01/08/2008 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 31 July 2008, the International Union of Railways (UIC) welcomed the opening of the first section of a Chinese high speed railway line for high speed trains developed in China. The line is called Hexie. From 1 August 2008 onwards, Hexie will link up Beijing to the port city of Tianjin some 120 km away. The system is designed for a maximum speed of 350 km/hour. The network's speed is much slower than in Europe (in a trial run on 24 June 2008, Hexie reached a maximum speed of 394.3 km/hr, some 200 km/hr less than the French TGV), the scale of the Chinese rail network is impressive. Over the next fifteen years, China is planning to introduce 10,000 km of high speed passenger lines, doubling the world's high speed train network. (A.By /transl fl)