It is reported that a new wave of subway construction is taking place across China with 89 urban rail transit lines covering 2,500 kilometers to be built and almost CNY 1 trillion to be invested by 2016. But while some people are applauding the ambitious efforts, others have been much more critical.
Many look forward to less traffic brought by the subways and above ground light rails, while others speculate as to whether the frenzy is part of the government effort to reinforce infrastructure building and stimulate consumption in line with a development strategy reiterated at the Central Economic Work Conference that ended recently.
China has already become the largest and the most robust urban rail transit line construction market in the world bringing over 10 billion yuan in investment annually. Currently, more than 10 Chinese cities, including Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou are running a total of 835.5 kilometers of urban rail transit lines.
In late August, officials with the Ministry of Construction revealed that the State Council had approved more rail transit projects in 22 cities across the country with the total investment topping CNY 882 billion. These include many second-tier and third-tier cities such as Wuhan, Xi'an, Harbin and Nanchang. More than 40 cities are building or planning to build rail lines.
Mr Liang Qinghuai a professor of planning and design of urban rail transit at Beijing Jiaotong University said "The construction of rail transit is essential because it is in line with the government's will to develop public transport to ease enormous traffic and environmental pressure brought by ongoing urbanization."
He said that some Chinese cities' layout and structure can't meet the requirement for public use any more due to population growth and an increasing number of private cars.