The current 7,531 km of track in China is more than the rest of the world put together. A journey from Wuhan to Guangzhou that used to take more than 10 hours by the 1,068 km conventional route, now takes less than three. (A similar-length journey in the US, from Washington DC to Chicago, takes 18 hours on Amtrak).
Chinese high speed rail to transport the equivalent of the entire U.S. population - 356 million people during the Spring Festival (Jan. 13 to Feb. 21, lasting 40 days)