in connecticut they do the most road repair late in election years. people are impacted by the roads being dug up but the government gets to show how hard they work for us but just for those 10 months every 2 years. politicians....
@@althomas6045 you reminded this my India. Near election every politician starts visiting and ever work gets started but never completed after elections
I was in Chengdu on Chinese new year 2010 and couldn't believe that such a huge city has no metro and we always have to take the bus. I just checked the map and boy things have changed.
Obviously, there are China-specific reasons, but the whole "we said it would be open in 2022, so we'll rush a bit to make sure it opens in December" thing is fairly common worldwide. Dhaka and Lagos both opened metros in December for this exact reason. It was also when the new Grand Central Madison in my city (NYC) almost opened, before meeting a few last-minute delays.
China itself is also kinda "continent-sized" with twice the population of Europe and their industrialization and modernization also came later. Just to add additional information. Probably we might see the same extent of development of transit lines in India sooner or later.
The Spring Festival in China is a very important festival for the vast majority of Chinese people. Many Chinese people have been busy working abroad for a year, and the Spring Festival is the time for them to go home and reunite. This will lead to hundreds of millions of Chinese traveling between north and south of China, from their workplaces to their hometowns. Therefore, the Spring Festival will lead to an extremely large passenger flow. (The Spring Festical = Chinese New Year)
IIRC, roughly 200 million Chinese citizens (1 in 7 people) travel for CNY. I personally think that estimate is on the low end of the estimates. With Zero COVID policies being lifted, I really wouldn't be surprised if 300 million people travelled for CNY within China.
Finally! I love how China is designing their cities. I constantly follow Walk East on RUclips and they really are living in the future. Would love to see more coverage because I feel like it goes unnoticed.
Their designed pretty well, but there is room for improvement. I think we need to step down from the idea that every house entry should face a street for example. Like having a pedestrian walk between a row blocks. You could potentially connect a city with streets AND pedestrian walks and use neighborhood and large plazas as central nodes. But i agree; Chinas new CBDs are dope.
Chinese cities should start building fast metro like RER in Paris. It is extremely inefficient to commute from suburbs to the other side of the city when Metro stops at every station.
@@dt8101To some extent building most section underground is not a very future proof concept as it prevents adding overtaking lines or infill stations in the future.
In Europe most of the transit lines also open in December (in 2022 on the 11th to be precise) because that's when the new international timetable goes into action. Like Line 20 between Zurich Altstetten and Killwangen-Spreitenbach that opened in 2022.
@@MTobias to national rail it applies certainly more strictly as for connection and track availability but on urban transit it also does very often at least in Switzerland certainly also because of the integrated time scheduling. Sometimes there are changes throughout the year with a special timetable but if you were to put it statistically I would bet december is the month where you'd see a spike compared to any other month in many other countries than China.
@@MTobias It does still affect urban rail as thats when all the buses also get their timetables updated, and since many of those also correspond to national rail, that means that its when the bus restructuring of bus networks happen either way. Though typically any new rapid transit like a metro line or light rail, will open a few weeks or a month before that so there's kind of a transition period where people can get used to the new transit option before the network around it is changed.
So, when stuff gets done that can be integrated without further changes to the network, they can be done anytime, but if other parts of the network need to be changed, then it'll be in December
May I propose a transit battle: Singapore MRT v Hong Kong MTR video? With both cities having similar histories, it'd be interesting to see how they have each evolved into the systems they are today. It might be worth taking into account stuff like interchange types and out of station transfer rules into such a video too.
@Zaydan Alfariz also... HK is more of a commuter rail turned metro than Singapore's metro first and only designs... there's very much different philosophy in the works.
@Zaydan Alfariz Singapore DID NOT have a COMMUTER rail, it has a INTRASTATE LONG DISTANCE rail. Two very different services, for one the service pre-move to woodlands is very limited, if not restrictive, by nature of the format of the rail between Woodlands Checkpoint TS and Tanjong Pagar RT, which is a single tracked, british origin alignment, much in the same way as much of the malaya's jungle railway on the mainline west coast and east coast branch. if Singapore had a "commuter rail", it would have been the precursor to the "modern" KTM alignment that we knew, the Tank Road to woodlands waterfront pre-Causeway. and therefore was axed by the colonial British authority in the 1800-ish.
Guangzhou metro got a weird habit that when they open a new line, it’s always on 28th of some month. We metro nerds call it the lucky day of Guangzhou Metro😂
Let's take a moment to appreciate Reese's efforts in pronouncing Chinese names. He didn't say them like a native speaker of Mandarin, but he did much better than your typical native English speaker! (Edited: Okay, he flubbed Beijing a bit, using the French j sound.)
yep agreed, it always seems to me like china is the big elephant in the room for youtube transit nerd channels, they build way more of everything than any other country in the world and yet everyone talks about other countries... surely there are interesting stories to be told about an HSR system that went from nothing to more than the rest of the world combined in less than 20 years for example, and lessons to learn for other developing countries. I know it's more difficult to research data and saying positive things about china gets you a lot of hate on the internet these days, but I'm always happy to see this type of content!
@@johannesgutsmiedl366 it's because everything is standardized, you're not gonna see many differences from city to city. So one or two videos explains the metros and HSR sufficiently.
There are already a plethora of Chinese videos which are beginning to cause me extreme envy and unhealthy jealousy, haha. Non-Chinese videos would be better than compounding the volume with somewhat more of the same, unless you of course come up with a unique perspective that you are creatively and proficiently able to do.
@@voongnz you could do so much more than that... talk about the history of those systems, oddities like the chongqing monorail, technical deep dives on for example the high speed rail trains (so far the only ones in the world designed to run at up to 380 km/h afaik), a look at the construction techniques that allow those insane build speeds... there's a looot to do, even though not all of it might fit this channel specifically.
@@RMTransit if you do a dedicated video, I hope you cover's Sydney's regional services. Not only those that are part of the main network, say to Newcastle, Lithgow, and Wollongong, which are regional locations, and the further diesel services.
