1. Basic Information of China's Transport Development in the "Eleventh Five-Year Plan" Period
1.1 Acceleration of transport infrastructure construction and improvement of transport network and structure
The overall national investment in road and waterborne transport totaled RMB 4.7 trillion in the eleventh five-year plan period which was more than doubled than the amount achieved in the tenth five-year plan period. The total mileage of the national highway network has reached 3.984 million kilometers, increasing 639,000 kilometers over the last five years. The total mileage of expressway has increased from 41,000 kilometers at the end of the tenth five-year plan period to 74,000 kilometers, marking an increase of 33,000 kilometers. The construction of five north-south and seven east-west national trunk highways has been completed thirteen years ahead of schedule, and eight inter-provincial highways across the western region have almost opened to traffic. (The eight inter-provincial highways are Arongqi-Beihai, Lanzhou-Mohan (Yunnan), Aletai-Hongqilapu, Xining-Ku'erle, Yinchuan-Wuhan, Xi'an-Hefei, Chongqing-Changsha and Chengdu-Zhangmu (Tibet)). The mileage of newly-built rural roads nationwide has reached 527,000 kilometers over the last five years, villages and towns with suitable conditions for building roads have been connected with roads.
The total number of deep-water berths of the coastal ports has reached 1,774 with an increase of 661 newly-built deep-water berths over the last five years. The handling capacity has increased by 3 billion tons, reaching 5.51 billion tons in total. Five specialized port transport system dealing with coal, oil, ore, container and grain respectively have been established. The length of newly-built and renovated inland waterways has reached 4,181 kilometers in the eleventh five-year plan period. As a result, the total length of inland waterways open to traffic has reached 124,000 kilometers, among which Class III and above waterways are 9,085 kilometers. A high class national waterway network has come into shape.
The infrastructure investment in civil aviation has reached RMB 250 billion over the last five years, which is the total amount of investment in civil aviation construction over the previous 25 years. The number of airports with scheduled flights has reached 176, increasing 35 over the last five years. Efforts have also been made on the further improvement of existing airports, thus building up a fully functional airport network with a suitable scale.
With respect to the post infrastructure construction, more than 2,500 post offices have been set up, and over 7,000 post offices in the Western region and rural areas have undergone renovation. Initiatives on "village post box" have been launched nationwide.
Transport infrastructure development has not only made a significant contribution to the national economic growth, but also to the countermeasures taken by China to respond to international financial crisis and expand domestic demand.