Hot take: Japan invented the bullet train, but China perfected it.
@HiddenLayer555 @dessalines There isn’t much lacking in the Japanese network.
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Now they are tunneling below the Japanese Alps to build a maglev connecting Tokyo to Osaka, the Tokaido Shinkansen is at capacity running 17 trains an hour during rush hours.
If perfected means they put it even where probably there wasn’t a need for it, then yes. HSR is fantastic for connecting big cities, but it’s also very expensive and sometimes China has prioritized HSR rather than regular rail, even though there wasn’t a strict need for very fast expensive trains. Sometimes slower, more frequent and cheaper low speed rail can make more sense.
It’s not bad per se, but it’s money that could be used for better purposes.
Counterpoint: HSR is far more energy efficient than air travel, which would otherwise be the preferred option because regular trains are just not fast enough for country as big as China. Even when the electricity is generated from coal, the simple physics of not needing to literally defy gravity significantly reduces the carbon footprint of the trip.
Bloody hell, Dessalines posted
Cries in HS2
Fuck the CCP
Have the new rail lines reduced automobile traffic? Or are they adding lines in anticipation of future traffic?
The PRC doesn’t have an already-built-up car-focused infrastructure like the US does for example, so they get to do it right from scratch. It becomes very difficult to get rid of that once it’s built, so its best to do it right from the start.
They’re trying to account for current and future needs for city-to-city travel.
They also have and still invest in decarbonizing with electric vehicles with battery swaps as well
Pure speculation on my part: The average Chinese citizen now has a higher standard of living, so the need for mobility increases. So you’ll have both more car owners and the need for railways, which do help reduce the need for cars, but also don’t fully overlap in use cases. You aren’t just going from people swapping their car for railways, but also giving many people that had no car to start with the option to choose between getting one or using trains for their travels. Which is good, but in absolute numbers you’d still see more cars.
Similar to how China is adding both a massive amount of renewable energy and at the same time still building coal power plants, simply because the overall need for energy is still growing.
Wbat’s saddest of all is that the US is a one-party state in all the worst ways and a democracy in many of the wrong ways.
Love trains
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70% of Chinese Millennials are homeowners
@Alsephina @Juice Isn’t their bigger problem having too many unfinished apartments? Many more than are needed.
(And are those rates including those who own apartments that will never be completed?)
It’s true there’s a lot of unfinished apartments, and imo it’s true that’s a big problem (or a symptom of a larger issue). But I don’t think it’s unfinished apartments are a bigger problem than lack of home ownership in the West
@OsrsNeedsF2P I meant a bigger problem in China
Nobody can buy land in china, it is only leased from the government for up to 70 years for residential usage (less for other purposes). Calling the tofu-dreg building on top of this “owning a home” is disingenuous at best and deceitful at worst. Why do people buy homes anyway instead of renting? Because all other options to invest are even worse and it is literally their only option.
I hope you don’t tolerate how mega corps “sell” you shit like digital media or IoT devices only to later change the terms of sale and steal it back from you, because you never really owned it. Don’t tolerate the same shit if a government does it to you.
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Let’s not pertend that this is because China has socialized housing. They used to do decades ago, but abolished for a long time.
In fact, China has one of the highest home price to income ratio (ratio of median apartment prices to median familial disposable income, expressed as years of income) in the world: https://www.numbeo.com/property-investment/rankings_by_country.jsp . Chinese people will need 30 years of disposible income to purchase an apartment; compare to 3 in the U.S., 7 in neterland, 11 in France, and 9 in U.K.
The high home ownership rate is likely due to 1. false report, 2. saving culture. In China parents typically have a good amount of saving to provide child a home upon their marriage etc. even though apartments in Beijing can easily cost double than a major U.S. city, and people in Beijing probably earn half as much.
Also a housing bubble and real estate being one of the few investment vehicles available to regular chinese.
Chinese people will need 30 years of disposible income to purchase an apartment; compare to 3 in the U.S.
Who can afford a condo with 3 years disposable income in the US? My spouse and I make above average money in a below average cost city and we couldn’t afford a condo here.
I think the definition of “disposable income” likely means the wage that reaches your bank account, i.e. wage - 401k, insurance etc.
In major city, this ratio is likely higher, but certainly no where near 30, but this data includes all of U.S. including rural areas with crazy cheap housing.
In fact, it is quite easy to get more “realistic” statistics just by looking up the median wage and housing price in Boston, New York, Seattle, LA etc. v.s. Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen etc.
If you are so eager to defend an authoritarian government, I believe it is better to present statistics with source, instead of just resort to your experience.
likely means the wage that reaches your bank account, i.e. wage - 401k, insurance etc
Well ain’t that a shit definition then
What statistics will you use? use wage - CPI? No matter what you use, I listed the Beijing median income, and beijing housing price. Unless you think making $10 per hour can somehow buy a 700k apartment, grabbing on the precise definition of one statistics doesn’t seem helpful to this discussion.
And you cannot deny the situation in the U.S. is not better than needing to buy 700k apartment with $10 wages.
