OK, here is the story of 3 new trolley routes that were open in January of this year, I wish I had a map of the city that marked all trolley routes clearly so that they can be traced down using my Corel Draw program.
For all the fans and advocates, a trip to Guangzhou China this week will not only be touched by the spirit of carnival in celebration of the arrival of the lunar new year of sheep, but also in time to praise three new trolley-bus routes that crossed the main waterway that enriched the largest metropolis in south central China.
Like three green ribbons, on Thursday January 23rd, 2003, trolley-buses on three new routes, routes 112, 113, and 114 marched across the mighty Pearl River from 3 different directions to congregate at the new trolley-bus hub atNan-tian (South Field) Road, thus bringing the environmentally friendly trolley-bus service to the residents of the south shore that until then, had never been able to directly enjoyed its superior quality.
For the first time, Guangzhou trolley-bus company employed local built trolley coaches instead of purchasing trolleys from Shanghai Sunwin Bus Plant as it had been repeatedly doing so when routes 108, 109, 110 and 111 were opened in the last few years Each one of the 50 brand new Pearl River brand trolley featured green external livery to portrait the environmentally friendly nature of trolley-bus; closed circuit TV was installed above the back door to ensure the best quality of monitoring even when driver's view became obscured when the bus was fully loaded; tri-color dot matrix display screen, and radio stop announcement were continuously being played to keep passengers fully informed of whereabouts the bus was traveling. Local news paper also reported that each new coach was installed with silicate battery pack to enable off wire operation and increased maneuverability, and employed the latest electronic braking system to ensure smooth and noise-less braking, the floor height was also being lowered to only 2 steps for more convenient access, all these attractive features came with a very appealing price of only ¥400,000 RMB ($48,300 USD)
All the trolley-bus infrastructure work took place in 2002, although the city's trolley-bus system was steadily growing since 1999, and one or two new trolley routes were being commenced every year since then, the pace of development seen to have accelerated even more in the year 2002. The city invested as much as ¥80,000,000 RMB ($9.66 million USD)(during the last few years, Guangzhou had already invested as much as ¥70,000,000 in its trolley-bus system) for land acquisition in construction of the new trolley-bus hub, construction of new substations, installation of trolley overhead, and researching in new air-conditioned trolley coaches that also employed various new technologies, the number of trolley routes and fleet size had expanded from 7 and 116 in 1998 to 14 and over 300 in 2003 respectively. It was estimated that with 300 trolley-buses, the amount of emission of carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxides can be reduced by as much as 672 and 312 metric tons respectively every year.
For the moment, the new air-conditioned Pearl River brand trolley coaches were deployed on routes 112 and 114, the fare on these 2 routes was set at ¥2.00 RMB flat, route 113 was settled mainly with the existing fleet of SK5105GP coaches bought from Shanghai a few years ago, and the fare was set at ¥1.00 RMB. The 3 trolley routes made the crossing of the Pearl River on 3 different bridges, with route 112 on Jiang-wan (River Bend) Bridge at east, route 113 on Jie-fang (Liberation) Bridge in the middle, and route 114 on Ren-min(People) Bridge at west. The destinations are:
112 Nan-tian (South Field) Road Transit Hub -- Tian-ping-jia (Sha-hê Transit Hub)
113 Nan-tian Road -- Airport Road
114 Nan-tian Road -- Luo-chong-wei
