Guangzhou–Shenzhen railway

Guangshen railway or Guangzhou–Shenzhen railway, also known as the Chinese section of the Kowloon–Canton railway in 1911–1949, is a railway in Guangdong province in the People's Republic of China, between Guangzhou and Shenzhen. It is operated by Guangshen Railway Co., Ltd., a publicly traded company.

With a length of 147 km, it was the first railway in the People's Republic of China to reach the speed of 220 km/h in some sections, though it is limited to about 180 km/h during commercial operation. Now it has four tracks between Guangzhou East and Shenzhen railway station. Line 1 and 2 are up-direction and down-direction 200 km/h (currently restricted to 180 km/h in operation) passenger lines for CRH EMU respectively, and Lines 3 and 4 are up-direction and down-direction 160 km/h (currently restricted to 140 km/h in operation) mixed passenger and freight line respectively. In order to reduce the interference to passenger trains in the daytime from lower-speed freight trains, most freight trains will be scheduled to run at night.

Guangshen railway connects with several other important railways to different directions. It links Jingguang railway and Guangmao railway in Guangzhou, Jingjiu railway in Dongguan (with which shares two regular speed track), and the East Rail line to Hong Kong at the southern end of the railway. Besides, there are some branch lines along Guangshen Railway, such as Pingyan railway to Yantian Port, Pingnan railway to Shenzhen West railway station and also the line to Huangbu Port.

Before the manifestation of COVID-19 pandemic in January 2020, traditional "Z-class" border-crossing services via the whole or part of the Guangshen Railway, serving Hong Kong and mainland destinations including Changping, Guangzhou East, Foshan and Zhaoqing, as well as to Beijing West and Shanghai, were available. However, the above-mentioned cross-border services were suspended since the on set of COVID-19 pandemic.

Starting 15 January 2023, train services between Hong Kong West Kowloon Railway Station and Guangzhou East Railway Station are available, at which Guangzhou-Shenzhen Railway is part of the route.

History
The idea of constructing a railway linking Canton (now Guangzhou) and Kowloon in Hong Kong, a British crown colony germinated in the late Qing dynasty. In 1899, Britain and the Qing government agreed to construct the KCR British Section, but Britain postponed the construction as Britain was busy at the Second Boer War in Africa. In 1907, Qing government and Britain formally signed an agreement in Peking on issuing a £100-million bond as part of loan for the construction of the Chinese section of the Kowloon–Canton railway. In July 1907, construction of the British Section of the KCR began. The construction of Chinese section was delayed and only started in 1909. Under the loan contract, China needed to employ the British engineers for the construction of Chinese section, but China still employed famous Chinese railway engineer, Zhan Tianyou, as a consultant. On 8 October 1911, the Chinese section of KCR with total length of 142.77 km was opened. The northern end of railway at that time was located in Dashatou, Guangzhou, was demolished in 1951. The through train service between Kowloon and Guangzhou also started to operate at the same time.

After the establishment of People's Republic of China in October 1949, the 'Chinese section of the Canton–Kowloon railway' was renamed 'Guangshen railway', and repairs were made to sections of the railroad damaged during the war. In 1967, railway department carried out a comprehensive maintenance on Guangshen railway to improve the transport capacity. Beginning in the 1980s economic reform policies of China, the establishment of Shenzhen Special Economic Zone and rapid economic development in the Pearl River Delta region has brought large volume of imported goods and increased passenger demand to the railway. Therefore, the second line of Guangshen Railway was constructed during 1984 to 1987 in order to meet the huge demand. Simultaneously Guangshen Railway Company (the predecessor of Guangshen Railway Company), which was directly subordinated to the Guangzhou Railway Bureau (now Guangzhou Railway Group), was established. This company was in charge of the construction projects and operational management of Guangshen Railway. In 1987, Guangshen railway became the first double-track railway in Guangdong province.

