Guangzhou Urban Planning Bureau and Guangzhou Metro Corp yesterday released two metro network plans and have asked the public to indicate their choice.

Citizens may submit their opinions by fax, letter or email to either the urban planning authorities or the metro corporation for the coming half month.

"We hope our citizens' concerns and ideas will improve our metro network planning," noted Wang Mengwei, director of Guangzhou Urban Planning Bureau.

According to Lu Guanglin, general manager of Guangzhou Metro Corp, both plans would require an investment of 200 billion yuan (US$24.10 billion), 60 per cent to come from the city's fiscal and land use revenues and the remaining 40 per cent to be borrowed from banks.

And construction cost for the new metro lines stands at 400 million yuan (US$48.19 million) per kilometre.

Lu said that both plans are feasible in terms of geological conditions, construction and investment experience, engineering technology and economic risks.

And both projects fit in well with the city's overall development plans.

One of the new plans consists of 14 urban metro lines and one suburban rail line, which will add up to 537.5 kilometres to the city's metro system, while the other one consists of 15 metro lines and one suburban rail line, with a total length of 514.7 kilometres.

When the new metro network goes into operation, Lu said, a passenger can reach any traffic point, terminal or even any corner in the urban area within 30 minutes and a passenger will be able to reach the Pearl River Delta cities of Nanhai, Foshan, Shunde and Dongguan within one hour.

When the projects are completed, the general manager said, Guangzhou will be level with some developed countries in terms of metro traffic.

In a recent seminar co-organized by Foshan Daily and the Foshan Metro Corp on metro-related economy, experts said that more metro lines will particularly benefit property developers and the tourism industry in the Pearl River Delta and that more metro lines will greatly improve traffic in downtown areas.

Based on the metro planning of the 1980's, Guangzhou Metro Line 1, which is 18.48 kilometres long, has been in use since 1999.

(China Daily November 8, 2002)