Infrastructure

Jiangsu has coordinated efforts in advancing the pilot project of boosting China’s strength in transportation and building a transportation modernization demonstration zone. With a focus on prioritizing key areas, addressing inadequacies and shoring up points of weakness, the province has accelerated steps to develop a comprehensive modern transportation system and worked vigorously to implement major infrastructure projects, hence a more well-rounded comprehensive transportation network. Jiangsu thus has moved further toward a leading province in transportation. Expressways are directly accessible by all counties in the province and cover all the cities and towns with a population exceeding 100,000. Ratio of ordinary state and provincial Class-I trunk roads is the highest in China. Expansion projects of Gaochun-Xuancheng Expressway, Liyang-Ningde Expressway, Yancheng-Sheyang Expressway and Nanjing-Ma’anshan Expressway have been completed and opened to traffic. Total length of highways in Jiangsu reached 158,000 km in 2022, including 5,087 km of expressways. With the Nanjing-Yancheng railway connection line put into operation, the total length of railways across the province has amounted to 4,276.9 km, of which 2,217.6 km are high-speed rail lines, taking the national lead in China. The province has managed to connect all its prefecture-level cities with bullet trains and 12 of them with high-speed trains. With that, the framework of a “Jiangsu on the tracks” has largely taken shape. Nine cities across the province have opened a total of 33 urban rail transit lines, with the operating mileage surpassing 1,000 km, coming in second in China. Jiangsu houses nine transport airports and eight A1-Type general aviation airports, making it possible to reach all counties (county-level cities) within 90 minutes by ground transportation. 41 integrated passenger transport hubs have been put in place, covering all prefecture-level cities. Jiangsu has devoted more energy to building a distinctive province in water transport. The province’s navigable inland waterways registered a total mileage of roughly 24,000 km, accounting for one-fifth of the national total; graded waterways measured about 8,813 km, occupying one-seventh of the national total, with both the mileage and density ranking first in China. High-level navigable inland waterways of grade-IV or above reported a mileage of 3,281 km and the mileage of provincial up-to-standard trunk waterways hit 2,488 km. Jiangsu is possessed of 6,406 productive port berths, 560 berths of 10,000-tonne-class or above and seven big ports with a cargo throughput of 200 million tonnes each. The ports’ comprehensive annual handling capacity added up to 2.62 billion tonnes and the annual throughput came to 3.24 billion tonnes, both ranking No.1 in China. A total of 18 river-crossing passages have been up and running, and nine are under construction, ensuring direct links between prefecture-level cities on both banks of the Yangtze River. A total of 15 counties (county-level cities and districts) were engaged in the rural road construction project, and 11 of them were identified as National Model Counties for Rural Roads with Good Construction, Management, Maintenance and Operation. Jiangsu is also a front-runner in rounding off the Changzhou pilot project construction for the new generation of national traffic control network with the very first state-level testing center for intelligent commercial vehicles in China. It has emerged as China’s first demonstration province for green, circular and low-carbon development of transport by rolling out the first action plan for new infrastructure construction in transport in China and releasing standard guidelines on smart highways, waterways and construction sites.

Mobility Service

The development of a “high-quality mobility circle” is picking up pace. A “one-hour high-speed rail circle” has taken shape in the core areas of the Yangtze River Delta (Shanghai, Nanjing and Hangzhou). It takes at most 2 hours to travel from any prefecture-level city in the province to Nanjing, and 2.5 hours to travel between prefecture-level cities. The “one schedule for each day” coordination mechanism for railway passenger transportation was set up, and high-speed rail shuttle bus services reached out to eight counties (county-level cities, districts) with 11 routes, short-listed as an innovation project for passenger transport connecting services under the auspices of China’s Ministry of Transport and a typical case of Jiangsu pilot programs for boosting China’s strength in transportation. Vigorous efforts were made to promote equal access to basic public services in transportation and facilitate integrated development of urban and rural transportation. Jiangsu ranks among the top in the country in terms of the number of urban public transport vehicles and lines as well as the operating mileage. Satisfaction rate in public transport took the first place in China for three years running. Nanjing, Suzhou, Kunshan, Changzhou and Yangzhou bagged in succession the title of National Exemplary City for Public Transport Development. Changzhou, Yangzhou and Kunshan were rated by the provincial government as the Provincial Public Transport Priority Exemplary Cities. The initiative to stimulate green mobility was carried out across the board, with Nanjing and the other 10 cities having passed the national up-to-standard evaluation for green mobility. Jiangsu witnessed continuous improvement in urban and rural coordinated development in transportation. Public transport covers almost all its towns and villages. A three-year action plan for urban-rural public transport integration was drawn up and put into practice. All the prefecture-level cities have reached the top 5A level in integrated development of urban and rural transport. Yixing and Yangzhong stood among the national first exemplary counties for urban-rural transport integration. Haimen, Yandu and Taicang made the list of the second national exemplary counties for urban-rural transport integrated development. Jiangsu worked together with Shanghai, Zhejiang and Anhui to release the Guidelines on Inter-provincial Adjacent Destinations Bus Operation Services in the Yangtze River Delta as a local standard in the YRD, opening another seven inter-provincial bus lines that connect adjacent areas and 13 intra-provincial lines linking adjacent destinations. Five new service facilities on ordinary national and provincial highways were commissioned, bringing the total tally to 148. Coverage rate of charging poles reached 42.5%. Barrier-free facilities could be found in all the 115 pairs of expressway service areas across the province. 16 battery swap stations in service areas were in place. The province took the lead in popularizing the application of active safety intelligent prevention and control system which was installed in the 42,000 vehicles for road passenger transport, tourism transport and hazardous chemicals transport across the province. The driver before-departure assessment prompt system was widely promoted, covering 88% of the enterprises engaged in road passenger transport, tourism transport and hazardous chemicals transport and poised to reach the fields of heavy-type general cargo vehicles and buses. The phase-IV container terminal of the Jiangsu Suzhou Taicang Port stood out as the first inland river automated terminal in the Yangtze River Basin. An electronic channel map of the inland river arteries measuring 2,500 km was generated including the entire Jiangsu section of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal. Jiangsu blazed new trails in providing the “Beidou Plus Water Navigation” accompanying services, with the “Beidou Navigation Service System for Inland Waterway Vessels” selected as one of the 50 key projects under the Smart Jiangsu Initiative in 2022.