Honestly, I am quite surprised how low tankies are willing to go to defend China. As a Chinese, it is very disheartening to me that people have never experienced or seen the suffering of living under an authoritarian government, are more willing to blindly defend it, than having a intellectual discussion.
Honestly, I am quite surprised how low tankies are willing to go to defend China. As a Chinese, it is very disheartening to me that people have never experienced or seen the suffering of living under an authoritarian government, are more willing to blindly defend it, than having a intellectual discussion.
Compare the prison population of the US to China’s lol.
It is hard to imagine that an adult talks like this. People points out most Chinese own homes, as if it is some policies that the west can learn from. I pointed out the stats that proved it is more about culture than China’s housing market.
Yet you are here just side stepping every way, accusing unrelated stuff, just to defend the CCP. I used to think tankies are just misinformed, but you have proved that you are simply vile and unwilling to accept.
It is totally okay with me that there are evil people that are unwilling to accept adult discussions; I just feel dishearten about other people misled by your propaganda, simply because they, in their good nature, decides to trust your posts and comments.
There is no point in continuing this discussion, since you clearly are not in good faith. See you in my block list. Bye.
Honestly, I am quite surprised how low tankies are willing to go to defend China. As a Chinese, it is very disheartening to me that people have never experienced or seen the suffering of living under an authoritarian government, are more willing to blindly defend it
There are literally some “tankies” on hexbear that are in China and posting from China right now. @[email protected]. There are some users here who are Chinese and grew up there (not sure if they’d want to be tagged though). There are journalists who decided to go live there in part because of how much more freedom they are afforded there, people like Ben Norton, who you would probably also label a “tankie.” All of whom can attest to how baseless and sinophobic all the fabricated “suffering of living under an authoritarian government” stories really are. We aren’t all just clueless westerners, but your assumption that we are is also telling.
I’m eating breakfast in Chengdu. I’m so oppressed right now.
There are certainly different people with different preferences, and most Chinese people are indeed fine with CCP. A dictatorship has an obvious need to maintain many nationalist, so it is not surprising that you can find Chinese who loves CCP.
Many people are more than willing to turn a blind eye on all the artists, journalist, and lawyer, who were arrested, since it has nothing to do when them. This is a emotional topics for me, because one of my highschool classmate has been seperated from her father, for he was advocating more transparent laws and enforcement.
There are plenty of Chinese mastodon instance, like https://douchi.space/explore, https://mstdn.moe/about, https://m.cmx.im/explore. Go there talk to them and see what they think.
Of course, you don’t need to believe me, or people on mastodon, or journalist from all “mainstream media”; and just trust people on hexbear. But that will likely be no different from people who only believe fox news and infowars.
Has any of this actually been built? Everybody’s got “plans.”
Elon Musk “plans” to build colonies on Mars.
Yes, this is the built status.
Yes, this is a map of what was completed in 2018. China isn’t the US, they don’t give billions of dollars of public funds to grifters like Elon Musk, they actually build things.
As an example, China used more concrete for building projects from the years 2011-2013, than the US used in the entire 20th century.
China has built entire ghost cities, bridges, subways and malls using Tofu Dreg construction. So yes, that is technically correct. China does indeed “build things.”
Actually planning for the future if something the US can’t even fathom doing. Remember this fearmongering article from the daily mail about a “ghost” subway station in Chongqing?
Here it is now:
Western countries look at China building a city where no people are, and see waste, when in reality its just the PRC properly planning and building cities, anticipating housing and infrastructure, before they need them.
Meanwhile the US doesn’t do anything beforehand and cities become a sprawling suburb, car-centered wasteland. They let private capital seeking short-term profits build their cities.
My general opinion on China over the past few years have evolved to “OK they aren’t perfect, but at least they seem to be trying, instead of actively making everything worse.”
I’ve lived inside the western propagandasphere most of my life, and I’m always surprised at how obscenely xenophobic and dishonest it is. To the point of being an inversion of reality.
I’m embarrassed to admit it, but I held on to many of these “china bad” media narratives and was reluctant to let go of them when confronted with reality. I can say now how wrong I was and irresponsible it was for me to perpetuate that bullshit. I won’t excuse my old attitudes, but I do recognize that I didn’t invent them either; I just sort of absorbed them.
The closer I look at China, the more my opinion improves. Especially with regard to geopolitics, the Belt and Road Initiative, BRICS, renewable energy and infrastructure building. It’s a success story of the process of socialism; they are effectively constraining and directing capital to improve material conditions for the working class. Planning society to meet the needs of its populations works. Building peaceful and productive partnerships around the world works. Of course nothing is perfect and any rapidly industrialized society comes with growing pains, esp given China’s own historical context, but I’ve come to regard China as close to as a model society for our point in time in many ways. And yep… I’ve also been guilty of having stupid ultra-left “iT’S NoT ReaL ComMuNiSm” takes too. I honestly wish I had been raised with a Marxist education in my early life so I could have found a sane way to understand the world much sooner.
