Ningping Grade-2 Highway

( chinadaily.com.cn )

Updated: 2011-03-31

Ningping (Ningde-Pingnan) Highway is a key construction project in the province and a World Bank-funded project. It is one of the “8 vertical highways and 9 horizontal highways” of the provincial trunk highway network. Its construction put an end to the history of no grade-2 highways in Pingnan. This road starts from Badu Bridge of the No. 104 National Highway in Jiaocheng and ends at Chengguan, Pingnan. It is 8.5m wide and 80.7km long. The total investment is above RMB380 million.

It is noteworthy that more than 200,000m3 of the gravel used on the road was all from Huotong Creek. This approach conserved water, avoided the destruction of mountain bodies and protected the primitive ecology, while also saving a large amount of funds and dredging the watercourse.

On October 17, 2006, Vice Premier Wu Yi came to Baishuiyang. After personally visiting the “water square,” dubbed “a unique scene in the world and a myth in the universe” by Fujian Provincial Party Secretary Lu Zhangong, she wrote with pleasure that “a Unique Landscape” Is something she’d like to see. She also bellowed: “the National Tourism Administration provides help with inviting renowned experts to make field investigation and plan tourist products.”

On November 9 of the same year, a research group led by Shao Qiwei, the Minister of National Tourism Administration came to Baishuiyang. Standing on the 80,000m2 flat, smooth stone and in the barely ankle-deep creek water, he declared, “shaping Baishuiyang into a national first-rate and world famous tourism brand!”

The construction of the Ningping Grade-2 Highway broke the traffic bottleneck which had held back local tourism for a long time. After this road is open to traffic, the driving time from Fuzhou to Baishuiyang will be shortened to only 3.5h. People driving cars may to Baishuiyang and back in one day.

The building of the Baishuiyang tourism brand is a core link between the tourism industry of Ningde City and its neighboring areas. Following the completion of the construction of Punan (Pucheng-Nanping) Expressway next year, the entire trip from Fuzhou to Wuyi Mountain will be on expressway. A number of expressways to be built soon, such as Yongwu and Ningshao, will link all the important tourist attractions in northern Fujian together.