Shadowing Practice: Vietnam’s $67BN Gamble on High-Speed Rail - Learn English Speaking with YouTube
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Vietnam is spending 17% of its entire GDP on one enormous mega bill.
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Vietnam is spending 17% of its entire GDP on one enormous mega bill.
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It's honestly pretty hard to imagine any other country on the planet doing that.
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But Vietnam is in a pretty good place right now.
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It's one of the fastest growing economies in Asia And you can see it.
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The country is in the midst of a building spree.
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New airports, new mega airports, new stadiums, new roads.
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And the World Bank forecasts this growth to just keep, well, growing.
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But it hasn't always been like this.
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And this remarkable reinvention could be more fragile than anyone would like to admit.
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This is the $67 billion North-South Railway,
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a gigantic high-speed line that'll run up the entire spine of the country,
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all the way from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City.
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It could quite literally be the mega project that will make or break Vietnam.
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HS2, the UK's troubled high-speed rail project,
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is one of the most expensive railways in the world.
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By some estimates, the cost of constructing it amounts to roughly 2.3 to 3% of the UK's entire annual GDP.
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While China's Three Gorges Dam a megaproject so enormous it actually slowed the rotation of the Earth,
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cost around 0.5% of China's GDP.
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To look closer to home,
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Indonesia spent roughly 0.55% of its GDP on a high-speed rail line from Jakarta to Bandung.
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We're telling you this to really put into perspective how enormous 17% is for Vietnam.
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It's the most expensive infrastructure project in the country's history, period.
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But the critical question isn't even whether they can afford it,
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it's whether they can afford not to.
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I talked to Dr. Scott McDonald,
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a lecturer at RMIT Vietnam based in Ho Chi Minh City.
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He explained to me that Vietnam is at a crucial tipping point.
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But it's constraining the economic growth in the country by not having a good rail system in place.
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The solution?
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To build an entirely new,
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1541km long new rail line.
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So far we've kind of talked about this project as numbers on a screen,
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but for you guys to really get a sense of it,
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we need to show you how big it really is.
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Thanks to the Mercator projection,
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most people have a pretty incorrect idea of the true size of Vietnam.
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If we overlaid it on the US,
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it would reach from New York to Miami.
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Over the In the UK,
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it would go from Scotland to Spain.
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This country is long and building a rail line up and down it is an enormous task.
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Just ask the French.
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They spent around 50 years building some 2,600 kilometres of rail throughout Vietnam.
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You know, obviously originally built during the French occupation back in the late 1800s and they've continued the same system since then.
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They've upgraded from steam engines to diesel engines,
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but the same one-meter gauge track has been used since then.
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Most countries using their rail system as kind of the backbone for transportation.
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In this country, it's maybe 6% of freight actually moves via the rail.
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Because it's so slow, it takes 30 plus,
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sometimes 35 hours just to get from Ho Chi Minh City up to Hanoi.
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So the rail system is pretty much used for tourists.
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This railway is part of the bottleneck that's choking the country.
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In many places it's just a single line and that line is old and in constant need of repairs and maintenance.
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Thanks to Vietnam's geography, it's also often extremely difficult to get that maintenance to the right place in time.
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The new project would add
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that 1,541 kilometres of high-speed track from Hanoi in the north
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all the way down to Ho Chi Minh City in the south.
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Each of these cities, along with Da Nang,
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are crucial epicentres for the country.
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10 million of Vietnam's 100 million people live in Ho Chi Minh.
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It's the country's largest city and its economic powerhouse.
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It's also set to grow.
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A lot.
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Some estimates predict an extra 4 million people moving here in the next few years.
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Hanoi comes in a close second with more than 8 million people.
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Right now, a journey between these two cities would take at least 30 hours.
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The new high-speed rail line would cut that down to just six.
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Aside from improving transport between these two hubs,
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a high-speed line would also connect rural communities.
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Suddenly, trade, ideas, people could all be shared on a massive scale.
