He said GDP growth in many of those areas had been independent of each other in the past, and relied mainly on real estate development and automobile sales, both of which had been run inefficiently while consuming massive resources.
Better access to fast railway links will now mean improved cargo transportation between factories in various cities, leading to greater expansion of support facilities, Wang said.
"Railways will indeed become a way to increase prosperity for so many industries," he added.
Wang calculates that a 600-billion-yuan ($96 billion) annual investment on railway construction could generate 3,000 kilometers of railway a year, which in turn could raise the country's annual GDP growth by 1.5 percentage points, and create more than 6 million jobs.
He said the country's tourism industry was likely to be one of those to most benefit from the high-speed rail development, and many in the sector have already been preparing to take advantage of the opportunities.
For instance, at Shijiazhuang Railway Station in the capital of Hebei province, which is the nearest major city to Beijing on the line, two new squares are being built together with a tourist center.
"The goal is to promote one-day trips, and to try to convert 'passing-by' passengers into 'staying over' passengers, which will really help boost the local catering and hotel industries," said Wen Hao, the director of the city's tourism office.
Apart from increasing the flow of people into the cities, the railway will also greatly increase freight traffic, he added.
Although largely being seen as a passenger line, Wu Ruliang, director of the Logistics Association of Hubei Province, said his industry will benefit greatly from the new high-speed link, and expects the cost of express delivery to drop by at least 50 percent as a result of its opening.
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