Guangshen railway is the first place in China to carry out successfully speed-up on the existing railroad. At the beginning of the 1990s, Guangzhou Railway Bureau and the Ministry of Railways carried out the pre-feasibility research about raising the maximum speed of passenger trains to 160 km/h. At 28 December 1991, the construction of the third line of Guangshen railway, and the speed-up improvement works of original double tracks started. In October 1994, the maximum speed of a train reached 174 km/h during the test. The first sub-high speed (160 km/h) passenger train in China started commercial operation at 22 December 1994, operating between Guangzhou and Shenzhen. In 1998 the electrification of two sub-high speed lines of Guangshen railway was finished. After the improvement the 200 km/h high speed trains are allowed to run on the existing sub-high speed railroad. A Swedish-built X 2000 tilting train called 'Xinshisu' began to serve intercity train service between Guangzhou and Shenzhen, as well as the through train to Hong Kong. The train are 165m long, consisting of a power car, five passenger cars, and a trailing car. The non-power cars can have a pitch of up to 8 degrees. They are noted for being very quiet (less than 65 dBA) even at 200 km/h. Such Swedish X 2000 trains allowed the line to reach 200 km/h (124 mph) and 220 km/h (137 mph) in some sections of the Guangshen line.

Construction of the fourth track was commenced at 31 December 2005, and was finished at 18 April 2007 in time for the Sixth Speed-Up Campaign. Since then Guangshen railway has been the first four-track railway in mainland China and it allows passenger trains and freight trains to run on separate lines. As of 2007, intercity train service between Guangzhou and Shenzhen uses 8-car CRH1A highspeed EMU. There were 100 pairs of trains operated daily. The fastest journey time was 52 minutes between Guangzhou East and Shenzhen with no stop in-between. Train numbers D7002 and D7008 had been used for such direct service.

Regularly operating "C-prefix" trains


Regularly operating service between Guangzhou and Shenzhen uses 8-car CRH1A EMU or CRH6A EMU. Currently train numbers with prefix "C" are in use.

In Shenzhen, these trains regularly uses Shenzhen railway station.

At Guangzhou side, all trains serve Guangzhou East railway station, and within the Guangshen line a few number of trains also serve Guangzhou railway station, mostly in a manner as an intermediate stopping before terminating at Guangzhou Baiyun railway station which is located at short distance beyond the Guangshen line.



"Demand-relief" trips
Temporally added trips for the Guangzhou-Dongguan-Shenzhen service may be numbered with prefix "Z", "C" or "D", using Shenzhen railway station or Shenzhen East railway station as the terminal station. It is possible that CR200J trains are deployed to the temporally added trips.

The emergence of "D-class" trip using CR200J trains in Shenzhen railway station begins in December 2019 serving regular long-distance trains numbered D727、D728 for Beijing West while this service actually runs mainly along the Beijing-Kowloon railway which starts its multiplexes with Guangshen line in Dongguan City, meaning that the initial manifestation of CR200J trains along Guangshen line was just confined within a limited distance.

For the use of CR200J trains travelling longer distance of GuangShen line for demand-relief purpose, one noteworthy example is, to start with, an internet media reported that a temporally added service was available at September 29, 30 and October 2,3,5,6 of year 2023, mentioning a pair of train service numbered D7495、D7496 although that was a cross-line traffic between Changsha railway station and Shenzhen East railway station for demand relief.



Shorter "intercity" service between Shenzhen East railway station and Guangzhou East railway station also exists, although in a rare, temporally manner and not on a regular basis. For the example in relation to the above-mentioned D7496 service in year 2023, to start with, Guangzhou Railway Group maintains serveral Sina Weibo accounts officially where latest information about status of available tickets up-to-date, in particular for the days within peak demand period, may be posted. Previous posts in the Guangzhou Railway Group's official Weibo channels show that service between Shenzhen East railway station and Guangzhou East railway station was provided with available ticket on-sale among at least some, if not all, of the days that the above-mentioned D7495、D7496 trips were in service in year 2023.







Examples of temporally added "D-class" service between Guangzhou city and Shenzhen city during peak-demand holidays, at which written notice has been announced via the |Official website of China Railway beforehand, include the added service during "Spring Festival Travel Rush" (or named as "chunyun") in year 2024 numbered D9785-D9786 serving between Shenzhen East railway station and Guangzhou East railway station, and D9791-D9796 serving between Guangzhou East railway station and Shenzhen railway station.



Stations with services
Most of the existing stations on the line are abandoned for passenger service, while reopening of a previously abandoned station after reconstruction or refurbishment can occur. Examples include Pinghu in year 2016 and Xintang in year 2024.

