Showing great ambition to boost airport industry, the Chinese
mainland will invest 140 billion yuan (US$17.5 billion) in the
construction of airports during the 11th five-year plan from this
year to 2010, a Chinese official said.
"In the next five years, we are going to launch 71 airport
expansion projects, relocate 11 airports and build 49 new airports,
" Zhang Haidong, from the General Administration of Civil Aviation
of China, said at the Fifth Airport Cities World Conference and
Exhibition (ACWCE) in Hong Kong which ended Wednesday.
He expected the mainland airport industry will have an average
growth rate at 11 percent from 2006 to 2020.
Of the 40 airports worldwide, airlines, government bodies and
aviation-related organizations attending the ACWCE, 17 were from
the Chinese mainland, including Beijing Capital International
Airport, Shanghai Pudong International Airport and Guangzhou Baiyun
International Airport.
Representatives said that the Chinese mainland airport industry
is growing rapidly. As major airports are evolving from a city's
airport to an airport city, becoming the focal point of people,
cargo, capital and information flows, an airport city will be an
increasingly important economic growth engine for local and
regional development.
Beijing Capital International Airport expansion project is the
largest one of all. With a total investment of 25 billion yuan
(US$3.13 billion), the airport will become a transport hub with an
annual capacity of 90 million passengers turnover and 9 million
tons cargo turnover by 2015.
"Beijing government has listed the airport economic zone into
the 11th five-year plan. So far the free trade logistics garden
near the airport has got approval from departments concerned. The
Beijing Conference Center is also near the airport. They will
support and push forward the development of the airport economic
zone," President of Beijing Capital Airports Holding Company Li
Peiying said.
Shanghai, the single city in the Chinese mainland with two
international airports - Pudong and Hongqiao, is striving to build
an integrated complex hub, which targets at a combined capacity of
110 million passengers by 2015.
To help achieve the target, a 12 square kilometer free trade
logistics area near the airport is built in the meanwhile. The
government also has decided to build a 86 km cargo expressway as an
international passage between the airport and the Yangtze River
Delta Region, Chairman and President of Shanghai Airport Authority
Wu Nianzu said.
He added that the Beijing-Shanghai High-Speed Railway Station,
the Shanghai-Hangzhou Maglev Train Station and the Urban Terminal
for Yangtze River Delta Region will meet at Hongqiao International
Airport when the Terminal II of Pudong International Airport is
finished and starts operation in 2008.
A 100 square kilometer economic zone will be established around
the relocated Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport, housing
industrial, logistics and commercial areas, President of Guangdong
Airport Management Corporation Liu Zijing said.
With a spider-like network of expressways with the downtown of
Guangzhou, one can reach major cities in the Pearl River Delta
Region within a couple of hours departing from the Baiyun
International Airport, Liu said.
Though confident in the future of the airport industry, Zhang
Haidong admitted there remains a lot of challenges ahead. "Lack of
infrastructure and airspace capacity are our major problems," he
said.
He hoped more foreign loans and capital could be pooled to the
industry.
(Xinhua News Agency September 14, 2006)