@RogerRamjet makes sense, especially, if you use Sydney as an example, we don't really have a CBD metro. Yes there is the 'new' LR system, but outside of that it's just the HR City Circle. If we used the definition of metro you've used here, then we do only have a 'regional' service from Tallwong to Chatswood, though I think it's to be extended to the CBD eventually. Hopefully @RMTransit takes a moment to explain :)
Finally something about China! Local Nanjinger here and I have to admit theyve done amazing on the metro this year! They opened lots of suburban lines for connectivity this year like S6 and S8
The Chinese New Year period is pretty much equivalent to Christmas in western countries. Most things get shut down and it gets really quiet, with many people going back to their hometown to celebrate with their family.
Come on, there're over 40 cities in Mainland China have metros and many of them are expanding their systems and even new cities would have metros！ 1 year may not enough to ride！ 😹🙀😹
Shenzhen has opened 128km of metro in the last 3 months of 2022 (the most in one year by its history), including 4 new lines (Line 6 Branch, 12, 14, 16) and 3 huge metro hubs (Gangxia North, Huangmugang and Universiade). Gangxia North station is the most important node of 120km/h express lines in the network, connecting Line 11 (Western/Airport Express) and 14 (Eastern Express) with two regional lines (Line 2/8 and Line 10), additional with future underground connection to Gangxia station on line 1. It has a great weight on functionality and also has a very futuristic architecture design. Huangmugang and Universiade have beautiful and gigantic architecture as well. All 4 new lines are GoA4 automated
At least here in Germany but I think it kinda EU wide, many if not all transit projects open on the same day in December. The opening of a new line or service almost always corresponds with the Europe wide annual change of train-schedules.
As a December baby, I support China’s inauguration date for its metros. Had no idea about this trend in the country. With the Chinese New Year occurring Jan/Feb, I thought it would be good luck to enter the new year with new metro. Just hoping the Metro in my wife’s hometown of Ho Chi Minh gets open soon.
Do you think it will be possible for my dream girl when I was a teenager, Jane Fonda, to be invited to attend the grand opening as a distinguished guest of honor? It sure would make it extra special, don't you think?
Just back from a trip to visit my friend in Nanjing, as a Shunde, Foshan native, having a metro station at your doorstep really means a lot, it only cost me 14CNY and about 2hrs to head to Baiyun Airport in Guangzhou, which is way cheaper than a 60 yuan airport coach which I need to drag my luggage for 20minutes to the coach pick up point, not to mention I can visit my old friends in downtown Foshan without worrying missing on the last inter-region bus at 9pm. Yeah it may take some time for businesses around the stations and commuters to fully commit to less drive more metro approach, but metro service will help moving a large amount of population at driving distance and expand surrounding businesses a lot.
A note on pronounciation: the second syllable in Beijing is pronounced identically to that in Nanjing. There is a mistaken perception among some English speakers that it's somehow supposed to sound like "zhing" instead of "djing" but that is not the case.
MTR served as a huge inspiration for mainland metro systems. The “A-standard” metro trains in China are derived from MTR’s Metro-Cammell EMUs in terms of specs, and passenger wayfinding / signage systems in many mainland cities are also derived from HK (e.g. the green exit signs). MTR indeed served as consultants for many mainland metro systems in the 2000s and operates a handful of them in Beijing, Shenzhen and Hangzhou.
Not all of them, Chongqing's metro was built with the help of Japanese consultants. That's why their monorail lines use Hitachi equipment and the wayfinding style is similar to JR's.
Actually according to National Development and Reform Commission only extension projects in cities that already had metro systems can be allowed, and it is less likely to see brandnew systems in cities like Taizhou or Yiwu in the next few years (excluding light rail or commuter train service)
The end of each year is an important milestones for cities infrastructure construction, to hit the target date is critical for the local governments to have ongoing and future contraction budgets to be endorsed.
CRRC is padding its export market by building all those rapid transit lines, but it is needed, China is huge population and Canada population fits nicely in just the Pearl Delta region
Thanks Reece for another clear, concise, informative, and entertaining transit video. Big fan here. I know you will have much success in 2023 and beyond. I am glad I found your channel and see you soon reaching 200K subscribers. Early congratulations!
Having worked with many government and large business customers in the past, this seems like a no-brainer to me. Those institutions work on yearly budgets. Work spilling over into another financial budget period is a major headache when working with/for them. All too often, we have to stop work in January and wait for their new budget to be approved and for them to sign a follow-up contract for us to continue working...
A possible additional explanation: Transit ridership tends to be a bit quieter in the winter compared to the summer, mostly because winter sees less casual leisure travel. Opening new systems in December makes sense if you want to pick a time that's a bit less hectic, so that any last-second kinks can be worked out with less disruption while you scale service up.
I would love to hear your opinion about CRRC's "Autonomous Rapid Rail Transit" trackless tram systems that use LiDAR. They seem rather gadgetbahn-y IMO but also really interesting and perhaps promising as a way to reduce the cost of fixed-route transit construction - at least according to the information that CRRC has released publicly in their efforts to sell their technologies abroad. Opinions?
@@MTobias It's a bit more complex than that, they're powered through induction conduits placed under the road. They therefore can't stray too far from the power connection.
@@MTobias I don't disagree with you as a whole. Most "trackless tram" technologies have little/nothing to differentiate themselves from buses. The only reason I ask about ARRT is because it does seem at least interesting as a proof-of-concept for a sort of automated, electrified BRT with some of the accessibility advantages of rail vehicles.
@@trebuh Not really. There's nothing special about the painted lines on the road. The buses have optical sensors on them to make sure they follow the painted lines. As for the power source, the buses use supercapacitor batteries that can be charged at terminal stations.
Transportation is one part that the authoritarian top down government of China does really well. They have built by far the most high speed rail, and tons of local city metro services. It does also help that they are the most populous and one of the densest countries in the world in the east of the country though.
