Remember, Hong Kong's glittering massive skyline, the largest collection of skyscrapers on the planet, containing some of the tallest buildings in the world; were all built using bamboo scaffolding and the Lion Rock spirit.

states "plastic sheeting covering scaffolding erected around buildings under construction, demolition, renovation or repair should be flame retardant." Examples of recognized Chinese, British and American standards are listed below:

HK Building Department Practice Notes for Authorized Persons, Registered Structural Engineers and Registered Geotechnical Engineers APP-70 "Use of Plastic Sheet to Cover Scaffolding Outside Buildings" and HK Labor Department "Code of Practice for Bamboo Scaffolding Safety"...

and flammable styrofoam used to board up windows (not common I think it was done here to protect the glass) that caused the fire to spread quickly. Bamboo does not catch fire that easily, shown by how most of the bamboo scaffolding remained intact after the tragedy. Under...

But Central Yards is pretty cool so I guess it's great Henderson Land is glazing it.

Background:

That being said Line 24 will have similar standards to Line 8 (6 car Type A trains) but will be built with higher line speeds (100kph vs 80kph of Line 8). So looking forward to this addition to the rapidly growing Guangzhou Metro network. (END)

BUT the project is now called the "Line 8 Northern Extension and Southern Branch". Guangzhou Metro hid an entirely new line (Line 24) in an innocuously named extension the project. (probs to make it easier to get approval) 🤣😂 Only in China do you disguise a 30km line as a simple "extension project".

There will be a same direction cross platform interchange between Line 8 and 24 at Jiangfu and connection tracks between the two lines are planned in, should the future need some thru op reverse branch craziness between Line 8 and 24....

So magic happens and the original Line 8 northern northern extension (right) got cut back, the branch and northern section to Guangzhou North Railway station is combined to become a new 40km long Line, Line 24. (left)...

.... the new regulations on urban line length means the longer slog from Guangzhou North Station via Line 8 (blue in previous map) can not exist. So the plan below can not just be an extension of Line 8 with a branch line...

This new regulation led to the explosion of high speed metro lines and long metro lines with higher operating speeds and passing loops for express/local services being constructed accross China. But more importantly for our case....

See below in blue for this monster branch line. Pink is the other direct branch, as shown in the previous train service diagram. However, new regulations restrict the route length of urban metro lines to prevent long unwieldly lines proposed in this plan....

The leg going thru the original Line 8 and the proposed Eastern Extension (both in blue below) would create a 80km long service with tight urban stop spacings and only 80kph running....

A complicated service was proposed for this project with L8 trains from Guangzhou N Station reverse branching with one leg going thru original L8 and beyond via Eastern Ext (blue) and the other a direct route to Guangzhou center (dashed red line in previous map, pink line here)....

Later a southern branch paralleling Line 8 heading into Guangzhou city center was added to the Line 8 Northern Northern Extension proposal (red dashed line). Just cause....

Originally Line 8 was planned heading to Guangzhou North Railway station in Huadu District in a project called the Northern Northern Extension (八號綫北北延段) as there was already was a Northern Extension underway from Cultural Park to Baiyunhu (白云湖) which today called Jiaoxin...

Line 24 is part of the "Line 8 Northern Extension and Southern Branch" project which started construction in 2023, adding +30km of additional under construction metro, cementing Guangzhou-Foshan with the largest metro expansion program in the world. However the project looks insanely strange...