Two new highways are planned for China

In China, the news that the construction industry has been waiting for came with an announcement over infrastructure spending. The Chinese Government said it will invest heavily in infrastructure spending over the next few years, some US$157 billion, particularly in extending the country’s high speed rail network. Some $4.45 billion will be invested in transport infrastructure in 2012. Of the total, $790 million will go on rural road improvements, of which 88% will be used in the central and western regions

Work on the new 218.5-kilometre Mianyang-Jiuzhaigou Expressway in Sichuan province, China is expected to begin later this year. Upon completion of the US$4.91 billion (CNY 30.58 billion) megaproject, the travel time from Chengdu city in the province to Jiuzhaigou via the expressway will take only 210 minutes. The expressway is expected to be completed within 60 months and is scheduled to be operational no later than 31 December 2018. Meanwhile, construction of the Ziyuan-Xing'an highway has fully started.

Plans are in hand for transport expansion in China. This includes major works in the Chinese provinces of Hubei and Hebei as well as the city of Yibin. In Hubei province the infrastructure programme calls for 6,500km of highway to be complete by the end of 2015. Hubei Province has spent US$17.07 billion in the first three years of the 12th Five-Year Period (2011-2015) on highway construction. At the moment, 2,278km of highway is under construction in the province. Meanwhile Hebei Province plans to spend $3.

China’s fast growing vehicle population is posing major challenges for traffic management, especially in major urban areas. Traffic congestion is already a serious problem in the capital Beijing and other major cities; Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzen, Tianjin, Dongugan, Hangzhou and Chengdu.