A worker cleans the head of a train that connects Beijing and Tianjin. [Ma Chao / China Daily]
Two years ago, on Aug 1, shiny bullet trains began to rocket like streaks of lightning between Beijing and Tianjin.The train, with a maximum speed of 350 kilometers per hour, reduced the traveling time between the megacities - from 75 minutes to merely half a hour.
Now, every day around 50,000 passengers travel on the Beijing-Tianjin Intercity Railway.
While many are occasional passengers, there are many who, like red blood cells in an artery, regularly ride the train between the two economic and cultural hubs of northern China.
Zhang Zhimai, 68, is a native of Beijing but he has lived and worked in Tianjin for decades. As a senior engineer with the Tianjin Research Institute of Construction Machinery, he is a regular passenger on the bullet train and makes business trips between Beijing and Tianjin at least once a week.
When METRO met Zhang in the first-class carriage, he was not making a business trip but traveling with his granddaughter. In addition to business trips, he frequently takes the train to visit relatives in the capital.
Zhang could not conceal his satisfaction with the speed, environment and service of the trains. Because he is an elderly man, he said the attendants usually offer him particularly good care.
"The service is brilliant," he said. "When I get on the train, the attendants often come to me and ask me whether I need help."
Zhang's satisfaction was common among passengers.
More than 10 Chinese and foreign passengers on the bullet train interviewed by METRO said they were impressed with the speed, environment and service provided.
While occasional passengers were largely awed by the lightning speed of the trains, regular commuters were not so impressed, complaining that they still have to spend a lot of time getting from the train stations at either end to their ultimate destinations.
Xu, an environmental technology engineer, lives in Beijing and travels two or three times a week from his home to his company located in Tianjin. While he takes a taxi from his home in Chaoyangmen, Dongcheng district, to the Beijing South Railway Station, it usually still takes him at least half a hour to get to the train.
When traffic is congested, which is a common, the journey takes between 40 minutes and an hour.
When he gets off the bullet train in Tianjin, he is met by a car sent by his company and he spends another 40 minutes or more getting to his workplace.
Despite the bullet train, he says he is still spending more than two hours on his commute, usually leaving home at 7 am and getting back home at 8 pm.
Compared with many other passengers, however, Xu is lucky.
Jiang, a young lady in the medical appliances trade, travels once a week from her home in Beijing to Tianjin to meet clients. Every time, she has to spend a hour traveling to the Beijing South Railway Station and another hour after she gets off the train at Tianjin Railway Station. She says the total travel time is two and half hours to three hours.
"If I commuted every day, I would be very tired," she said.
In addition to wishing the congested cities at either end of the fast train were less gridlocked, passengers said they would also like to see the bullet train lower its prices for regular commuters.
A second-class single ticket costs 58 yuan one-way, while a ticket on a slower train would cost only around 20 yuan and an intercity coach ticket 35.
But while regular commuters would like to see the price to ride the bullet train lowered, occasional passengers thought it was good value for money.
"We think the price is OK," said a middle-aged couple who had taken the train four times.
Even though Xu's company pays for his ticket, he told METRO the price "is too high for ordinary people to accept".
Jiang agreed. Like Xu, her company reimburses her tickets. But "the price is too high if I pay for the tickets out of my own pocket", she said.
If a passenger commutes every day on the bullet trains, it would cost around 2,500 yuan a month (if there were 22 working days in a month). The expenditure would be enough to rent a two-bedroom apartment near the Beijing South Railway station.
In spite of the relatively high ticket price, the railway made a loss of 700 million yuan (around $103 million) between Aug 1, 2008, and Sept 30, 2009. A loss is also expected for the second year.
Two years ago, the intercity railway was hailed as a milestone to integrate the two major cities. Two years later, however, even though the train has brought a great deal of convenience to passengers, it has not made everyone happy and has certainly not made a profit.
