The 104-year-old Shanghai West Railway Station terminal building in Zhenru will be replaced by a larger one next April as part of a traffic hub complex at the city's "west gate" linking neighboring Jiangsu Province.

The 2,000-square-meter old building will be demolished before March 15 and the new terminal will be built 50 meters to the west closer to the future transit hall and links to the Metro Line 11 and the Shanghai-Nanjing railway.

The two-story building will cover 4,000 square meters of floor space and will be one of the 17 railway stations on the inter-city railway between Shanghai and Nanjing, Jiangsu's capital.

It will also function as a hub linking railways, the Metro and bus routes.

The routes for some railway lines using the station will be changed next month with workers now digging an underground passageway to the north of the new station.

In the southwest, Metro Line 11 is under construction.

The Shanghai-Nanjing Railway will run from July 1 next year serving an estimated 16 million passengers annually and boosting the economy of Zhenru area – a sub-center of west Shanghai.

Hong Kong-based Cheung Kong (Holdings) Limited is investing 10 billion yuan (US$1.43 billion) in a development which will begin construction near the station next month or in April.

Cities linked by the railway, such as Zhenjiang, Danyang, Changzhou and Wuxi, have also begun to build new terminal buildings to boost tourism and real estate.

Zhenjiang plans a 90,000 square-meter plaza near its station promoting local food and beverages, tourism, recreation and shopping.

(Shanghai Daily February 24, 2009)