China issues plan for national road network

BEIJING - A plan to expand China's national road network to 401,000 km by 2030 was released on Thursday.

The plan, compiled by the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Transport, will require an investment of 4.7 trillion yuan ($761.8 billion), according to information provided at a joint press conference.

The network expansion aims to bring the length of national non-toll roads to 265,000 km and that of low-toll expressways to 118,000 km by 2030.

Despite booming construction in recent years, more than 900 counties in China have yet to be connected to the national road network and some expressways are overcrowded, according to Dai Dongchang, chief planner at the Ministry of Transport.

As of the end of 2012, China had 173,000 km of national-level roads, including 105,000 km of common roads and 68,000 km of expressways. The national-level roads accounted for 4 percent of China's road network at all levels, including national-level, provincial and rural roads.

The plan calls for the road network to reach a size of 5.8 million km by 2030.