Europe is quite a bit behind China in terms of high speed rail and freight rail, actually. Because Europe is not one country, there's an absolute mess of different railway standards, including different gauges, electrification systems, signalling systems, and manual couplers that are inefficient. For example, that trip from Lisbon to Moscow would require at least 3 gauge changes along the way. China has one main rail gauge and one uniform system, allowing wagons full of freight to ride on one railway network all the way from Xinjiang to Beijing.
Europe is quite a bit behind China in terms of high speed rail and freight rail, actually. Because Europe is not one country, there's an absolute mess of different railway standards, including different gauges, electrification systems, signalling systems, and manual couplers that are inefficient. For example, that trip from Lisbon to Moscow would require at least 3 gauge changes along the way. China has one main rail gauge and one uniform system, allowing wagons full of freight to ride on one railway network all the way from Xinjiang to Beijing.