High Speed Rail - A Definition In Crisis I am growing weary of news reports talking about high speed trains when in reality the speed of these trains are not true high speed. According to Wikipedia, there is no single standard that applies worldwide, new lines in excess of 250 kilometres per hour (160 miles per hour) and existing lines in excess of 200 kilometres per hour (120 miles per hour) are widely considered to be high-speed, with some extending the definition to include lower speeds in areas for which these speeds still represent significant improvements. There is general agreement with the definition that 250 km/h on new lines and 200 km/h on existing track would constitute high speed rail. In reality many new high speed lines travel over 300 km/h. It is the last part of the Wikipedia paragraph where the definition of high speed rail gets abused. This is especially true in North America where our passenger trains run at speeds, that  in many cases, are over a half a ...