2022 Chinese Line openings: Jan: Chongqing; Feb: Hangzhou; Mar; Guangzhou; Apr: Hangzhou/Fuzhou/Shaoxing; May: Guangzhou; Jun: Hangzhou/Chongqing/Zhengzhou/Changsha/Kunming; Aug: Chongqing/Fuzhou/Jinhua; Sep: Hangzhou/Dalian/Nanjing/Zhengzhou (Autumn Festival/National Holiday 01 Oct are symbolically important opening times); Oct: Shenzhen; Nov: Nantong/Tianjin/Foshan/Shenzhen - then 12 openings in late December. Dates are planned throughout the year and are quite rigorous, and the symbolic nature of the calendar in Chinese culture plays a major part in opening schedules. I am afraid the emphasis on simple procrastination in this video is incorrect
Actually,those new metro lines are almost in big cities like Beijing and Shanghai and other capitals of those provinces to reduce the pressure on transportation for growing populations. The Chinese government have already come up with a policy to limit those middle ranged cities to build new subways in 2018. And turned their focus on developing suburban and cross cities rail to promote the developing of city groups eg:Shanghai-suzhou Line11.
hey are you planning on making a video on China's rolling stock standardization for both Metros and HSR? If you have already made one i am extremely sorry but i cant find one, hopefully one can direct me to it
As a Chinese myself, I can confirm that Lunar New Year is very important to almost every Chinese, some in Vietnam or other Asian countries. Having everyone visiting families from places to places, without delay of planning, railroad/metro transport is usually the way to go, unless you're going from Beijing to Hong Kong, then flying is more convenient. This is why they need metros around that time before the big rush, or it would be a massive headache for travelers.
You are fake Chinese. Real Chinese never call it Lunar New Year. We call it Chinese New Year. Chinese traditional calendar is Lunisolar calendar, NOT lunar calendar. Calling it Lunar New Year is scientifically wrong. Islam New Year is the real Lunar New Year because Islam calendar is lunar calendar.
@@dt8101 First of all, just because my background is nothing but a bus doesn't mean I'm not Chinese. In fact, both of my parents have family history from China. I was born and raised in Hong Kong before I moved to the U.S. So do not say I'm not Chinese and do not assume someone's race. Second, Chinese New Year is just another saying for Lunar New Year, and most people call it because they thought only Chinese people would celebrate this holiday. In fact, there are more countries participate this holiday including Taiwan, both Koreas, Japan, Vietnam, Japan, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei, etc. Basically places with some Kanji in their languages and people from said places will celebrate Lunar New Year, and they CLEARLY ARE NOT from China. Third, there is no real Lunar New Year for a country specifically. Lunar New Year is based on the day according to Lunar calendar's first day of the year. And Chinese traditional calendar is based on Lunar calendar and makes both New Years mostly land on the same day, if not just a couple days apart. Some people use both terms to fit the conversation setting, as Chinese New Year is specific while Lunar New Year is more general. I call it Lunar New Year here because there might be some viewers of RMTransit that are not Chinese but they celebrate Lunar New Year, and it might be awkward to say Chinese New Year. For Chinese, Lunar New Year also make sense and some of them even said Lunar instead of Chinese, or even Spring Festival. Either one of these are still correct. I hope you understand that some people call things differently, like Metro vs Subway, or High Speed Rail vs Bullet Train. Just because it is the different way than what you speak, doesn't they are not wrong. I hope this explain well to you and once again, I. AM. CHINESE.
@@JonathanChan212 首先这个视频谈论的是中国，中国人过的是春节，对应的英文是Chinese new year，而不是lunar new year，lunar是阴历对应的是月亮历，中国的是农历，农历是阴阳合历，其次什么越南东南亚地区过节，不应该是中国文化影响或者是华人带去的吗，东南亚地区还有冬至 立春这节气吗，lunar new year就是为了弱化中国文化，现在韩国都直接在前面加Korea lunar new year，还宣传lunar new year吗，是我的我维护，不是我的别硬塞我不要
Meanwhile, Beijing government failed to open Changping line extension in time (as promised). And by now, still no confirmed date. We are wondering about whether it would open in December 40th or Dec, 62nd. Beijing gov has been behaving like a student fighting against DDL, and then FAILED, and just give up. If they failed to open a line within time, then the opening date would be much postponed. From 2010, Beijing usually open new lines in last Saturday of the year. But in 2020, it's Dec 30th. In 2021, it's Dec 31st. And now, Changping line extension is still TBA. Also, Beijing has its own metro train manufacture, the BSR. Not CRRC.
Hi excellent video of yours i hope later you can make an actualization of the current subways that are going to open in this year, keep the good work cheers
Hello, thank you for your channel and producing incredibly high quality content on the field of transit. Your detailed knowledge of transit systems around the world is extraordinary.
I think Chinese metros like the September-January season, looking at the lines of the St.Petersburg of China (aka Nanjing) really liking that time( but really loving December)
Hey Reece, I just took a look at some of these lines on OpenStreetMap, like Guangzhou line 18, and from looking at their alignments they don't go through the city centers but terminate in them them. Would the model Chinese cities are using could be called highspeed and metronized commuter lines (with future plans of central city through tunnels?)
Guangzhou line 18 terminates in the city center for now. Phase 2 (under construction) will extend it northward. Line 22, which is pretty short currently, is also getting a long extension northward
Some of the Mainland China's metros 🚇 like Guangzhou had used the way as New York's did, ie, building a new rapid line with the current lines for releasing the cowardly lines.
That's good, but it's a shame that labor goes into the making of these as well as technology theft from Germany, Japan, and the US, which explains partially a small reason why the US can't build high speed rail or subways.
The High-speed metros mentioned at the beginning of the are somehow a make-up for the lack of commuter/regional rails like RER. Due to the relative late development of national rail systems, few lines passing through large cities have spare time to operate commuter trains, so instead of relying on existing rail infrastructures, cities are forced to start out brand-new systems by themselves.
I only used the old(er) metro system in Beijing back in 2019 and I still get flashbacks because it is still cleaner and more modern than the ones in most of Germany. I really really miss my time in China
Here in Toronto the 9 km Eglinton Crosstown LRT (which is half underground) which has been in construction since 2011 is delayed yet again, after nearly 12 years and 12+ billion. Wonder how long it would have taken/cost for a similar line in China.
The Chinese central gov't will set a growth target for cities and provinces to try and hit, which I think hits on some of what you said, procrastination. A metro line opened or extend in May will do the same for reaching the growth target as doing it in December, or in the other last months of the year
I did read an article last month criticizing Beijing for literally opening all the new lines and extensions since 2010 as some projectes do not need to wait until December and for other projects it would be better to wait longer. btw, Hangzhou is pretty much an exception for this rule. Last year, opening of some of the major projects took place on Feb21st, Apr 1st, Jun 10th and Sep 22nd. The metro network has been expanding quite rapidly even accoridng to Chinese standard.
