Abstract
China has proposed an ambitious high-speed rail (HSR) program by 2030 to connect all provincial capitals (excluding Lhasa) and large cities with more than half million people. Little attention has been paid to evaluate its potential impacts on ground transportation accessibility. To answer this question, we adopted a door-to-door approach to calculate two indicators: the weighted average travel time and daily accessibility. The results show that the HSR network follows the same spatial patterns of population size and regional development, thus preferentially serving eastern China. The two accessibility indicators suggest that the large-scale construction of HSR network by 2030 will substantially improve accessibility and alter the spatial disparities of accessibility. On average, accessibility of all cities will increase by 61.7%. Geographically, cities with higher accessibility are located in the quadrilateral area of ‘Wuhan-Zhengzhou-Jinan-Nanjing’ on the southeastern section of the ‘Hu Line.’ While the least accessible cities are distributed in peripheral areas. Although the HSR development can benefit accessibility throughout the country, the disparities of accessibility would widen slightly among regions, provinces and cities.
Highlights
Compared with other forms of ground transportation, the new high-speed rail (HSR) can reduce journey time, offer a higher level of safety and comfort, and lower costs for passengers [1,2]
The coefficient of variation (CV) value of WATT between provinces increases from 41.7% to 50.6% during the first stage of the HSR network development and the disparity will be further aggravated with the future HSR network extension in the second period (53.9%)
The most accessible cities are located in the center and eastern regions of China, in the quadrilateral area of ‘Wuhan-Zhengzhou-Jinan-Nanjing,’ while the least accessible cities are distributed in peripheral areas
Summary
Compared with other forms of ground transportation (e.g., bus, car and conventional rail), the new high-speed rail (HSR) can reduce journey time, offer a higher level of safety and comfort, and lower costs for passengers [1,2]. HSR is considered a better alternative to air transportation for short trips (150–800 km), when people take into account urban traffic congestion and potential flight delays [3]. Because of these advantages, HSR lines has been growing fast across the world in recent decades [4,5] (Figure 1). The country has proposed an ambitious HSR program by 2030 to link all provincial capitals (excluding Lhasa) and cities with more than half million people [7] (Figure 2). The expansion of HSR network would inevitably contract time-space of the country, and alter the spatial pattern (disparities) of regional accessibility [8,9]
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