The Hungarian section, spanning approximately 158.6 km, is an electrified line designed for both passenger and freight transport, with a maximum speed of 160 km per hour. Its construction, jointly undertaken by China Railway Group Limited and local Hungarian firms, started in 2022.
The original Budapest-Belgrade Railway, built in the late 1800s, was a single-track railway that had degenerated after more than a century of service, thus enfeebling the transport capacity and obstructing land transport between China and Europe. While building the Hungarian section, the project team overcame challenges in languages, laws and technical standards and successfully aligned Chinese rail technologies and equipment with the European Union’s Technical Specifications for Interoperability for railways. (....)