Intercity railways from Guangzhou to Foshan and from Foshan to Dongguan were officially put into operation on May 26th

Intercity railways from Guangzhou to Foshan and from Foshan to Dongguan were officially put into operation on Sunday. The two newly opened intercity railways are connected with the already opened ones from Foshan to Zhaoqing and from Dongguan to Huizhou, forming a 258-kilometer railway line linking the five cities from east to west in Guangdong. The railway is the longest intercity railway in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and is of great significance in accelerating the formation of a one-hour life circle in the area. 

Starting from Panyu Station in Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong, passengers can arrive in Foshan or Dongguan within 30 minutes, and can reach Zhaoqing or Huizhou in just one hour.
The line, linking cities including Huizhou, Dongguan, Guangzhou, Foshan, and Zhaoqing from the east to the west, is 258 kilometers long with a total of 39 stops for ordinary trains, but fast trains only stop at 14 of them. The maximum speed of a train is 200 kilometers per hour, while the average interval between trains is 26 minutes.

Zhang Qiao, a senior engineer with the Guangdong Intercity Railway Operation Co., Ltd., noted that the railway will bring convenience to local people, who will be able to take it like taking a subway.

China has, in recent years, boosted the connectivity of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. According to the Guangzhou Metro, it is expected that by 2035, the operational scale of rail transit in the Greater Bay Area will reach 7,500 kilometers, covering all cities above county-level and 80 percent of the towns with a planned population above 50,000.
Passengers can enjoy better service and smoother transfers inside stations. For example, at Panyu Station and several subway stations in Guangzhou, specialty products including food are available so that passengers can buy in a "one-stop" manner.

With the operation of the four lines, multiple stations have implemented mutual security recognition with national railway stations, facilitating convenient and smoother transfers.

There are a total of seven stations along the intercity lines where passengers can transfer to national railway lines and to subway lines, according to the intercity railway operator.
Among them, passengers can transfer to the national railway at Foshan West Station and Dongguan West Station through convenient transfer passage, without the need for secondary security checks.
The minimum fare between Guangzhou and Zhaoqing, and from Guangzhou to Huizhou intercity stations, is five yuan (69 US cents), with a maximum one-way fare of 153 yuan.

A multipayment system has been introduced, by which passengers can either buy tickets in advance on the 12306 ticket-booking platform, which is the usual practice for most passengers, or board the trains directly by scanning their regular bus or subway payment QR code or swiping transportation cards.

"It is so convenient to board the intercity train now, with just scanning the payment QR code of my digital transportation card, just like taking a subway," said Wang Xuelin, a 38-year-old woman who was going back to Huizhou from Guangzhou with her child on Sunday.
For Wang, it will take less than two hours by the intercity railway to travel from Panyu Station in Guangzhou to Xiaojinkou Station, the final stop in Huizhou.
"I will travel frequently between the two cities now" because of the convenient new link, she said.

Some netizens called the new intercity railway links "the subway of the Greater Bay Area".

Source: 广州外事