Another dominant reason is local governments in China want to show their political achievement within a year. And rushing a line to open in December mean they can count that as part of their achievment for the year.
However you might feel about China’s government at least they appreciate the benefits of mass transit and see it as a source of national pride and accomplishment.
Having been to China, the metrolines and HSR really puts America to shame. But hey America has the strongest army in the world so that counts for something!
Metro Van planned expo extension to Langley for a decade and then finally under construction. Qingdao my hometown opened its first metro in 2015, now 7 lines with 12 lines under construction. I know Qingdao is much larger and 3 -4x more population but we are just too slow...
Unfortunately I think this would be the one of the last few years you would be seeing that. Metro and public transport in general is used by local governments to promote real estate development, which is the most important income for local governments. As the housing bubble is destined to burst, this among many other factors will spell the end of the era of massive infrastructure building in China. Alas my country has many great engineers but never once in the history did she have any semblance of good governance.
I think you made a mistake by not even mention CHINESE New year travel. The biggest human migration on earth.. which comes around 20 th of January.. if you want to make money why not open the train route in December to be ready for massive travel in January...makes sense right.
Just a correction for a lot of comments here relating to Chinese New Year. It is opening in December not to accommodate the increase in flow during the holidays, but rather for the migrant workers to complete the projects and go home in January before the holidays
Can you do a video on benefits and disadvantages of metro system using maglev? I know on the whole that there is less mechanical wear and noise but increased power consumption, however there must be way more nuances that I am not aware of.
Can you make a video of Seoul's upcoming new subway/light metro lines? Im particularly interested on the SinAsan Line and the northward extension of Shinbundang Line to Yongsan Station then eventually to Seoul Station and Samsong Station in Goyang province, partly sharing tracks with GTX-A in that section.
According to the 2020 published information on metro by countries. China had 8,684km total metro length by 2020. This more than the combined total of the next 19 runner-up countries put together, including US, UK, France, Canada, India, Japan, South Korea, Spain, Germany....... It is just common sense. China does not have large oil and gas reserves so its people do not have large car ownership like the other developed countries. Metro is the only way to solve its public transportation problem. As the metro, same as the HSR, are all electrified so China has managed to reduce its oil import which is already the world's biggest.
In lots of places the metro opens before xmas or elections to show people that the goverment is building and improving things.
in connecticut they do the most road repair late in election years. people are impacted by the roads being dug up but the government gets to show how hard they work for us but just for those 10 months every 2 years. politicians....
yep.
Of course, but it seems much more common in China than other places!
But in China elections have passed (they are every 5 years)
@@althomas6045 you reminded this my India. Near election every politician starts visiting and ever work gets started but never completed after elections
I was in Chengdu on Chinese new year 2010 and couldn't believe that such a huge city has no metro and we always have to take the bus. I just checked the map and boy things have changed.
Chengdu has built roughly 500km metros in 10 years like Hangzhou. These to chinese cities have probably the fastest growing metro systems.
Its nuts!
Yes it's crazy fast how things change there.
@@RMTransit now that would be a video I'd love to see :)
There're 12 metro lines in Chengdu right now, and there'll be another 8 new lines by 2025.
Obviously, there are China-specific reasons, but the whole "we said it would be open in 2022, so we'll rush a bit to make sure it opens in December" thing is fairly common worldwide. Dhaka and Lagos both opened metros in December for this exact reason. It was also when the new Grand Central Madison in my city (NYC) almost opened, before meeting a few last-minute delays.
Of course, but I think you see it to a much higher extent in China!
@@RMTransit China builds much more each year than anywhere else which strongly supports your correct premise.
China itself is also kinda "continent-sized" with twice the population of Europe and their industrialization and modernization also came later. Just to add additional information. Probably we might see the same extent of development of transit lines in India sooner or later.
The Spring Festival in China is a very important festival for the vast majority of Chinese people.
Many Chinese people have been busy working abroad for a year, and the Spring Festival is the time for them to go home and reunite.
This will lead to hundreds of millions of Chinese traveling between north and south of China, from their workplaces to their hometowns.
Therefore, the Spring Festival will lead to an extremely large passenger flow.
(The Spring Festical = Chinese New Year)
Honestly, pretty much the entire East and Southeast Asia goes on break
Yep! It's a massive holiday!
@@RMTransit It's simply our Christmas
@@zhuyuan0624 It is Christmas (gift-giving), Thanksgivings (hanging out with family), AND New Years all rolled into one.
IIRC, roughly 200 million Chinese citizens (1 in 7 people) travel for CNY. I personally think that estimate is on the low end of the estimates. With Zero COVID policies being lifted, I really wouldn't be surprised if 300 million people travelled for CNY within China.
Finally! I love how China is designing their cities. I constantly follow Walk East on RUclips and they really are living in the future. Would love to see more coverage because I feel like it goes unnoticed.
Their designed pretty well, but there is room for improvement. I think we need to step down from the idea that every house entry should face a street for example. Like having a pedestrian walk between a row blocks. You could potentially connect a city with streets AND pedestrian walks and use neighborhood and large plazas as central nodes. But i agree; Chinas new CBDs are dope.
@@91djdjvery house entry faces a road? That's a big Nono in fengshui
Chinese cities should start building fast metro like RER in Paris. It is extremely inefficient to commute from suburbs to the other side of the city when Metro stops at every station.
@@AmelieZh I will praise any exception 😄
@@dt8101To some extent building most section underground is not a very future proof concept as it prevents adding overtaking lines or infill stations in the future.
In Europe most of the transit lines also open in December (in 2022 on the 11th to be precise) because that's when the new international timetable goes into action. Like Line 20 between Zurich Altstetten and Killwangen-Spreitenbach that opened in 2022.
This mostly applies to national rail instead of urban rapid transit afaik, though.
@@MTobias to national rail it applies certainly more strictly as for connection and track availability but on urban transit it also does very often at least in Switzerland certainly also because of the integrated time scheduling. Sometimes there are changes throughout the year with a special timetable but if you were to put it statistically I would bet december is the month where you'd see a spike compared to any other month in many other countries than China.
