The high-speed railway linking Zhanjiang to Guangzhou and other first-tier cities in the Pearl-River Delta will be opened in 2017, vice mayor of Zhanjiang city said yesterday.

Zhao Zhihui, vice mayor of Zhanjiang city, held an online talk with netizens concerning the city’s transportation infrastructure construction on the morning of March 27. Here are some highlights of the talk.

1. New airport to complete in 2018

The new airport in Zhanjiang city will complete construction and go into operation in 2018. The construction plan was authorized by the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) in January. The contruction project, jointly implemented by Zhanjiang government , Guangdong Airport Group and Maoming municipal government, has a planned handling capacity of 5 million people annually. It will serve a population of more than 30 million from cities like Zhanjiang, Maoming and Yunfu in West Guangdong, and Yulin in South Guangxi.

2. Zhanjiang to join high-speed railway network

Zhanjiang will be connected to several lines of high-speed railways in a few years. Zhanjiang people can take high-speed trains to Guangzhou when the Jiangmen-Maoming railway completes in 2017. Another line starting from Zhangjiajie - a tourism city in West Hunan, will also pass Zhanjiang to head for Haikou, capital city of Hainan province, a hotspot tourism island. The Zhangjiajie-Haikou High-speed Railway will be proposed to be listed into the country’s 13th Five-Year-Plan.

3. Zhanjiang Port plans further expansion

Several projects for expanding Zhanjiang Port will be initiated this year. The Nanshan Port in Xuwen county will start construction, which will become a pivot port linking Guangdong, Guangxi and Hainan provinces. Leizhou city will also construct a port area, which is to serve the Datang Thermal Power Plant and the surrounding industrial parks. The port projects in Suixi and Lianjiang, to be approved by the Ministry of Transportation and the provincial government, are expected to start in the second half of the year.

4. Highways to extend further

Zhanjiang plans to construct two highways outside the city, which will extend to Yunfu city and Yulin city respectively. The construction is expected to complete in 2017. The Leizhou-Donghai Island Highway and Zhanjiang-Xuwen Highway will also be extended. By 2020, Zhanjiang will have a total highway length of 500 kilometers, doubling the current mileage.

Zhao Zhihui answers questions from netizens about the city's transportation infrastructure construction. [Photo from yinsha.com]