Hanoi to build 8 urban railways

Under the general draft on Hanoi transport -2030 and vision till 2050, Hanoi will have a modern transport system with eight urban railways totalling at 284 kilometres in length to link the inner city and satellite urban and other nearby localities.

Accordingly, along with five approved railway routes, the advisory agency proposed adding three new routes including Noi Bai – Phu Dien – Ha Dong – Ngoc Hoi, Me Linh – An Khanh – Duong Noi and Mai Dich – Yen – So – Linh Nam – Duong Xa. In addition, the inner urban areas will have six subway lines. Hanoi railway station will become multi-purpose urban services and trade centre complex and be passenger transhipment terminal for urban railways and national railway.

Hanoi will also have many highways and 6-8 lane radial routes, 100-110 metre corridor. Those are North-South highway route, Thang Long – Hoa Binh Avenue, western highway (Ho Chi Minh road), Hanoi – Lao Cai expressway, Noi Bai – Ha Long, Hanoi- Hai Phong, Hanoi – Thai Nguyen expressway.

Development orientation for the central of Hanoi is also divided into three specific areas: the inner city area from the Red River right bank to the ring road No 2, the expanded inner city area from the ring road No 2 to Nhue River and urban development area from Nhue River to the ring road No 4 and areas of Me Linh, Dong Anh, Long Bien, Gia Lam belonging to the north area of Red River.

Service and finance trade centres will be built in new urban zones, major transport roads, transhipment terminal railway like Ha Dong, Dan Phuong, Hoai Duc, Thuong Tin, and Thanh Tri.

Political and administrative centres and agencies of Party, Congress and the government will be gathered at Ba Dinh area.

As planned, the general draft for Hanoi capital to 2030 and vision to 2050 will be submitted for prime minister’s approval in November 2010.

According to the Hanoi Department of Statistics, in 2010, the capital city would attract some $800 million of investment, increasing 1.5 times against last year.

Of 350 projects investing in Hanoi this year, about 300 ones were newly licensed with total pledged capital of $500 million and 50 others registered to raise investment capital to $300 million.

Amongst Hanoi’s investors (excluding industrial and export processing zones), Hong Kong and China took the lead with 37.1 percent of the total investment capital and then Korea and Japan.

In terms of number of projects, Korea led the list with 67 projects and followed by Japan with 25 projects.