【正文】 transport capacity, low consumption of energy, less pollution, less occupation of land, and greater safety. The development of highspeed railways is suitable for the national conditions in China. The authors suggest that, with the HuNing(shanghainanjing) section of the JingHu(beijingshanghai) Railway as the starting point, a highspeed dedicated passenger railway line be built to realize the separate transportation of passengers and goods, thus easing the strain on transport in East China, accumulating experience for the future development of highspeed railways, and bringing along the development of high and new technology industries.As veteran scientific and technical workers engaged in the longterm construction of railways, we have been very much concerned with the railway construction program stipulated in the “Ninth FiveYear Plan”, especially with the problems of highspeed railway construction. It is wellknown that munications and transportation have been restraining the development of the national economy of China, and railways, as backbone of prehensive munications and transportation system, undertake the main task of medium and longdistance passenger and freight transport (in 1994, in the total amount of turnover of passengers by various means of transportation, railways accounted for %。 in the total amount of turnover of goods, railways accounted for %, and railways undertook 95% in the amount of passenger transport of distances over 800km), and the contradiction is especially evident, so it is essential to get rid of dogmas on the basis of indepth reform and science and technology progress, in order to realize the great development in quantity and great improvement in quality.As regards developing railways by relying on science and technology, a correct policy decision has been made in the medium and longterm science and technology development program, namely, “for goods transport, heavy dual should be developed, and for passenger transport, high speed should be developed”. Common awareness has been developed in this point. We suggest that with the HuNing (ShanghaiNanjing) Section of the JingHu (BeijingShanghai) Railway as the starting point, a dedicated highspeed passenger railway line be built, to realize the separate transportation of passengers and goods, thus easing the strain of transportation in East China, and accumulating experience for the future development of highspeed railways.1. The Advantages and FunctionsSpeed is an important indicator of the modernization of munications and transportation. It affects the rise or decline of a certain transportation means to a great extent. Highspeed railways enjoy a series of technical and economic advantages, such as high speed (it has reached 300~350km per hour)。 high transportation capacity (the Japanese Shinkansen accounting for only 9% of the network, has fulfilled 30% of passenger railway traffic volume and 38% of operational revenue, the average annual traffic volume of the Tokaido Shinkansen is 120 million passenger journeys, and the highest has reached 170 million)。 low energy consumption (the ratio of energy consumption per km, per person for highspeed railways, automobiles and airplanes is 1::), less pollution （highspeed electrified railways basically produce no air pollution), less occupation of land (as pared with expressways, the ratio for the use of land is 1:2.~), more safety (no accidents of casualities for more than 30 years have been recorded ), meeting the new demands of a modern social and economic life on munications and transportation. Therefore, after Japan built Tokaido Shinkansen, France, Germany, Italy and spain developed in petition, and South Korea, Russia, the United States, Canada, Brazil, Australia, and Taiwan Province in China are actively building them or making preparations. In December 1994, the heads of member countries of the European Union ratified in Germany a construction plan of 92 billion European currency units, preparing to plete 29,000km of a PanEuropean highspeed railway network before the year of 2010. The highspeed railways have made the rail transportation display the vigor of youth again, thus inducing a new “munications revolution” in the world. This has already exerted and will further exert a deep and farreaching influence on munications and transportation.2. Suitable for the National Conditions in ChinaThe basic conditions if railway in China are:being less in quantity, poor in equipment,lagging behind in management, and being overloaded. The potential passenger traffic flow induced due to the reform and opening to the outside world policy and economic development in a population of is very great,so none of the transport means can bear it alone,Therefore it is necessary to fully utilize the merits of various transport means, and stress the role of prehensive transportation and munication system. Among them the main load of a large amount of medium and long distant transportation should naturally be borne by the railways. However, the traditional lowspeed and lowefficiency railway transport can no longer meet the needs of economic and social development, and the only way out is to rely on the modernization and realization of highspeed railways. One of the important measures is, while generally raising the speed on all the railway lines, to build highspeed railways, and to realize separation of passenger traffic from freight traffic in the areas where transport is especially busy and the capacity of the railway lines has been saturated. Under the circumstances of the restraint of unfavorable factors such as population, resources and environment confronting the economic and social development of China, the development of highspeed railways is not only suitable for the national conditions in China, but also able to bring advantages into the full. Looking forward to the 21st century, it can be anticipated that highspeed railways will