On Dec 26, theopening ceremonyfor the start of major projects was held in December 2019 in in Zigui County, Yichang City, and theconstruction12 projects with a total investment of nearly 12 billion yuan was kicked off. Among them, the starting construction of the Maoping Port Railway recognized as a three gorges hub and the south of Yangtze River Oil and Gas Pipeline over the dam were built as more key projects of Yichang’s port-based national logistics hub.
On behalf of Zhou Ji, Municipal Party Secretary, Zhang Jiasheng, deputy secretary of the municipal party committee and mayor, announced the start of construction. Yuan Weidong, the deputy secretary of the municipal party committee and secretary of the political and legal committee of the municipal party committee, leaders of the standing committee of the municipal people’s congress, the municipal government and the municipal CPPCC, as well as officials of the China Railway 20thBureau Group co., ltd attended theopening ceremony.
In recent years, the municipal party committee and the municipal government regarded Yichang Urban Construction Investment Holding Group as the subject of investment, construction and operation to build the transportation system over the Three Gorges Dam with the FanbaExpressway along the north and south of the Yangtze River, the Zigui Port of the upper dam, Baiyang Port of the lower dam, the Zigui, Baiyang Port Railway and Oil Product Fanba Pipeline in the South of the Yangtze River, that is, “two roads, two ports, two railways and one pipe” at its core, which plays an active role in unblocking the Yangtze River golden waterway. In September of this year, Yichang, as the only one in Hubei Province and one of the five hubs in central areas, was successfully listed among the first batch of national logistics hubs.
The Maoping Port Railway for relieving port pressure and the oil and gas pipeline project in the south of the Yangtze River are important parts of the Three Gorges Fanba Transportation System, and they are also significant key projects tobuild Yichang into a port-based national logistics hub.
As Zigui’s first railway, the Maoping Port Railway with a total investment of 3.516 billion yuan, from the west end of Yichang South Station of Yichang-WanzhouRailway, passes through Dianjun District, Yiling District, Zigui County of Yichang City, and finally to Maoping PortDistrict, with a total length of more than 39 km. The whole line consists of four stations: Yichangnan, Shiliping, Zigui and Maoping Port.
With a total investment of 6.54 billion yuan, the oil and gas pipeline project in the south of the Yangtze River is planned to use the “water-pipe-water” mode to transport the oil product from the lower reaches of the Yangtze River through the Three Gorges Dam to the Sichuan-Chongqing areas, and in the meantime to transport methanol in an opposite direction. After going into operation, the volume of oil product and dangerous chemicals can increase 9 million tons per year by the transportation over the dam.
After the completion of the above projects, a coordinated transportation of seamless mode and integrated loading and unloading is expected to be built between Maoping Port in the upper reaches of the dam and Baiyang Port in the lower reaches of the dam, which can form a combined transport system by railway, waterway and pipeline. Hence, the bottleneck problem of the Three Gorges shipping can be effectively solved, and the advantages of the Yangtze River golden waterway can be brought into full play.
At present, other key projects of Yichang port-based national logistics hub have been completed or are being moved forward. Multiple joint systems of transport are basically formed and put into operation, including “combined waterway and railway transport”, “waterway and highway”, “waterway and waterway”, “waterway, highway and waterway” and “waterway, railway and waterway”. Among them, “waterway and highway” emergency way over the dam for vehicles started to be carried out in March, “waterway and highway” emergency way over the dam for containers went into operation in June and the construction of Baiyang Port Railway commenced in August.
In the future, Yichang will build a national logistics hub channel system based on Baiyang and Maoping Fanba Combination Port, which is connected in four directions, possessing a combined transport of railway, waterway, highway and air transportation, and a “four-flow” integration of population, goods, capital and information.
Other 10 projects, including the comprehensive water environment management project of Maoping River Watershed in Zigui County, are under construction, with a total investment of nearly 2 billion yuan. (Reporter, Gao Wei)