The two major airports in Guangdong have been connected.

According to information from Guangdong Transport and Guangzhou Daily, with the approval of the Department of Transport of Guangdong Province, the Zhuliao-Xintang South section of the Guangzhou-Shenzhen Intercity Railway is scheduled to open for operation at 12:00 on July 31.

Public information shows that the total length of this line is 48.2 kilometers, with a designed speed of 160 km/h. 7 new stations are set up, namely Zhongluotan East, Jiufo, Fulang, Xinlong, Zhenlong, Yongning North and Yongning South. The line operates in connection with the already opened Xintang South-Shenzhen Airport section of the Guangzhou-Shenzhen Intercity Railway, and can reach Qingyuan directly via the Guangzhou East Ring Intercity Railway.

The entire Guangzhou-Shenzhen Intercity Railway will connect key areas including Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport, Sino-Singapore Guangzhou Knowledge City, Zengcheng Development Zone and Shenzhen Bao'an International Airport, further accelerating and expanding the "one-hour living circle" between Guangzhou and Shenzhen.

At present, one high-speed railway and two intercity railways have been opened between Guangzhou and Shenzhen, namely the Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong High-Speed Railway (Shenzhen North to Guangzhou South), the Guangzhou-Shenzhen Railway (Shenzhen to Guangzhou East) and the Guangzhou-Shenzhen Intercity Railway (Shenzhen Airport to Guangzhou East). With the opening of the Zhuliao-Xintang South section of the Guangzhou-Shenzhen Intercity Railway this time, the two major airports in Guangzhou and Shenzhen will realize direct connection for the first time, with the fastest travel time no more than 100 minutes.

In recent years, cities including Beijing, Shanghai and Chengdu have successively entered the "dual-airport" era, with a significant increase in passenger throughput of airports. In 2025, the passenger throughput of Guangzhou and Shenzhen airports ranked the second and fourth nationwide respectively; but if calculated by city-level caliber, Guangzhou and Shenzhen ranked fourth and fifth respectively, after Shanghai, Beijing and Chengdu.

Some views hold that with the rapid connection between the two major airports of Guangzhou and Shenzhen, the two airports can serve as each other's "second airport", providing more efficient and convenient aviation resource sharing for residents in the Greater Bay Area.

Higher airport passenger throughput also means more traffic inflow and business opportunities. In fact, the rail transit system between Guangzhou and Shenzhen is still being continuously upgraded, and the second Guangzhou-Shenzhen high-speed railway has also been included in the plan.

In recent years, with the increasingly close exchanges of people between the two cities, the shortcomings of the existing lines have gradually emerged: although the Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong High-Speed Railway is fast, Guangzhou South Railway Station is far from the central urban area; the Guangzhou-Shenzhen Railway has a relatively low speed and its transport capacity is nearly saturated; the Guangzhou-Shenzhen Intercity Railway bypasses the main urban area of Dongguan, with limited drainage capacity.

The planning of the second Guangzhou-Shenzhen high-speed railway has long been on the agenda. As early as 2020, the "Plan for Infrastructure Interconnection in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area" issued by the National Development and Reform Commission included the second Guangzhou-Shenzhen high-speed railway project.

Earlier this year, the outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan of Guangdong Province once again proposed to "steadily advance... the second Guangzhou-Shenzhen high-speed railway and Guangzhou-Zhuhai (Macao) high-speed railway projects", and positioned it as a key infrastructure for deepening the "dual-city linkage and strategic coordination" between Guangzhou and Shenzhen.

According to previous public information, the line has a designed speed of 350 km/h. After completion, the transfer time between the two major airports in Guangzhou and Shenzhen is expected to be shortened to about half an hour.

The second Guangzhou-Shenzhen high-speed railway not only serves Guangzhou and Shenzhen, but also connects multiple core nodes on the east bank of the Greater Bay Area. Especially for Dongguan, the second Guangzhou-Shenzhen high-speed railway is of extraordinary significance — it will end the history of "no high-speed railway" in the central urban area of Dongguan, and greatly improve the radiation capacity of its central urban area.

However, at present, the second Guangzhou-Shenzhen high-speed railway is still in the preliminary research stage, and there is no specific timetable for the full commencement of construction.

This article is from the WeChat Official Account "City Evolution", written by Liu Yanmei, and published with authorization by 36Kr.