China is planning to construct an expressway connecting Chongqing, the largest industrial city on the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, to Changsha, capital of central China's Hunan Province.

A report containing planning and preliminary designs of the expressway has just been completed and passed acceptance of the Chinese Ministry of Communications.

The expressway will start in Luxi County in western Hunan, extend westwards, traverseJishou City, Huayuan County, Chongqing' s Tujia-Miao Autonomous County of Xiushan, and end at the Chongqing Municipality.

The section in Hunan will be 135 km, cost eight billion yuan (about US$ 963 million), and will join existing expressways linking up to Changsha. Other information about the length and investment needed for the section in Chongqing is not available.

Construction of the new expressway project will begin in October 2002. Upon completion, the trip from Jishou City, the prefectural seat of the Tujia-Miao Autonomous Prefecture of Xiangxi, to Changsha will be shortened from eight and a half hours to three hours.

Wu Jihai, head of the Tujia-Miao Autonomous Prefectural Government of Xiangxi, predicted that the new expressway would enormously improve transport conditions in western Hunan, which is inhabited by many people of the Tujia and Miao ethnic groups, and eventually improve local economic development in those mountainous areas.

(Xinhua 40/28/2001)