世行：中国高铁建设成本只有他国三分之二

中新社北京7月10日电 (记者 丁栋)世界银行[微博]10日发布报告指出，截至2013年年末，中国已建成总里程超过1万公里的高速铁路网，而中国的高铁建设成本至多只有其他国家的三分之二。

    高速铁路通常指时速250公里或者超过250公里的铁路。世界银行最新研究报告《中国高速铁路：建设成本分析》指出，中国的高铁建设成本往往低于其他国家。中国建设时速可达350公里的高铁，每公里的基础设施单位建设成本通常为1700万至2100万美元，高架桥和隧道比例较大，而欧洲高铁每公里的建设成本为2500万至3900万美元，美国加利福尼亚州目前估计可高达5600万美元。

    报告分析称，影响高铁项目建设成本有若干因素，其中主要因素包括线路设计速度、沿线地形、天气条件、征地成本、路基的建设方式、大跨度桥梁建设以及大型车站建设等。中国往往倾向于采用在高架桥上铺设轨道的方式，这样可以最大限度地降低拆迁成本和减少占用农田，同时也能减轻对环境的影响。中国双线高铁的高架桥建设成本在每公里5700万至7300万元人民币之间。

    世界银行高级交通专家欧杰说：“中国在六七年的时间完成了超过1万公里的高铁网建设，而且单位成本低于其他国家的类似项目。除了中国劳动力成本较低外，另一个可能的原因是中国规划建设的高铁网规模大，因此有可能对各项建设内容实行标准化设计，建立设备制造和土建工程的富有创新性和竞争力的产能，以及在多个项目上摊还土建设备的资金成本。”

    报告称，世界银行在中国贷款支持了6条时速200～350公里的铁路项目。(完)

Cost of High Speed Rail in China One Third Lower than in Other Countries

July 10, 2014

BEIJING, July 10, 2014 – By the end of 2013, China had built a high speed rail[1] network of over 10,000 route-km, far exceeding that in any other country and larger than the network in the entire European Union. It has been accomplished at a cost which is at most two-thirds of that in other countries. A new World Bank paper takes a look at this expansion, its construction unit costs and some of its key cost components. It also outlines reasons that may explain the comparatively low cost of high speed railway construction in China.

According to the paper titled High-Speed Railways in China: A Look at Construction Costs, several factors influence the cost of a high speed rail project construction. The major factors include the line design speed, topography along the alignment, weather conditions, land acquisition costs, use of viaducts instead of embankments, the construction of major bridges across wide rivers, and the construction of mega stations.

Laying track on viaducts is often preferred in China to minimize resettlement and the use of fertile land as well as to reduce environmental impacts. The estimated cost of viaducts in China ranges from RMB 57 to 73 m/km for a double track line.  Such costs are kept low through standardization of the design and manufacturing process for casting and laying bridge beams on viaducts.

Special bridges that cross large navigable rivers or that need to accommodate special topographic features like mountains have much higher cost per kilometer than that of a regular viaduct. Usually such bridges represent a small percentage of the total number of bridges. Projects having larger proportion of special bridges tend to have a high unit cost.

Railway stations play a dual role as transport hubs and urban centers. Small stations (3,000 sq m station building) cost about RMB 40 million and account for 1.0 to 1.5 percent of the total project cost, while mega stations may cost up to RMB 13 billion and are frequently built as independent projects.

The paper notes that construction cost of high speed rail in China tends to be lower than in other countries. China’s high speed rail with a maximum speed of 350 km/h has a typical infrastructure unit cost of about US$ 17-21m per km, with a high ratio of viaducts and tunnels, as compared with US$25-39 m per km in Europe and as high as US$ 56m per km currently estimated in California.

“China has accomplished a remarkable feat in building over 10,000 km of high speed railway network in a period of six to seven years at a unit cost that is lower than the cost of similar projects in other countries,” said Gerald Ollivier, a World Bank Senior Transport Specialist and co-author of the paper. “Besides the lower cost of labor in China, one possible reason for this is the large scale of the high speed railway network planned in China. This has allowed the standardization of the design of various construction elements, the development of innovative and competitive capacity for manufacture of equipment and construction and the amortization of the capital cost of construction equipment over a number of projects.” 

This paper is the ninth of a series of papers on transport topics produced by the World Bank in Beijing. The World Bank has supported six railway projects with speeds ranging from 200 km/h to 350 km/h in China.