These are often interwoven, so it makes perfect sense!
@@MTobias It does still affect urban rail as thats when all the buses also get their timetables updated, and since many of those also correspond to national rail, that means that its when the bus restructuring of bus networks happen either way. Though typically any new rapid transit like a metro line or light rail, will open a few weeks or a month before that so there's kind of a transition period where people can get used to the new transit option before the network around it is changed.
So, when stuff gets done that can be integrated without further changes to the network, they can be done anytime, but if other parts of the network need to be changed, then it'll be in December
May I propose a transit battle: Singapore MRT v Hong Kong MTR video? With both cities having similar histories, it'd be interesting to see how they have each evolved into the systems they are today. It might be worth taking into account stuff like interchange types and out of station transfer rules into such a video too.
He's done a video on that, HK edged out SG slightly.
Now THIS right here is a good idea!
@@qp4590 An updated one may be in order!
@Zaydan Alfariz also... HK is more of a commuter rail turned metro than Singapore's metro first and only designs... there's very much different philosophy in the works.
@Zaydan Alfariz Singapore DID NOT have a COMMUTER rail, it has a INTRASTATE LONG DISTANCE rail.
Two very different services, for one the service pre-move to woodlands is very limited, if not restrictive, by nature of the format of the rail between Woodlands Checkpoint TS and Tanjong Pagar RT, which is a single tracked, british origin alignment, much in the same way as much of the malaya's jungle railway on the mainline west coast and east coast branch.
if Singapore had a "commuter rail", it would have been the precursor to the "modern" KTM alignment that we knew, the Tank Road to woodlands waterfront pre-Causeway. and therefore was axed by the colonial British authority in the 1800-ish.
Guangzhou metro got a weird habit that when they open a new line, it’s always on 28th of some month.
We metro nerds call it the lucky day of Guangzhou Metro😂
cuz line 1 was opened on Dec. 28😁, and yeah opening on the last 4th day of the year still count as "TB open this year"(lol
Chinese like number 6 and 8 and you can say Dec 28 is the last lucky day in one year.
Let's take a moment to appreciate Reese's efforts in pronouncing Chinese names. He didn't say them like a native speaker of Mandarin, but he did much better than your typical native English speaker! (Edited: Okay, he flubbed Beijing a bit, using the French j sound.)
More Chinese metro videos would be great, great video! I am also interested in high speed rails in other countries
High speed rail is the future!
yep agreed, it always seems to me like china is the big elephant in the room for youtube transit nerd channels, they build way more of everything than any other country in the world and yet everyone talks about other countries... surely there are interesting stories to be told about an HSR system that went from nothing to more than the rest of the world combined in less than 20 years for example, and lessons to learn for other developing countries. I know it's more difficult to research data and saying positive things about china gets you a lot of hate on the internet these days, but I'm always happy to see this type of content!
@@johannesgutsmiedl366 it's because everything is standardized, you're not gonna see many differences from city to city. So one or two videos explains the metros and HSR sufficiently.
There are already a plethora of Chinese videos which are beginning to cause me extreme envy and unhealthy jealousy, haha. Non-Chinese videos would be better than compounding the volume with somewhat more of the same, unless you of course come up with a unique perspective that you are creatively and proficiently able to do.
@@voongnz you could do so much more than that... talk about the history of those systems, oddities like the chongqing monorail, technical deep dives on for example the high speed rail trains (so far the only ones in the world designed to run at up to 380 km/h afaik), a look at the construction techniques that allow those insane build speeds... there's a looot to do, even though not all of it might fit this channel specifically.
I'd be interested in watching a video on regional metros generally- e.g. not just BART but also the chinese ones you mentioned, probably others etc
I have some that touch on it but, a dedicated video may be in order.
@@RMTransit if you do a dedicated video, I hope you cover's Sydney's regional services. Not only those that are part of the main network, say to Newcastle, Lithgow, and Wollongong, which are regional locations, and the further diesel services.
@RogerRamjet makes sense, especially, if you use Sydney as an example, we don't really have a CBD metro. Yes there is the 'new' LR system, but outside of that it's just the HR City Circle. If we used the definition of metro you've used here, then we do only have a 'regional' service from Tallwong to Chatswood, though I think it's to be extended to the CBD eventually. Hopefully @RMTransit takes a moment to explain :)
@@arokh72 I am curious about the tram lines in Melbourne. You guys have more trollies/ light rail lines than San Francisco and Philadelphia I think.
Finally something about China! Local Nanjinger here and I have to admit theyve done amazing on the metro this year! They opened lots of suburban lines for connectivity this year like S6 and S8
The Chinese New Year period is pretty much equivalent to Christmas in western countries. Most things get shut down and it gets really quiet, with many people going back to their hometown to celebrate with their family.
Meanwhile, in Toronto, one new metro line opens once every 50 years.
That's faster than CAHSR lol.
I wish I could spend a year just riding all the metro systems in China.
Come on, there're over 40 cities in Mainland China have metros and many of them are expanding their systems and even new cities would have metros！ 1 year may not enough to ride！ 😹🙀😹
me too, also high speed rail
Would be fun wouldn't it!
I've visited all of them except Taizhou and Jinhua! Lovely experience to say the least and I've visited most of the stations in the networks
@@西南交大 really? That's unbelievable achievement
Shenzhen has opened 128km of metro in the last 3 months of 2022 (the most in one year by its history), including 4 new lines (Line 6 Branch, 12, 14, 16) and 3 huge metro hubs (Gangxia North, Huangmugang and Universiade). Gangxia North station is the most important node of 120km/h express lines in the network, connecting Line 11 (Western/Airport Express) and 14 (Eastern Express) with two regional lines (Line 2/8 and Line 10), additional with future underground connection to Gangxia station on line 1. It has a great weight on functionality and also has a very futuristic architecture design. Huangmugang and Universiade have beautiful and gigantic architecture as well. All 4 new lines are GoA4 automated
Not as much as a day of Chengdu yet 🤣
@@enzhus 把转移支付给回广东，我们就能建得更多了
Are you eventually planning an explainer on some more Chinese metro networks? Preferrably Guangzhou's (for me)
God I wish we could be building that much transit
Ask your politicians!
