The Beijing-Shanghai expressway is scheduled to formally open on April 28 while regular buses are also permitted to run on it. It is reported that only transport enterprises at second level and above, which are located in cities within a 50-km range along the trunk lines of the expressway, are allowed to run their top-quality buses on this expressway, at unified standard prices.

Through vehicles had been put into trial operation on the Beijing-Shanghai Expressway for 26 days during the Spring Festival this year and been well received by passengers. The 1,262-km, four-lane expressway, which cost a total of 39.3 billion yuan, connects Beijing, Tianjin and Shanghai municipalities and Hebei, Shandong and Jiangsu provinces. It takes only 12 hours to travel from Shanghai to Beijing by bus, with the designed fastest speed of 120km/hour.

(People’s Daily 04/16/2001)