The rail line, to be funded by a Chinese government-backed consortium, is just one of several high-profile projects in the valley that show the domestic benefits of a growing Chinese economy and its perils.“The project will be a landmark in overseas investment for the Chinese railway sector and serve as a model of international cooperation,” Yang Zhongmin, chairman of China Railway International, a newly formed Nevada firm owned by Chinese project backers, told Xinhua, a Chinese newspaper.The state-owned project, which could break ground as soon as September 2016, is expected to cost at least $100 million.It also is a chess move by China, which is looking to beat Japan in a race to export high-speed rail technology.

For China, the deal marks an opportunity to establish a foothold in the U.S. rail market. The largest bullet-train company in Japan had expressed interest in XpressWest several years ago but lost out. Just weeks after China won the Los Angeles-Las Vegas route, it also beat Japan in a months-long battle for an Indonesian contract to build a railway from Jakarta to Bandung.

To be fair, XpressWest is just one of a number of proposals to link Southern California and Southern Nevada that have come and gone since the 1970s. In the late 1990s, a proposal to connect Anaheim and Las Vegas with a magnetic levitation train was floated but went nowhere. In 1999, Amtrak proposed upgrading service to use high-speed Spanish-made Talgo trains, but the concept sputtered. Then there was the Z-Train, which was supposed to have gone into service in 2012. And a startup based in El Segundo, Calif., now is looking to bring Elon Musk’s Hyperloop to the route.

As Chinese capital takes a great leap outward, other projects funded by Chinese investors could take shape. Electric cars from Faraday Future, a project linked to Chinese tech conglomerate Leshi Internet Information and Technology, could roll off a production line in North Las Vegas, if a rumored tax incentive passes a special session of the Legislature that Gov. Brian Sandoval may call.

Chinese investment also has helped fund several new casinos in Las Vegas, including the Lucky Dragon, SLS Las Vegas (almost a quarter of the financing came from Chinese investment) and Resorts World Las Vegas, which broke ground in May with funding from the Genting Group, an Asian multinational corporation.