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It's hard to overstate how big an impact this would have on the economy and the people of this nation.
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Currently, there are no renderings of how the train itself will actually look,
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but I really want to see what it looks like
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and I don't want to let something as simple as it not existing yet stop me.
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This is why I love Rayon Design,
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a state of the art CAD platform built for interior designers
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and architects that's fully web based and effortlessly fits in with modern workflows.
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Typically you might use Rayon to design commercial or residential projects,
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but in reality you can create whatever you want.
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For example, as a fan of remote working,
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I've built this recording studio on rails.
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I can put my set up here,
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soundproof the walls and get some big windows in so I can look out over the gorgeous Vietnamese coast.
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And okay, sure, this might not be what ends up getting built,
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but you never know, they might see this video and feel inspired.
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Almost as inspired as you'll feel working with Rayon's intuitive interface.
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Here, you can design, edit,
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document, and present all in the same place.
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Rayon's got your back, from initial drawings to final live presentations that will impress any client.
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But they haven't dipped their focus when it comes to being a heavy lifting CAD software.
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Their extensive library has over 10,000 CAD blocks,
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all in top, front and side views.
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So if you're an architect or an interior designer,
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why not try a round design today for free by scanning the QR code on screen
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or clicking the link in the description.
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While I'm thinking about it,
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why stop at just a recording studio?
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I could put a squat rack in one of these carriages.
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Maybe that's the thing that all major railways these days are missing.
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To really understand just how transformative high-speed rail can be,
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we have to look at where it came from.
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You probably know it by a different name,
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Shinkansen, or in English, the bullet train.
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Japan's high-speed rail story began in the early 1960s at a moment
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when the country was rebuilding itself after the destruction of the Second World War.
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With its economy growing at an unprecedented speed and its cities straining under the pressure of overcrowded rail lines,
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Japan made a radical decision.
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Instead of upgrading existing tracks,
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it would build an entirely new railway designed from the ground up for speed.
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The result was the Shinkansen,
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opened in 1964 just in time for the Tokyo Olympics.
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It was the world's first true high-speed rail line,
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connecting Tokyo and Osaka and cutting journey times almost in half.
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But at the time it was an enormous financial risk.
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Costs ballooned, the project faced political opposition and critics questioned whether passengers would even come.
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They were wrong.
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The Shinkansen proved not just to be fast,
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but reliable, safe and completely transformative.
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It reshaped Japan's cities, opened up rural areas and set the template for every high-speed rail network that followed.
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So what made this radical new rail line so fast?
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Well first off, by building an entirely new line,
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they separated freight from passenger trains.
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which had previously all shared the same track and helped to make the route more congested.
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On top of that, this new route was designed to be as straight as possible,
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allowing the trains to go fast.
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Really, really fast.
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At the time, it was around 200km an hour.
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The new line used a wider gauge too – 4'8",
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instead of the 3'6", you'd find out on the traditional lines.
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That improved stability at higher speeds,
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reduced sway and allowed for more powerful train designs.
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Over time, these designs steadily became more aerodynamic,
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with smooth car bodies and rounded noses.
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The aim was to reduce overall air resistance,
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and they've only got better at that over time.
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The original line reportedly covered its construction cost within seven years because of the incredible demand for tickets.
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In 1964, 23 million passengers used the bullet train.
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Today, that number is more than 400 million.
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The project helped spur Japan's post-war economic miracle,
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boosting the country to become,
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at its height, the second largest economy in the world.
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Regions connected to the Shinkansen lines experienced a 20% increase in productivity,
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while the now interconnected Tokyo-Osaka mega-region has become one of the largest economic corridors in the world,
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accounting for 40% of Japan's GDP.
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Now, China took this concept and did what China does best – scaled it.
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Massively.
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In less than a decade,
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they built a high-speed rail network larger than any other country.
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More than two-thirds of the world's high-speed rail now sits in China.
