China has started building a 200 kilometer-per-hour railway from Fuzhou, capital city of southeast China's Fujian Province, to Xiamen, a coastal city in the province.

The line, with a length of 273 kilometers and a total investment of 14.42 billion yuan, will be completed in 2009.

Since the railway will be constructed in high land, about 40 percent of the railway will be on bridges and in tunnels.

The Fuzhou-Xiamen line is part of China's coastal network of express railways.

The original railways in the province, with speeds of 60 to 70 kilometers per hour, are antiquated, a local official said.

The Fuzhou-Xiamen line will connect the original ones and form a network within the province, he said.

(Xinhua News Agency October 4, 2005)