At least here in Germany but I think it kinda EU wide, many if not all transit projects open on the same day in December.
The opening of a new line or service almost always corresponds with the Europe wide annual change of train-schedules.
Yep! Its not a China exclusive thing, just a very strong trend.
As a December baby, I support China’s inauguration date for its metros. Had no idea about this trend in the country. With the Chinese New Year occurring Jan/Feb, I thought it would be good luck to enter the new year with new metro. Just hoping the Metro in my wife’s hometown of Ho Chi Minh gets open soon.
HCMC Metro is doing test runs rn, probably going to open sometime late this year or early next year.
@@edisonz2006 my brother in law sent me a a few pics of the test run. Really excited for the opening of this considering it’s Japanese made :)
@@japanesetrainandtravel6168 very exciting stuff!
Do you think it will be possible for my dream girl when I was a teenager, Jane Fonda, to be invited to attend the grand opening as a distinguished guest of honor? It sure would make it extra special, don't you think?
Please consider doing a video on when gondolas should and should not be used
Stay tuned next week :)
Yeah!!!!
Just back from a trip to visit my friend in Nanjing, as a Shunde, Foshan native, having a metro station at your doorstep really means a lot, it only cost me 14CNY and about 2hrs to head to Baiyun Airport in Guangzhou, which is way cheaper than a 60 yuan airport coach which I need to drag my luggage for 20minutes to the coach pick up point, not to mention I can visit my old friends in downtown Foshan without worrying missing on the last inter-region bus at 9pm.
Yeah it may take some time for businesses around the stations and commuters to fully commit to less drive more metro approach, but metro service will help moving a large amount of population at driving distance and expand surrounding businesses a lot.
While in decembre Chinese people were having new metro lines,
we Argentinians,
WERE WINNING THE WORLD CUP!!!!1!1!!!¡¡11!!!!!
MUCHAAAAAAACHOOOOOS
I get a kick out of soccer.Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooal!!!!!
A note on pronounciation: the second syllable in Beijing is pronounced identically to that in Nanjing. There is a mistaken perception among some English speakers that it's somehow supposed to sound like "zhing" instead of "djing" but that is not the case.
I find interesting that all the metros are based on the HK's MTR, all those system have the same aesthetic
MTR served as a huge inspiration for mainland metro systems. The “A-standard” metro trains in China are derived from MTR’s Metro-Cammell EMUs in terms of specs, and passenger wayfinding / signage systems in many mainland cities are also derived from HK (e.g. the green exit signs). MTR indeed served as consultants for many mainland metro systems in the 2000s and operates a handful of them in Beijing, Shenzhen and Hangzhou.
Mainland China's metros aren't fully based on Hong Kong's MTR nowadays, some were based from MRT from Singapore. And now some from Tokyo and New York.
Not all of them, Chongqing's metro was built with the help of Japanese consultants. That's why their monorail lines use Hitachi equipment and the wayfinding style is similar to JR's.
@@edisonz2006 ,only the monorail was, not the underground railways.
@@wai-shinglam4447 The other lines have JR-style signage too.
Actually according to National Development and Reform Commission only extension projects in cities that already had metro systems can be allowed, and it is less likely to see brandnew systems in cities like Taizhou or Yiwu in the next few years (excluding light rail or commuter train service)
The end of each year is an important milestones for cities infrastructure construction, to hit the target date is critical for the local governments to have ongoing and future contraction budgets to be endorsed.
These short 5 minute videos are good. More should be made
CRRC is padding its export market by building all those rapid transit lines, but it is needed, China is huge population and Canada population fits nicely in just the Pearl Delta region
@@incisive2641 Yeah its much more populous
Great video, this channel has grown a lot in the last 6 months. I’ve been here since 12k subs.
Thanks for the support!
I would love to watch a video on the non-Tokyo metro systems in Japan.
Thanks Reece for another clear, concise, informative, and entertaining transit video. Big fan here. I know you will have much success in 2023 and beyond. I am glad I found your channel and see you soon reaching 200K subscribers. Early congratulations!
Hello, will you be covering the BKK metro expansion and the whole BTS/MRT system this year? Thanks!
Thats the plan!
Having worked with many government and large business customers in the past, this seems like a no-brainer to me. Those institutions work on yearly budgets. Work spilling over into another financial budget period is a major headache when working with/for them. All too often, we have to stop work in January and wait for their new budget to be approved and for them to sign a follow-up contract for us to continue working...
A possible additional explanation: Transit ridership tends to be a bit quieter in the winter compared to the summer, mostly because winter sees less casual leisure travel. Opening new systems in December makes sense if you want to pick a time that's a bit less hectic, so that any last-second kinks can be worked out with less disruption while you scale service up.
Especially in cities like San Diego, where the transit system is heavily dependent on university students.
I would love to hear your opinion about CRRC's "Autonomous Rapid Rail Transit" trackless tram systems that use LiDAR. They seem rather gadgetbahn-y IMO but also really interesting and perhaps promising as a way to reduce the cost of fixed-route transit construction - at least according to the information that CRRC has released publicly in their efforts to sell their technologies abroad. Opinions?
"trackless tram" is just a marketing term for "overpriced bus"
Those really are just big buses.
@@MTobias It's a bit more complex than that, they're powered through induction conduits placed under the road. They therefore can't stray too far from the power connection.
@@MTobias I don't disagree with you as a whole. Most "trackless tram" technologies have little/nothing to differentiate themselves from buses. The only reason I ask about ARRT is because it does seem at least interesting as a proof-of-concept for a sort of automated, electrified BRT with some of the accessibility advantages of rail vehicles.
@@trebuh Not really. There's nothing special about the painted lines on the road. The buses have optical sensors on them to make sure they follow the painted lines. As for the power source, the buses use supercapacitor batteries that can be charged at terminal stations.
Transportation is one part that the authoritarian top down government of China does really well. They have built by far the most high speed rail, and tons of local city metro services. It does also help that they are the most populous and one of the densest countries in the world in the east of the country though.
The new rail stretches are the cities' Christmas Gifts.