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Its drastically cut journey times,
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improved passenger safety, reduced carbon emissions and facilitated labour mobility.
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from provincial or less developed areas now have access to the country's booming metropolises.
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Studies also found that tourism increased 20% in provinces connected by high-speed rail and generated 25% more revenue as a direct result.
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In 2024, China's National Railway handled a record 4 billion passenger trips,
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with daily traffic reaching nearly 21 million people.
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That's the equivalent of moving one-third of the United Kingdom every single day.
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The railways have acted as a foundation,
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connecting the country on a truly unprecedented scale and facilitating enormous economic growth as a direct result.
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You can see then why Vietnam would want to invest in this kind of infrastructure.
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But building a high-speed railway isn't as simple as building a regular old railway.
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In order for it to be as effective as possible,
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the line has to be as straight and flat as possible.
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is basic physics.
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At low speeds, tight curves are fine,
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but at high speeds the same curve becomes dangerous or wildly uncomfortable.
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The faster you go, the more force you feel at every turn.
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So immediately we have a problem.
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This is the ideal line.
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And this is Vietnam's line.
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Once you leave the urban areas of Ho Chi Minh City and Tanoi and approach central Vietnam,
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Things get tricky, to say the least.
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The Annamite Mountains run close to the coast and essentially block the path of any future track.
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Teams will have to bore through it and that won't be easy.
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This range is a fractured landscape of limestone mountains and unstable karst geology where tunneling carries a constant risk of collapse.
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You know, Vietnam only has roughly about 20% flat land.
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The rest is all mountains and valleys and rivers over 2,000 rivers between here and Hanoi that have to be crossed."
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Further south, the line has to cross the Mekong Delta,
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a vast floodplain of soft,
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waterlogged soils that honestly behave less like solid ground and more like slurry.
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Extensive ground treatment and continuous maintenance is all going to be required to help keep any high-speed tracks stable.
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It's very similar to what Japan actually faced with their own rail system.
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You know, they're not exactly flatland either.
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Japan is now widely regarded as the global benchmark for tunneling and seismic rail engineering.
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10% of the route is going to be tunneled,
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but 60% of it is going to have to be up on bridges and viaducts.
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That's far more than you typically see on a standard route and is part of what makes this project so incredibly expensive.
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Also with flood risks, Vietnam is very prone,
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especially lately, with climate change and whatnot to typhoons and landslides and heavy rains, everything else.
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And they tend to take out bridges and things like this.
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So the viaduct is one way to kind of raise above that flood risk.
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Now electrification is definitely another challenge because the current system is all run by diesel locomotives.
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So there's no electrification anywhere,
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which again is more costs involved in that too.
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And before all of this,
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there's one very crucial thing Vietnam needs first.
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Land.
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This will be the largest land clearance exercise in the country's history,
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and it will have to be done through some of Vietnam's most densely populated urban areas,
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many of which are characterised by informal developments.
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That's already raised concerns.
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While the Vietnamese government holds sweeping powers to acquire land for major infrastructure projects,
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compensation is frequently set below market value,
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making displacement a politically sensitive issue.
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Unlike most countries, all land in Vietnam is formerly owned by the state,
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with individuals and businesses granted land use rights rather than freehold ownership.
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In theory, that can simplify large-scale acquisition and remove many of the legal obstacles
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that big route projects in other countries tend to run into.
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I've never had much experience in a country like this where it has the one-party system.
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In my mind, I always thought that the one party is the law, right?
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They do whatever they want to do.
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But that's not quite the case.
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They still have to compensate.
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In practice, it shifts the challenge from the courts more directly onto the state.
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It's going to take an unprecedented level of coordination to relocate communities and keep this project moving.
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And as we understand it,
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those landowners have every right to sue the government if they they wish.
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In other words, this whole thing is going to be far from easy.
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There's also another pretty key factor in all this.
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Vietnam has never done anything like this before,
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so naturally they're going to have to import a lot of talent to get it built.
