According to the Jinan Railway Transportation Bureau, the Jiaoji Line, Shandong's first passenger line, has entered the road paving and bridge erecting phase and is scheduled to be put into use by May of next year. By then transit time between Qingdao and Jinan will be shortened within one and a half hours and passengers heading for Beijing will spend less than 5 hours in transit.

       The new passenger line started construction on January, 8 of this year. With designed speed at 200 to 250 kilometers per hour and running trains with electric locomotives, the 362.5 kilometers long line is composed of 173 kilometers newly built railway lines, 149 kilometers of repaired lines, and 17 terminals.

       The current Jiaoji railway line mainly serves cargo transport whereas the future passenger line will be able to transfer 60 million men times each year, 6 times more than the current capacity. At each hour of each day, a passenger train will pull out from some city along the new line, thus materializng public transportation system amongst the cities close to the new route.