The idea of constructing a railway linking Canton and Kowloon in Hong Kong, a British crown colony germinated in the late Qing dynasty. In 1899, Britain and the Qing government agreed to construct the Kowloon–Canton railway, but Britain postponed the construction as Britain was busy at the Second Boer War in Africa. In 1907, Qing government and Britain formally signed an agreement in Peking on issuing a £100-million bond as part of loan for the construction of the Chinese section of the Kowloon–Canton railway. In July 1907, construction of the British Section of the KCR began. The construction of Chinese section was delayed and only started in 1909. Under the loan contract, China needed to employ the British engineers for the construction of Chinese section, but China still employed famous Chinese railway engineers, Zhan Tianyou, as a consultant. On 8 October 1911, the Chinese section of KCR with total length of was opened. The northern end of railway at that time was located in Dashatou, Guangzhou, where was demolished in 1951. The through train service between Kowloon and Guangzhou also started to operate at the same time. After the establishment of People's Republic of China in October 1949, the 'Chinese section of the Canton–Kowloon railway' was renamed 'Guangshen railway', and repair the railroad damaged during the war. In 1967, railway department carried out a comprehensive maintenance on Guangshen railway to improve the transport capacity. From 1980s, since the economic reform policy of China, the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone was established. The rapid economic development in the Pearl River Delta region brought large amount of importing goods and passengers to the railway. Therefore, the second line of Guangshen Railway was constructed during 1984–1987 in order to meet the huge demand. Simultaneously Guangshen Railway Company, which was directly subordinated to the Guangzhou Railway Bureau, was established. This company was in charge of the construction works and operational management of Guangshen Railway. In 1987, Guangshen railway became the first double-track railway in Guangdong province.
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Indeed, Guangshen railway is the first place in China to carry out successfully speed-up on the existing railroad. At the beginning of the 1990s, Guangzhou Railway Bureau and the Ministry of Railways carried out the pre-feasibility research about raising the maximum speed of passenger trains to 160 km/h. At 28 December 1991, the construction of the third line of Guangshen railway, and the speed-up improvement works of original double tracks started. In October 1994, the maximum speed of a train reached 174 km/h during the test. At 22 December 1994, the first sub-high speed passenger train in China started commercial operation between Guangzhou and Shenzhen. In 1998, the electrification of two sub-high speed lines of Guangshen railway was finished. After the improvement the 200 km/h high speed trains are allowed to run on the existing subhigh speed railroad. A Swedish-built X 2000tilting train called 'Xinshisu' began to serve intercity train service between Guangzhou and Shenzhen, as well as the through train to Hong Kong. The train are 165m long, consisting of a power car, five passenger cars, and a trailing car. The non-power cars can have a pitch of up to 8 degrees. They are noted for being very quiet even at 200 km/h. Construction of the fourth track was commenced at 31 December 2005, and was finished at 18 April 2007 in time for the Sixth Speed-Up Campaign. Since then Guangshen railway has been the first four-track railway in mainland China and it allows passenger trains and freight trains to run on separate lines.
Guangshen intercity trains
As of 2007, intercity train service between Guangzhou and Shenzhen uses 8-car CRH1A highspeed EMU. There are 100 pairs of trains operated daily, in which 98 pairs will stop for 1.5 minutes at three stations: Zhangmutou, Dongguan and Shilong. On the 'As-frequent-as-buses' basis, one pair of trains is dispatched every 5 minutes on average during peak hours. The fastest journey time is 52 minutes between Guangzhou East and Shenzhen for D7002 and D7008 with no stop.
Rolling stock
Stations
Stations with services
Most of the stations on the line are now abandoned for passenger service. Currently, the only stations on the line offering passengers service are, in order:
