Blindfolds and Bullet Trains

Train speeds in China topped out at 160 kilometers per hour back in 2004, the year the government pulled the throttle on an historic, nationwide expansion for high-speed rail.

Around that time, bullet-train expert Tadaharu Ohashi, chairman of Japan's Kawasaki Heavy Industries, advised China's energetic railroad builders not to rush into the project. Japan, a world leader in the technology, had spent 30 years raising train speeds to 300 kph.