As the empire collapses, I think it’s becoming clear to more people that the western media narrative is a bandage over the rotting wound of capitalism; ignoring its own decay and falsely demanding that we believe everywhere else must be somehow worse.
This is 6 years ago. Is there a more recent map?
Yes
May we see it?
No
:(
For a more detailed view at all rail infrastructure the transport layer on osm is nice: https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=7/29.845/113.676&layers=T
All the dark black lines should be train lines. This shows all types tho, not just the high speed ones. But honestly for general commercial and social prosperity, the regional lines are probably more important than the high speed long distance ones. If you go over to Europe while using this layer, it will get very dense.
Edit: this ones is a bit more nuanced http://cnrail.geogv.org/enus/about
Im a fan of high speed rail as much as anyone but a lot of this network has been built with massive debts and for a lot lines, no immediate commercial viability. Not a million miles away from Victorian railway companies in London building lines for, hoped for, future demand. I hope it works out, but there is for sure a risk of it becoming a millstone.
built with massive debts for a lot lines, no immediate commercial viability.
The Chinese state owns the whole system, and state debt isn’t what you think it is. This is not a commercial system, so “commercial viability” is irrelevant.
@davel @elgordino True. However, many stations are ghost stations, that only got built because a provincial official got their hands on the money from Beijing. Also much of critical construction is already in a bad and unsafe state, only shortly after opening. This means that on many stretches top speeds cannot be maintained or they can’t even be used at all. Much construction is of “tofu dreg” quality and is crumbling already.
“Ghost stations” are bullshit[1][2], and “tofu dreg quality” is bullshit running on the fumes of 1980s Chinese manufacturing (and is racist). Where do our iPhones and other smart phones and our laptops come from? What country’s lunar lander just returned from far side of the moon? People need to get their heads out of their asses.
@davel LOL
@davel @elgordino the viability is: how do we let people move around the country, what is the cheapest way.
This is cheap.
It’s also cheap everywhere else.
And by cheap I mean cheaper than alternatives.
It’s cheaper than just one more lane, bro. one more lane will fix it, bro, i swear.
It’s also cheaper than flying, in terms of climate change.
@davel comedy mode: one more track, you wont believe how many more people can use just one more track ;)
@davel Air travel is also demanding on:
* Road infrastructure for the airport, trains deliver people closer to where they want in the first place and the connect better to the rest of the PT system.
* Land use. Airports are huge.
* Airports also cost a lot, factoring them into the price of moving people around is important, frequently this is paid for the state.
* Noisy in ways that just can’t be mitigated.It really isn’t a good option.
has been built with massive debts
While they have been financed it has not resulted in substantial long term debts.
no immediate commercial viability
Lmao. This is public infrastructure not a business grift.
When the private sector is in charge of things like this they do it worse and at higher expense btw.
Not a million miles away from Victorian railway companies in London building lines for, hoped for, future demand.
Very different, actually.
I hope it works out, but there is for sure a risk of it becoming a millstone.
I’m sure the Redditor that thinks public infrastructure needs commercial viability has plenty of useful lectures for the Chinese state on how to drive production and transportation.
Why does public infrastructure need to be commercially viable? There’s plenty of good reasons for people to need to travel aside from engaging in commerce.
The justification should go the other way round; infrastructure is for public use, and commercial entities ought to be taxed extra for utilizing public resources.
They always forget in their arguments too, that being able to move people around is better economically for the whole country rather than businesses or the state trying to profit off people buying train tickets.
Thats one of the best and safest investment any country could make. Rail will not become useless anytime soon. I would be more concerned about construction working conditions.
Making a profit off of public services is not one of the PRC’s goals.
Is the US interstate highway system commercially viable? It seems to lose money constantly.
As someone who loves trains I find this truly impressive and I wish my country cared half as much about trains as China does
China’s population density in its eastern half is an order of magnitude higher than pretty much every country, which really changes the transportation calculation. It’d be impossible for them to build enough roads to effectively transport their population around the country
you could force everyone to drive. itd be terrible, but that hasnt stopped cities like LA (a more population dense city) from doing what theyre doing.
LA is the second biggest city in the US and it’d be like 15th biggest in China. Los Angeles is also the 308th most dense city in the continental US, and not even on the radar internationally for density
You don’t even need that many people before cars become impractical.
You don’t need many to become impractical. But you need China levels for it to become geometrically impossible.
Amazing what a nation can do with slave labor
Do you think the PRC has high speed rail because of “slave labor?” What on Earth are you talking about?
Do you know which country built its railways by actual Chinese slave labour? USA.
For some reason it is always projection, even in such a completely unlikely case as this one.
Then the states should have a huge high speed rail system, since we have the largest available slave population in the world.
That doesn’t seem to be stopping them from buying cars on mass. Just saying.
China has 0.17 private vehicles per capita compared to the US 0.81 cars per person. So basically I’m calling your comment BS.
when you have 1.5 billion people vs 330 million you’re bound to have some cars. better to look at cars per capita to get an idea of how many people are actually driving
