Hitting the road

If the country's railway expansion has offered people more convenient and faster ways to travel, even more are benefiting from the growth of its road network.

When the People's Republic of China was founded in 1949, the total length of its road network was a mere 80,800 km, only 30,000 km of which was paved. That figure hit 5.2 million km last year.

One of the most appealing accomplishments is the development of the national freeway system.

While developed countries, like the United States and Germany had expressway networks in place by the 1990s, China was only just starting.

Though late to the game, it has caught up fast.

The country opened its first expressway connecting Shanghai and the satellite town of Jiading, in 1988, and is now home to the world's longest expressway network, spanning 160,000 km, said Wang Songbo, deputy director of the comprehensive planning department at the Ministry of Transport.

The network will continue to grow. By the end of this year, more expressways will join the freeway network, among them freeways connecting China's future city－the Xiong'an New Area in Hebei province－with the rest of the country.

The network of seven freeways began construction in 2018 with the aim of being finished in 3 years, setting a new freeway construction speed record, said Hou Zhimin, deputy head of the transport commission of Hebei province.

According to the Xiong'an transport blueprint, seven freeways will surround the new area－three east-west expressways and four north-south ones－to serve as the city's fast-track outreach legs. Four out of the seven freeways are newly planned, and three are existing.

The fact that China is able to build four smart freeways in three years demonstrates its strength in road-building.

The new freeways meet the highest standard in expressway construction in the country and engineers have carried out intelligent transport trials.

Along the Beijing-Xiong'an freeway, 3,700 smart lamps have been installed that are able to adjust their brightness according to prevailing conditions.

"The lamps will automatically dim when it is bright enough, and switch to power-saving mode when traffic levels are lower, to save energy and reduce carbon emissions," said Zhang Mengqiang, an engineer on the freeway, adding that one lane is reserved for self-driving vehicles.

The development of China's road network has not only been about linking megacities, but also about building roads to connect with the countryside.

Once, paved roads were luxuries in cities, let alone in rural areas, but today, paved roads have been extended even to the most mountainous places.

By 2019, most villages and towns around the country had access to asphalt roads and were covered by bus services by August of last year, according to the Ministry of Transport.

In the mountainous villages of the Aba Tibetan and Qiang autonomous prefecture in Southwest China's Sichuan province, herders used to ride horses along narrow gravel roads to reach towns, and yaks were the main way of carrying cargo.

"It usually took two days for villagers to reach town to sell yaks and buy daily necessities," said He Dongming, deputy head of the transport bureau in the prefecture's Zamtang county, which is located where the provincial borders of Sichuan, Gansu and Qinghai meet.

As they were unable to transport fresh agricultural produce out of the mountains quickly enough, herders could only sell produce that could be stored, like clarified butter and cheese. Fresh produce, like milk, went bad before it could reach the market.

A 34-km country road, opened in 2018, has reduced the 2-day trip to about 40 minutes.

Zenger, one of the herders to have benefited from the new road, said that now he can sell more produce, and as a result he was able to earn 12,000 yuan ($1,880) in the summer of 2019.

Four out of the seven freeways are newly planned, and three are existing.

The fact that China is able to build four smart freeways in three years demonstrates its strength in road-building.

The new freeways meet the highest standard in expressway construction in the country and engineers have carried out intelligent transport trials.

Along the Beijing-Xiong'an freeway, 3,700 smart lamps have been installed that are able to adjust their brightness according to prevailing conditions.

"The lamps will automatically dim when it is bright enough, and switch to power-saving mode when traffic levels are lower, to save energy and reduce carbon emissions," said Zhang Mengqiang, an engineer on the freeway, adding that one lane is reserved for self-driving vehicles.

The development of China's road network has not only been about linking megacities, but also about building roads to connect with the countryside.

Once, paved roads were luxuries in cities, let alone in rural areas, but today, paved roads have been extended even to the most mountainous places.

By 2019, most villages and towns around the country had access to asphalt roads and were covered by bus services by August of last year, according to the Ministry of Transport.

In the mountainous villages of the Aba Tibetan and Qiang autonomous prefecture in Southwest China's Sichuan province, herders used to ride horses along narrow gravel roads to reach towns, and yaks were the main way of carrying cargo.

"It usually took two days for villagers to reach town to sell yaks and buy daily necessities," said He Dongming, deputy head of the transport bureau in the prefecture's Zamtang county, which is located where the provincial borders of Sichuan, Gansu and Qinghai meet.

As they were unable to transport fresh agricultural produce out of the mountains quickly enough, herders could only sell produce that could be stored, like clarified butter and cheese. Fresh produce, like milk, went bad before it could reach the market.

A 34-km country road, opened in 2018, has reduced the 2-day trip to about 40 minutes.

Zenger, one of the herders to have benefited from the new road, said that now he can sell more produce, and as a result he was able to earn 12,000 yuan ($1,880) in the summer of 2019.

According to the ministry, China's rural roads now extend to 4.35 million km, and account for about 84 percent of the total road network.