Yes, I would like to see a video on Chinese metro standardization please.
The Ankeng Light Rail in New Taipei opened on Jan 9, but was supposed to open in December 2022.
Bro RMTransit LITERALLY SHOWED MY HOME at 4:30
2022 Chinese Line openings:
Jan: Chongqing; Feb: Hangzhou; Mar; Guangzhou; Apr: Hangzhou/Fuzhou/Shaoxing; May: Guangzhou; Jun: Hangzhou/Chongqing/Zhengzhou/Changsha/Kunming; Aug: Chongqing/Fuzhou/Jinhua; Sep: Hangzhou/Dalian/Nanjing/Zhengzhou (Autumn Festival/National Holiday 01 Oct are symbolically important opening times); Oct: Shenzhen; Nov: Nantong/Tianjin/Foshan/Shenzhen - then 12 openings in late December. Dates are planned throughout the year and are quite rigorous, and the symbolic nature of the calendar in Chinese culture plays a major part in opening schedules. I am afraid the emphasis on simple procrastination in this video is incorrect
Actually,those new metro lines are almost in big cities like Beijing and Shanghai and other capitals of those provinces to reduce the pressure on transportation for growing populations. The Chinese government have already come up with a policy to limit those middle ranged cities to build new subways in 2018. And turned their focus on developing suburban and cross cities rail to promote the developing of city groups eg:Shanghai-suzhou Line11.
I wish Toronto can have more subway lines and stations, took the city 13 years to add 2 stations….
hey are you planning on making a video on China's rolling stock standardization for both Metros and HSR?
If you have already made one i am extremely sorry but i cant find one, hopefully one can direct me to it
thanks @rmtransit and @JRUrbaneNetwork for being alsome and giving us these videos.
Thank you for watching!
Because of 春运, which is the largest human migration in the world (several times larger than the runners up, USA Thanksgiving)
As a Chinese myself, I can confirm that Lunar New Year is very important to almost every Chinese, some in Vietnam or other Asian countries. Having everyone visiting families from places to places, without delay of planning, railroad/metro transport is usually the way to go, unless you're going from Beijing to Hong Kong, then flying is more convenient. This is why they need metros around that time before the big rush, or it would be a massive headache for travelers.
You are fake Chinese. Real Chinese never call it Lunar New Year. We call it Chinese New Year. Chinese traditional calendar is Lunisolar calendar, NOT lunar calendar. Calling it Lunar New Year is scientifically wrong. Islam New Year is the real Lunar New Year because Islam calendar is lunar calendar.
@@dt8101 First of all, just because my background is nothing but a bus doesn't mean I'm not Chinese. In fact, both of my parents have family history from China. I was born and raised in Hong Kong before I moved to the U.S. So do not say I'm not Chinese and do not assume someone's race.
Second, Chinese New Year is just another saying for Lunar New Year, and most people call it because they thought only Chinese people would celebrate this holiday. In fact, there are more countries participate this holiday including Taiwan, both Koreas, Japan, Vietnam, Japan, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei, etc. Basically places with some Kanji in their languages and people from said places will celebrate Lunar New Year, and they CLEARLY ARE NOT from China.
Third, there is no real Lunar New Year for a country specifically. Lunar New Year is based on the day according to Lunar calendar's first day of the year. And Chinese traditional calendar is based on Lunar calendar and makes both New Years mostly land on the same day, if not just a couple days apart. Some people use both terms to fit the conversation setting, as Chinese New Year is specific while Lunar New Year is more general. I call it Lunar New Year here because there might be some viewers of RMTransit that are not Chinese but they celebrate Lunar New Year, and it might be awkward to say Chinese New Year. For Chinese, Lunar New Year also make sense and some of them even said Lunar instead of Chinese, or even Spring Festival. Either one of these are still correct.
I hope you understand that some people call things differently, like Metro vs Subway, or High Speed Rail vs Bullet Train. Just because it is the different way than what you speak, doesn't they are not wrong. I hope this explain well to you and once again, I. AM. CHINESE.
@clemathieu JT Check my explanation when I reply to D T
@@JonathanChan212 首先这个视频谈论的是中国，中国人过的是春节，对应的英文是Chinese new year，而不是lunar new year，lunar是阴历对应的是月亮历，中国的是农历，农历是阴阳合历，其次什么越南东南亚地区过节，不应该是中国文化影响或者是华人带去的吗，东南亚地区还有冬至 立春这节气吗，lunar new year就是为了弱化中国文化，现在韩国都直接在前面加Korea lunar new year，还宣传lunar new year吗，是我的我维护，不是我的别硬塞我不要
Hello! Great video! At 3:10 you said to comment if interested in an updated video on china’s rolling stock. We’ll I’d love to see a follow up video!
I love how you live, eat and breathe transit systems. To geek is to truly be an expert.
Istanbul’s new metro line M8 opened a week late, on January 6th 😂
China cities need 3 million residents to build a metro system.
Meanwhile, Beijing government failed to open Changping line extension in time (as promised). And by now, still no confirmed date. We are wondering about whether it would open in December 40th or Dec, 62nd. Beijing gov has been behaving like a student fighting against DDL, and then FAILED, and just give up. If they failed to open a line within time, then the opening date would be much postponed. From 2010, Beijing usually open new lines in last Saturday of the year. But in 2020, it's Dec 30th. In 2021, it's Dec 31st. And now, Changping line extension is still TBA.
Also, Beijing has its own metro train manufacture, the BSR. Not CRRC.
昌平线南延预计2023年4月
Hi excellent video of yours i hope later you can make an actualization of the current subways that are going to open in this year, keep the good work cheers
This is a new concept to an American that glorifies any rapid transit opening, like Northgate extension in Seattle light rail...
Hello, thank you for your channel and producing incredibly high quality content on the field of transit. Your detailed knowledge of transit systems around the world is extraordinary.
Oh great, now I'm really curious what the 5 standardised rolling stock are
Nice info.
