Shijiazhuang was not the only urban center to benefit from the advent of rail transport. Many other cities rose as the network attracted businesses and workers. Zhengzhou, the capital and largest city in Henan province; Zhuzhou a strong economic center in central China's Hunan province; and Shenzhen in Guangdong province, all enjoyed unprecedented rapid growth, fueled by the industries that evolved from the railways.
However, growth also resulted in problems, mainly those associated with urban planning, as floods of workers migrated to the cities in search of work.
Home from home
The railway still plays an important role in the lives of Shijiazhuang's residents. On Friday afternoon, Zhang Chao called his wife to tell her that he would be joining the family for dinner that evening. After taking the bullet train from Beijing, the 26-year-old arrived at the family home at around 7:30 pm, seeing his wife and parents for the first time in five days.
Zhang's routine hasn't changed for the past two years; he leaves Shijiazhuang every Monday morning to travel to his job in Beijing and returns every Friday.
"It once occurred to me to buy an apartment in Beijing to save time traveling back and forth," said Zhang, who works as a legal consultant for the Beijing Railway Bureau. "But I can't afford the high property prices in Beijing - the average price was more than 17,000 yuan ($2,800) per square meter in June."
Zhang began his nomadic lifestyle soon after he started his job. "The journey only takes 70 minutes on the high-speed train, and at most two hours for the entire one-way trip including the bus from the railway station to my residential community. But sometimes Beijing residents spend just as long trapped in their cars in traffic jams, so it's quite acceptable."
His case is by no means unique, as many young people choose to remain in their hometowns because of the lower property prices, but work in Beijing because the wages are higher and there is a greater number of opportunities.
Businesspeople also benefit. "It's a great time for local companies to do business in Beijing," said Li Kang a manager at Jingkang Co, a chemical company that sells commodities, mainly in Shijiazhuang and Xingtai city, where Li lives.
Source: China Daily
Time: 2013-07-16