As at year 2024, major stations on the line offering passengers service are, in order:

Service heading to Guangzhou Baiyun Railway Station


As mentioned in the Stations list in the "Stations" section in above, a few number of departures, using CRH trains, provide service to Guangzhou railway station. Starting year 2024, the coverage of above-mentioned service is further extended to Guangzhou Baiyun Railway Station as the terminal station, located at a short distance beyond the Guang-shen line.

Service heading to Hong Kong West Kowloon Railway Station
This service uses Guangzhou–Shenzhen railway and Ganzhou-Shenzhen High-speed railway to Shenzhen North direction and provides service between Guangzhou East railway station and Hong Kong West Kowloon Railway Station.

Service heading to other mainland cities
For traffic heading to other cities, there are services of EMUs using Guangzhou–Shenzhen railway as part of the route.

The completion of upgrading work in year 2020 makes the whole Guangshen line to be compatible with CTCS-2, as a result more EMUs from nationwide railway network can enter Guangshen line, and use Shenzhen railway station, Guangzhou East railway station or Guangzhou railway station as terminal station. Thus, more cross-line traffic and also more variety of types of EMUs becomes available along the Guangzhou–Shenzhen railway.

On the otherhand, the construction of the Guangzhou-Zhanjiang High-speed Railway results in a disruption of some of the cross-line traffic, as trains of China Railway coming from Foshan city will not enter and leave the Guangzhou Railway Station starting from 11 October 2023.

Service heading towards Chaoshan or Fujian direction


Daily trains are offered between Guangzhou East Railway Station and Chaoshan Railway Station, a few of them will continue to Shantou Railway Station; in addition, starting from 1 July 2018, one departure serving the Guangzhou East to Chaoshan service will continue to Xiamen.

Since not later than 26 June 2021, more EMU trains are available for service between Xiamen (or Xiamen North Station) and Guangzhou, at which two of them (using Xiamen North Station at the time of writing in June 2023) will continue to Nanning East Station. CRH2A EMU trains are in use for service between Xiamen North and Nanning. However, with effective from 11 October 2023 the captioned trains, formerly from Fujian heading to Guangxi province, are shorten to serve only between Fujian province and Guangzhou city.





Starting January 2024, newly added service using CRH380A EMU running between Guangzhou East railway station and Longyan railway station becomes available.

Service heading towards Zhejiang or Jiangsu Province direction
Starting 11 October 2022, a pair of EMU train service between Guangzhou East railway station and Hangzhou East railway station numbered D3121/4 and D3122/3 with a stop at Shenzhen North railway station becomes available that CRH1E trains are in use.

Service heading towards Ganzhou direction
Train departures are available between Guangzhou East station and Ganzhou West railway station.

Between 15 January 2022 to 9 January 2024, a pair of departures is available using CRH380A EMU trains, at which train G2775/G2778 departs from Guangzhou East station exists, and train G2777/G2776 departs from Ganzhou West station, as at June 2023 this service serves Dongguan railway station as well; in addition, another pair for the Guangzhou East to Ganzhou West service was added since 11 October 2022, with train number D1695/D1698 and D1697/D1696, at which CRH1E-250 train is in use as at June 2023.



Starting from 10 January 2024, the above-mentioned service was suspended, and the newly added service for cross-line traffic between Guangzhou East station and Ganzhou West railway station heading to JiangXi Province direction takes Guangzhou–Shanwei HSR to Ganzhou–Shenzhen HSR instead thus the new service no longer serves Dongguan railway station.

Service heading west from Guangzhou
A disruption of this cross-line traffic, starting 11 October 2023, occurs because of the construction of the Guangzhou-Zhanjiang High-speed Railway.

Starting 10 July 2019 to 10 October 2023, there was a daily service between Shenzhen Railway Station and Huaiji Railway Station on Guiyang-Guangzhou HSR, which is the first utilizing the whole Guangzhou-Shenzhen line in full as part of the route; however, according to the new railway timetable effective from 11 October 2023, such direct train service no longer exist.



China Railway Nanning Group's EMU trains running on the whole Guangzhou-Shenzhen line used to be exist that, since not later than year 2023 such EMU train service was previously available between Shenzhen railway station (the one in Luohu district near the Hong Kong border) and Liuzhou via Guangzhou, which was numbered D3665/D3666; however, with effective from 11 October 2023, train number D3665/D3666 no longer serves Shenzhen and Dongguan, and this pair of train serves Zhuhai and Zhongshan instead.