I think Chinese metros like the September-January season, looking at the lines of the St.Petersburg of China (aka Nanjing) really liking that time( but really loving December)
Would love to see the video about the five trains
Tianjin often opens new metro line in December because the first metro line Jiyou (now metro line 1) was operated on 28 December, 1984 (*´ω｀*)
Hey Reece, I just took a look at some of these lines on OpenStreetMap, like Guangzhou line 18, and from looking at their alignments they don't go through the city centers but terminate in them them. Would the model Chinese cities are using could be called highspeed and metronized commuter lines (with future plans of central city through tunnels?)
Guangzhou line 18 terminates in the city center for now. Phase 2 (under construction) will extend it northward. Line 22, which is pretty short currently, is also getting a long extension northward
Some of the Mainland China's metros 🚇 like Guangzhou had used the way as New York's did, ie, building a new rapid line with the current lines for releasing the cowardly lines.
@@skypesos appreciate the info
@@wai-shinglam4447 lol
@skypesos they are planned to go inside its city center (and also other cities like zhuhai)
That's good, but it's a shame that labor goes into the making of these as well as technology theft from Germany, Japan, and the US, which explains partially a small reason why the US can't build high speed rail or subways.
Why not Talk about the new metro line in Dhaka Bangladesh for once!
The High-speed metros mentioned at the beginning of the are somehow a make-up for the lack of commuter/regional rails like RER. Due to the relative late development of national rail systems, few lines passing through large cities have spare time to operate commuter trains, so instead of relying on existing rail infrastructures, cities are forced to start out brand-new systems by themselves.
Thank you, I was wondering about that for quite some time...
Day #6 of asking RMTransit to play City Bus Manager on PC. I want to see how he would manage a Public Transport Company.
I only used the old(er) metro system in Beijing back in 2019 and I still get flashbacks because it is still cleaner and more modern than the ones in most of Germany. I really really miss my time in China
Luxembourg tram network video?
Here in Toronto the 9 km Eglinton Crosstown LRT (which is half underground) which has been in construction since 2011 is delayed yet again, after nearly 12 years and 12+ billion. Wonder how long it would have taken/cost for a similar line in China.
The regulations is hard there. There are 1000 different interest needs to be heard.
The Chinese central gov't will set a growth target for cities and provinces to try and hit, which I think hits on some of what you said, procrastination. A metro line opened or extend in May will do the same for reaching the growth target as doing it in December, or in the other last months of the year
I did read an article last month criticizing Beijing for literally opening all the new lines and extensions since 2010 as some projectes do not need to wait until December and for other projects it would be better to wait longer. btw, Hangzhou is pretty much an exception for this rule. Last year, opening of some of the major projects took place on Feb21st, Apr 1st, Jun 10th and Sep 22nd. The metro network has been expanding quite rapidly even accoridng to Chinese standard.
This will no longer be true for 2023, Changping Line south extension has been delayed to early 2023.
@@user-kr1qk8iq1i Yeah, and the extension is said to be opened on Jan 21st
More pls!!
So neat. I learned something new. Thanks for sharing!
Probably a "Chinese Metro-Christmas Tradition"...
Make a video on the new Dhaka metro
updated video on chinese metro standardization please!
I'd find it so interesting to see a video about Hamburg's public transport, maybe even with some facts about the bus net :)
Please also explain why do Japanese train companies always re-schedule their trains in March
Meanwhile, here in NYC we can’t even open a single station on time and on an INSANE budget.
Can you review Klang Valley Rail Network? Would love to hear your opinion on our transit system
I want this type of speed of building metros in India...
Awesome Chinese metros!
Another dominant reason is local governments in China want to show their political achievement within a year. And rushing a line to open in December mean they can count that as part of their achievment for the year.
However you might feel about China’s government at least they appreciate the benefits of mass transit and see it as a source of national pride and accomplishment.
Of course!
make a video about Dhaka metro
Really nice video and It would be good if you provide statistics as well
Do Prague metro system explained
Having been to China, the metrolines and HSR really puts America to shame. But hey America has the strongest army in the world so that counts for something!
The army destroy things, American cities needs a fully integrated metro system
who needs to build metro lines when you can just invest in being able to blow up other people's lines instead?
Metro Van planned expo extension to Langley for a decade and then finally under construction. Qingdao my hometown opened its first metro in 2015, now 7 lines with 12 lines under construction. I know Qingdao is much larger and 3 -4x more population but we are just too slow...
The month 12 denotes the 12 animals of the Chinese Zodiac, hence December is the latest possible time to open a metro line in China.
Unfortunately I think this would be the one of the last few years you would be seeing that. Metro and public transport in general is used by local governments to promote real estate development, which is the most important income for local governments. As the housing bubble is destined to burst, this among many other factors will spell the end of the era of massive infrastructure building in China.
Alas my country has many great engineers but never once in the history did she have any semblance of good governance.
I think you made a mistake by not even mention CHINESE New year travel. The biggest human migration on earth.. which comes around 20 th of January.. if you want to make money why not open the train route in December to be ready for massive travel in January...makes sense right.
Just a correction for a lot of comments here relating to Chinese New Year. It is opening in December not to accommodate the increase in flow during the holidays, but rather for the migrant workers to complete the projects and go home in January before the holidays
Can you do a video on benefits and disadvantages of metro system using maglev? I know on the whole that there is less mechanical wear and noise but increased power consumption, however there must be way more nuances that I am not aware of.
Isn't the real reason because they update the train schedules in Dec/Jan?
Can you make a video of Seoul's upcoming new subway/light metro lines? Im particularly interested on the SinAsan Line and the northward extension of Shinbundang Line to Yongsan Station then eventually to Seoul Station and Samsong Station in Goyang province, partly sharing tracks with GTX-A in that section.
please talk about jakarta MRT and LRT that gonna be open soon
According to the 2020 published information on metro by countries. China had 8,684km total metro length by 2020. This more than the combined total of the next 19 runner-up countries put together, including US, UK, France, Canada, India, Japan, South Korea, Spain, Germany.......
It is just common sense. China does not have large oil and gas reserves so its people do not have large car ownership like the other developed countries. Metro is the only way to solve its public transportation problem. As the metro, same as the HSR, are all electrified so China has managed to reduce its oil import which is already the world's biggest.
Do a video on Dhaka's newly opened Metro Rail, the Most densely populated city in the world
If only procrastination in NA meant "it'll open in December" instead of "it'll open 3 years late" .