A public park is being built in downtown Nanjing, capital of east China's Jiangsu Province, where 6,600 people can take refuge in case of earthquake.

Zhao Bing, an engineer with the Nanjing Seismological Bureau, said Tuesday the park, which will cover an area of 16 hectares, would be open to visitors in the first half of the year.

"The park can play a pivotal role as a place of refuge in case of earthquake for people coming from the downtown district crowded with skyscrapers," he said.

He said the park has been designed with underground living facilities to accommodate 6,600 people for a month. It has a food warehouse, clinics, garbage disposal facilities and a helipad, or helicopter landing pad.

Xu Hong, head of the municipal parks bureau, said that many Chinese cities have beefed up earthquake evacuation facilities in wake of the magnitude-8 Wenchuan earthquake that hit China's southwestern Sichuan province in 2008.

He said the nation's capital, Beijing, has 15 parks suitable for earthquake evacuation with the capacity to accommodate 200,000 people.

(Xinhua News Agency February 17, 2010)