Commuters feel zippy about Line 4

By Qin Zhongwei (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-09-29 09:25

"It's finally open," exclaimed Wang Shuo as he passed the Zhongguancun subway station of Line 4 at 3:07 pm yesterday. "I'm going to go home on the new line once I'm off work."

Line 4, which officially opened to the public several minutes earlier, would zip him straight home in 30 minutes, a bargain of time that will eventually win over his aversion for the immense crowds on the subway.

"I would rather be packed like sardine in the subway car rather than stand on a bus crawling during morning rush-hour," said Wang, who works at an information technology firm. Every morning, he takes two lines and switches to a bus before reaching his office from his home in Xuanwumen.

The new subway expansion, which stretches a total of 28.2 km from the north to the far south, will make the daily commute much easier for Wang and 400,000 others who live in or may go to the four densest districts of the capital: Haidian, Xicheng, Xuanwu and Fengtai.

The service line with 24 stations will send passengers to the following famous landmarks: Yuanmingyuan Park, Peking University, Zhongguancun, National Library, Beijing Zoo, Xidan and Beijing South Railway Station. The ticket price is still 2 yuan.

"We do not need to take an hour and a half to Xidan anymore," said college students Chen Li and Ren Chao.

Studying in Huilongguan, in northern Beijing, the pair often feel that their shopping fanaticism dissipates after wasting hours in a subway or traffic jam to get to their downtown shopping paradise.

But to passengers like Chen and Ren, they are more excited because the new line is different from others.

The ninth line in the capital, but the first to be operated by the Hong Kong Mass Transit Railway, everything about the new line reminds passengers of a Hong Kong subway car, from the bilingual signs, the flat-panel screens, the smiling staff in white gloves near the security scanner, to the line's uniquely designed stations.

Chen and his wife, both in their late sixties and who declined to give their names, were among the first group of curious passengers to ride the city's new modern line.

Both grew up in hutongs in central Beijing and never imagined that one day they would be able to ride the subway to the Yuanmingyuan Park, which was still a suburban area 50 years ago. They said they were impressed with the detail-oriented service including the car's spaciousness.

"Old people like us usually cannot hear clearly what the speaker says on the platform. But I can hear clearly the voice, which is in a sweet tone and it's bilingual."

"Everything is quite good, expect that the air conditioner (in the car) is a little cold," Chen's wife added.