hongqiao Railway Station, preventing reporters from seeing inside.
The planned VIP suites had attracted heavy criticism from passengers complaining about high ticket prices and the difficulty of buying even standing tickets during the annual Spring Festival rush.
Such luxury suites, charging more than 2,000 yuan (US$308) a ticket, appeared on bullet trains between Shanghai and cities in Sichuan Province in January. The suites did not prove popular.
Railway expert Sun Zhang, a professor at Shanghai's Tongji University, praised the removal of the suites as "giving more choice to the ordinary passengers."
The bullet trains are built to carry around 1,000 passengers. With removal of the suites, there will be room for dozens more.
Trains on the Shanghai-Beijing route will travel at speeds of up to 300 kilometers per hour instead of the previously planned 350km per hour for safety reasons and to reduce costs.
The 1,318-kilometer journey will take five hours.
Meanwhile a two-month crackdown on the production, processing, storage and sale of hazardous products within 200 meters of the track and stations is set to begin soon.
The news came after the first phase of month-long trial runs on the route had been carried out, according to Legal Evening News over the weekend. Some luxury seats, similar to those on passenger planes, will remain in business-class carriages, the reports said.
The rail link is due to be in service by the end of June.
On May 11, when the trial runs began, carriages believed to contain VIP facilities had their curtains drawn at Shanghai's Hongqiao Railway Station, preventing reporters from seeing inside.
The planned VIP suites had attracted heavy criticism from passengers complaining about high ticket prices and the difficulty of buying even standing tickets during the annual Spring Festival rush.
Such luxury suites, charging more than 2,000 yuan (US$308) a ticket, appeared on bullet trains between Shanghai and cities in Sichuan Province in January. The suites did not prove popular.
Railway expert Sun Zhang, a professor at Shanghai's Tongji University, praised the removal of the suites as "giving more choice to the ordinary passengers."
The bullet trains are built to carry around 1,000 passengers. With removal of the suites, there will be room for dozens more.
Trains on the Shanghai-Beijing route will travel at speeds of up to 300 kilometers per hour instead of the previously planned 350km per hour for safety reasons and to reduce costs.
The 1,318-kilometer journey will take five hours.
Meanwhile a two-month crackdown on the production, processing, storage and sale of hazardous products within 200 meters of the track and stations is set to begin soon.
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