[photopress:beijing_traffic.jpg,full,alignright]Beijing will build more subway lines and a city rail track as well as fast bus routes as part of the 11th Five-year plan.
By 2008, in time for the Olympics and everything, at the moment, is on or before time, there will be three more subway lines and one light rail track linking the city to the airport will be complete and will go directly to the Olympic venues.
Another four lines, including some extensions to existing lines and a new line out to Yizhuang Development Zone, southeast of Beijing, will be completed by 2010.
Within the city center, there will be a subway linking Beijing Railway Station and Beijing West Railway Station.
The aim is that it will only take 50 minutes for residents inside the fifth ring road to travel within the city. People living outside the fifth ring road should be able to reach the city center within one hour and it should take suburban residents no longer than two hours. Between Beijing and surrounding cities travel should take no longer than three hours.
Then there are the roads. The plan is for 14 fast straight roads and three fast loop roads that will crisscross the whole city. There will be a few north-south and east-west main roads linking both sides of the city. It is expected that public transportation will carry approximately 40 percent of commuters every day.
Then there is parking space. Beijing’s other ambition — which, bluntly, is not achievable if any other city is a guide — is to ensure every motor vehicle has a parking space. There will be more public parking spaces made available in the city while in suburban areas, Beijing will build parking facilities where people can park their cars and then switch to public transportation.
Beijing also plans to build roads linking the city to Shijiazhuang, the capital of Hebei province, and Qinhuangdao, to the northeast of Beijing. And, while all of this is happening, Beijing will begin work on another airport before 2010; the location has already been chosen.
The extensions currently being made to the existing Beijing airport will be completed by 2008 and that will peak at 60 million passengers every year.
Then there will be an express railway between Beijing and Shanghai to bring travel time down to five hours which will cut down on some domestic flights.
Source:People’s Daily Online
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