Chongqing- The famous poet Li Bai from the Tang Dynasty (618-907) once wrote a poem and indicated “the hard roads all toward Shu (ancient name for the Sichuan and Chongqing area).” At the time of the first anniversary of the development of the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle, Li’s poem is no longer a case in the construction of transportation and interconnection between Sichuan and Chongqing.
World-class city cluster
The National Development and Reform Commission released the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor’s Overall Plan last August to establish a logistics and operation organization center for the Corridor. In fact, Chengdu-Chongqing Economic Circle relies on the Corridor, where it is endowed with exceptional advantages to develop a “passage economy.”
According to a report released by Lianhe Zaobao this January, while RCEP largely promotes the bilateral trade between Chengdu-Chongqing and ASEAN, the Corridor will serve as the carrier of RCEP to become the paramount trade lifeline between two regions.
Through developing the Corridor, Chengdu and Chongqing are expected to be ranked among the world-class city clusters with global influence in 2035; scholars being interviewed by Lianhe Zaobao predicted this.
During the 14th Five-Year Plan period, Chongqing will accelerate the infrastructure construction of the Corridor through improving the efficiency of logistical service and promoting integrated development of the passage and regional economy, said Dong Jianguo, Director of Chongqing Development and Reform Commission.
Chongqing will improve logistical service efficiency and promote the integrated development of the passage and regional economy.
Dong continued, Chongqing will also upgrade and reform railway freight stations, including Tuan Jie Village, and promote the construction of the inbound railways in hub ports, including Xin Tian Port at Wanzhou District and Longtou Port at Fulin District, to open up systems in railway and waterway transportations.
Dong also guaranteed that Chongqing would continue to enhance the cooperation with ASEAN in business and economy, through promoting trade in better quality and larger amount, improving the cooperation of passage industry, building a positive business environment, and implementing the China-Singapore (Chongqing) Initiative in high standards.
A distance of 40 minutes' train
"The preliminary work of the Chengdu-Chongqing High-Speed Railway has achieved initial results," said Chen Shuping, Deputy Secretary-general of the Sichuan Provincial Government. "We are proceeding the preparatory work for the preliminary construction site accordingly." So far, the High-Speed Railway project is waiting to get an approval for the start of construction.
The Railway is the first essential project with substantial progress since Chengdu-Chongqing Economic Circle was proposed and a significant part to constitute a major channel for outreach in the Chengdu-Chongqing region.
It starts from the Chengdu transportation hub, with the route amounts to 278 kilometers in the distance and is designed to speed at 350 km/h. The Railways' total investment is estimated to be 61 billion yuan (approx. 9.4 billion U.S. Dollars).
So far, the Fuxing model is currently China's fastest and most advanced high-speed train, the Fuxing train can reduce the travel time between Chengdu and Chongqing from 90 minutes to 62 minutes.
According to Deng, the High-Speed Railway is advanced with a shorter route and quicker speed. In the future, the travel time between the High-Tech Zones of both cities will be reduced to less than 40 minutes, and the formulated stops of the route, including the Western (Chongqing) Science City, which is highly expected by many.
The travel time between the High-Tech Zones of both cities will be reduced to less than 40 minutes through the Chengdu-Chongqing High-Speed Railway.
Xu Ren'an, Director of the Chongqing Municipal Transportation Bureau, said that Sichuan and Chongqing are working together with the national ministries to draft the Chengdu-Chongqing twin city economic circle integrated three-dimensional transportation network planning (2021-2035), to have more major transportation projects included into the national 14th Five-Year Plan.
More importantly, Chongqing will continue shaping a comprehensive transport network in the Chengdu-Chongqing Economic Circle, which features multi-level rails, multi-lane expressways, waterways with a deadweight exceeding 1,000 tons, twin-hub airports, interconnected pipelines, express delivery covering rural areas, and integrated transport, according to Action Plan to Fuel Chengdu-Chongqing Economic Circle Construction and Catalyse Transportation Infrastructure Building (2020-2022), that was released by Chongqing Municipal People’s Government recently.
The Action Plan also sets goals for the three years, including investing 420 billion yuan (approx. 64 billion U. S. dollars), seeing the length of trunk lines in expressways, national or provincial highways, and pipelines etc. under construction reaching 6,500 km, establishing 9 basic networks and carrying out 40 projects with over 10 billion yuan (approx. 1.6 billion U. S. dollars) of investment.
Chongqing Municipal People’s Government released the Action Plan to Fuel Chengdu-Chongqing Economic Circle Construction and Catalyze Transportation Infrastructure Building (2020-2022) recently.
The planning and the construction of Western (Chongqing) Science City, also play an important role in developing the Chengdu-Chongqing Economic Circle. This will further encourage Chengdu and Chongqing to mutually innovate and establish a science innovation center's central area, with a widespread national influence and high quality in development.
Intelligent Manufacturing Industrial Park at Western (Chongqing) Science City.
Integrate S&T transfer service
While the construction of the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle is deepening in time, initiating the Chongqing branch construction of the National Southwest Centre for Technology Transfer is crucial to accelerate the development of the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle.
Yizhiwang, a scientific and technological innovation platform located at Liangjiang New Area in Chongqing, reached a series of cooperative agreements with the National Southwest Centre for Technology Transfer, situated in Chengdu, jointly promote the science and technology transfer service integration in Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle.
Specifically, they plan to create an online platform of Yizhiwang and National Southwest Centre for Technology Transfer and establish the One-stop Platform for Science and Technology Achievements and Information. This involves delivering information, such as technological policy, achievements, and critical activities.
Yizhiwang will also carry out activities with National Southwest Centre for Technology Transfer, focusing on big data, new materials, energy conservation, environmental protection, rail transit, biomedicine, and so on.
On the construction of technology transfer institutions, both sides will mutually recommend high-quality service institutions for achievements transfer and transformation to settle in local, and provide them with science and technology policies, physical carriers, and services in support.
This further leads to the promotion in the construction of a regional technology transfer system and the cultivation of national and municipal technology transfer models.
(Fan Xingyan and Fu Xiaoduo, as interns, also contributed to this report.)