>>1213372The current updated Chinese government requirements for construction of new urban rail projects is this:
Metro: GDP 300 Billion Yuan, Local government annual income 30 Billion Yuan, Population 3 Million (urban area)
Light Rail: GDP 150 Billion Yuan, Local government annual income 15 Billion Yuan, Population 1.5 Million (urban area)
Now approximately 6.5 Yuan equal to 1 USD so that'd be 44 Billion USD GDP and 4.4 Billion USD government income for Metro construction, and 22 Billion USD GDP and 2.2 Billion USD local government income for Light Rail construction.
Also, the initial projected passenger flow should be larger than 7000/hour/km for metro and 4000/hour/km for light rail, long term projected passenger flow should exceeds 30000 and 10000 respectively
Also at least 40% construction budget should directly come from the city's budget and no loan would be allowed to kick start the project, if the city debt ratio exceeded 100%/120% then 60%/80% budget should come from the city's budget, and cities with over 150% debts are not allowed to construct new rail transit.
As an reference, there were 43 cities that obtained approval for construction of rail transit (all are metro) before this regulation come out in earlier this year, however 13 of them will not fit the new requirement. 9 of them, including Nanning, Hohhot, Baotou, Kunming, Xian, Lanzhou, Shenyang, Harbin, Guiyang have too much debt, Taiyuan have not enough regular government income, Urumqi have not enough GDP, Baotou, Lanzhou, Luoyang, Hohhot, Nantong, Fuzhou have less population than required. However, it appears that these cities that have already obtained approval before the new rule would not be affected by the new regulation.
Now, look at those smaller cities that are trying to construct these "cloud rail":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anyanghttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qufuhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guang%27anhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengbu 
