Summary：The Hanyi Railway, a section of a major high-speed rail corridor between the eastern metropolis of Shanghai and southwest China’s city of Chengdu, opened Sunday.

The Hanyi Railway, a section of a major high-speed rail corridor between the eastern metropolis of Shanghai and southwest China’s city of Chengdu, opened Sunday.

The 293-km Hanyi Railway links Wuhan and Yichang, 2 large cities in central China’s Hubei province. The railway will reduce travel time between the cities to 1 hr, 39 mins, said Yang Tao, an official with the Wuhan railway bureau.

The Hanyi Railway is part of the Shanghai-Wuhan-Chengdu Railway, or Huhanrong Railway, a major east-west high-speed rail corridor outlined in China’s national high-speed railway development plan.

The 2,078-km railway will travel though four provinces and two municipalities, connecting the cities of Shanghai, Nanjing, Hefei, Wuhan, Chongqing and Chengdu.