Within recent years, China's major cities have all put the building of urban rail systems at the top of their planning lists. In the next few years, the combined length of urban railways will grow by another 400 km (249 miles) in 15 of China's big cities, involving an investment of 130 billion yuan (US$15.7 billion).

China used to depend heavily on imported equipment and facilities when building subway systems. However, the China Zhuzhou Time Group has broken this dependency by developing the core technology itself -- the auxiliary converter of the rail traction control system.

The technology has quickly been adopted in the construction of the Tsuen Wan Subway Line in Hong Kong, according to a contract signed by Zhuzhou Time and the HK Railway Co. Ltd on April 16. The company beat such international big names as Japan's Mitsubishi and Toshiba to win bids for the 70 million yuan (US$8.45 million) project.

This is seen as a breakthrough in the development of China's railway technology.

Also in April, Zhuzhou Time clinched four other contracts with urban rail builders in cities like Beijing and Nanjing with total contractual capital worth over one billion yuan (US$121 million).

According to the long-term urban development strategy drafted by a dozen Chinese cities, investment in building rail networks is estimated at some 700 billion yuan (US$85 billion). Large-scale urban rail systems will greatly ease traffic congestion problems and reduce pollution in cities and hence is supported by local governments.

China's home-grown railway technology has the obvious advantage of low cost, which meets the need for large-capacity urban rail systems.

On April 12, Beijing ordered the largest batch so far of electric carriages to be used on light rails, worth 1.2 billion yuan (US$145 billion).

The municipal government of Beijing has approved a 180 billion (US$21.7 billion) budget to improve urban infrastructure before it hosts the 2008 Olympics. Some 90 billion (US$11.9 billion) of the budget will be used on transport, of which rail will constitute an important part.

Shanghai plans to have 11 subways and seven or eight "fast rail lines" covering 6,340 square meters (7,583 sqaure yards) of urban areas, and also linking booming high-tech zones, tourist spots and Chongming Island in the city's suburban areas.

Some analysts say that strong sales of family cars in China, boosted by the recent price cut, has forced traffic authorities to seek ways to ease increasingly serious congestion in cities, leading to the construction of light rail networks. Meanwhile, awareness of the need for urban environmental protection is cited for the growth in rail traffic.

(People's Daily May 21, 2002)