Beijing−Shenyang Expressway

Jingshen Expressway (Beijing segment, taken in July of 2004)

Running for a long 658 kilometres from Sifang Bridge on the Eastern 4th Ring Road in Beijing through to Shenyang City in Liaoning Province in northeastern China, the Jingshen expressway was completed in time for the 50th anniversary of the People's Republic of China. It leaves Beijing heading east and is numbered G025. The expressway opened to the general motoring public on September 15, 1999, after four years of work on different sections. It crosses the jurisdictions of Beijing municipality, Hebei province, Tianjin municipality and Liaoning province.

The speed limit is 110 km/h (although in May of 2004, legislation raised the maximum expressway speed limit nationwide to a uniform 120km/h). Most, if not all, of the expressway have three lanes going in each direction, making it six in total. Congestions, except for cases of fog, are consequently rare.

Jixian in Tianjin, Tangshan, Beidaihe, Qinghuangdao, Shanhaiguan (site of the eastern end of the Great Wall of China), Jinzhou, Panjin and Anshan are all linked by this expressway.

Tolls

As of the Eastern 5th Ring Road in Beijing, toll charges apply.

Toll Network

When the expressway opened in September of 1999, people were complaining about one thing: namely, the sheer amount of toll gates! In some cases, a toll booth appeared every 15 kilometres.

It so turned out that the Jingshen expressway was constructed by different organisations, and as a result, each set up their own toll gate. This seemed to be OK at the start, but made traffic awfully slow, as traffic piled up in front of toll gates.

The PRC's Ministry of Communications (Transport) stepped in after four years and declared that, effective September 1, 2003, the Baodi toll gate in Tianjin and the Yutian toll gate in Hebei would be demolished, in order to create a networked toll system. Additionally, two expressway toll gates near Shanhaiguan would be merged as one. (Plans also hint that the toll gate at Bailu, Beijing, just east of the Eastern 5th Ring Road, would be gone soon, as soon as Beijing "gets its act together" and joins the networked toll system. The rather frightening in appearance toll gate at Xianghe in Hebei, however, would be kept.)

Thus, for the section from Xianghe in western Hebei through to Shanhaiguan in eastern Hebei (and even through the Tianjin portion), this networked toll system applies -- one of the first of its kind. This does away with the previous system, where toll booths appeared every time the jurisdiction changed. For some odd reason, Beijing and Liaoning are still not part of the networked toll system.

China plans to expand the networked toll system nationwide, starting with the Jingshen expressway as some kind of testing ground. For now, the change is being accepted positively. Average speed on the expressway has gone up, and a May 2004 law on traffic in general raised maximum speed limits on expressways nationwide from 110 km/h to 120 km/h. This makes traffic jams on this expressway either rare, or a thing of the past.