Guangdong plans to invest 76.3 billion yuan (US$11.2 billion) to build five expressways in the province with the tendering process to commence soon, the Guangzhou Daily reported on Monday.

All five projects will be treated as a whole and be built under two contracts, according to the rules of the upcoming tender process. Each project is also scheduled to take three years to complete.

The Jiangmen-Luoding Expressway, a 147.7-km trunk line in the province’s planned expressway networks, is scheduled to be built between 2010 and 2013 at a cost of 16.78 billion yuan. The designed speeds for vehicles are 100 km/h and 120 km/h.

The expressway, upon opening to traffic, is expected to significantly shorten the travel time from Jiangmen to Luoding, as well as that from Zhongshan and Jiangmen to neighboring Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region.

The other four will be located outside of the Pearl River Delta, totaling 632 km in length and costing 59.55 billion yuan.

(chinadaily.com.cn June 17, 2009)