Shenzhen will need 120 billion yuan of investment to extend its urban rail length by 365 km in the next 25 years, according to the government's urban planning report.
The report has just passed experts' appraisal by the city's urban planning commission.
The experts expect that Shenzhen will have 500,000 minibuses and cars by 2010, which will satiate the city's traffic capacity in rush hours. It is urgent to build an urban rail traffic system to ease the congestion, they said.
China's first economic zone, built 21 years ago, Shenzhen has become an economic powerhouse in south China's Guangdong Province with great potential for high-tech industries.
It won the title of the world's most beautiful garden city last year. However, the modern city with skyscrapers and flyovers does not yet have urban rail traffic.
Of the planned rail construction, 80 to 100 km will be subways, and the rest will be a ground-level light rail system or elevated railway.
(People's Daily December 12, 2001)