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The country has limited experience,
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even with modern electrified double track rail,
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and has struggled with just metro projects.
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In fact, those metro projects have kind of been testing ground for the construction of high-speed rail.
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The other skill gap area is operational.
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Train drivers, maintenance technicians, safety inspectors.
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But this requires a culture of precision and safety that has to be developed from scratch.
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The Ministry of Transport even warned that without early workforce development plans,
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Vietnam can have no choice but to depend on foreign experts.
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the line will either way require some kind of foreign investment.
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The key question really isn't which country's trains Vietnam is going to buy
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but which partner is best going to facilitate that genuine technology transfer.
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Vietnam doesn't want to just purchase trains,
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it wants to eventually manufacture and maintain them domestically.
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Spending this much on one infrastructure project could crowd out spending on other areas like education,
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healthcare, or even improving the regional rail that's already there.
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It's also not clear whether people are actually going to use the new railway.
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Vietnam has frequent, cheap domestic flights,
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and the flight corridor between Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City is one of the busiest in the entire world.
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11 million people travel annually.
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Now, if the high-speed rail can capture even 50% of that market,
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the government has already stated that that they're going to cap the fares at 75% of airline tickets.
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This project has been debated for 15 years already,
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but right now could be the perfect time to pull it off.
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Vietnam is on a roll.
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It's got a good hand and it's playing it well.
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But with a gamble this big,
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it really needs to pay off.
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This video was sponsored by Rayon Design.
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Don't forget that if you're a professional interior designer or an architect,
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you're want to check out round design for yourself for free at the link in the description
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and as always guys if you enjoyed this video
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and you want to get more from the definitive video channel for construction make sure you're subscribed to the b1m
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Why practice speaking with this video?
Engaging with the video "Vietnam’s $67BN Gamble on High-Speed Rail" provides an excellent opportunity for english speaking practice. The content discusses a monumental infrastructure project, making it not only informative but also ideal for learners who want to enhance their vocabulary related to economics, transport, and development. By analyzing such topics, you expose yourself to diverse grammatical structures and the nuances of formal English presentation.
Employing the shadowing technique while following along with the speaker allows you to mimic intonation, pace, and emotion. This method encourages a deeper understanding of context and fluency, making it an effective strategy for improving communication skills. Additionally, discussing economic growth and infrastructure can lead to rich conversations with fellow learners or in practical settings.
Grammar & Expressions in Context
- Present Continuous Tense: The speaker often uses the present continuous to discuss ongoing situations. For instance, phrases like "is spending," and "is in the midst of," depict actions currently happening.
- Comparative Structures: Expressions such as "more fragile than anyone would like to admit" exemplify how to make comparisons, an essential skill in persuasive and descriptive speaking.
- Modal Verbs: The use of modal verbs like "could" in "it could quite literally be the mega project" conveys possibility, which adds a layer of speculation in discussions.
- Complex Sentences: The speaker formulates sentences with multiple clauses. For example, "Vietnam is at a crucial tipping point, but it's constraining economic growth by not having a good rail system." Understanding this structure can enhance your sentence formation skills.
Common Pronunciation Traps
Watch out for specific terms and phrases that may pose challenges in improving english pronunciation. Words like "infrastructure," "economy," and "railway" might be tricky due to their syllable stress. The speaker's accent, which may include specific regional intonations, can also influence how these words are articulated.
Using a shadowing app can be incredibly beneficial here, as you practice repeating these words directly after the speaker to ensure you capture the right sounds and rhythms. Pay close attention to the speaker's pronunciation of "Vietnam," which may differ from what you're accustomed to, and the phrase "mega project," which combines words that flow quickly together. Focusing on these commonly mispronounced phrases will significantly help you sound more natural in conversations.
Engaging with this video not only enriches your vocabulary and understanding of complex topics but also presents practical opportunities to shadowspeak, leading to noticeable improvements in your speaking skills.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.
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