China Daily:
The Outline put forward that a safe, convenient, efficient, and green modern comprehensive transportation system will be established and the expressway tolls at provincial borders will be removed across the nation. The latter can be deemed as a measure to realize the former concept. What is its current progress? Thank you.
Li Xiaopeng:
Thank you for your question. You have just mentioned a key task of the transportation sector this year.
We all know that expressway construction in China was conducted by the provinces separately, so establishing toll booths at province borders was the only option in the past. In addition, technology and network facilities were also limited then. Since the conditions have changed now, such past systems can be done away with to improve efficiency and lower logistics costs and people’s burden. The State Council unveiled a guideline on deepening the toll way system reform and removing expressway tolls at provincial borders in May this year. This noted that expressway tolls at provincial borders will be removed by the end of this year.
To accomplish this task well, the State Council approved the establishment of a leading group joined by several ministries and led by the Ministry of Transport. All the provinces have put forward a clear agenda and schedule on this task and the removal of expressway toll booths is now being implemented across the whole country.
Li Xiaopeng：
First, the electronic toll collection (ETC) system was popularized rapidly this year. By September 18, the total number of ETC users stood at 130.51 million, meaning 68.39% of the task of issuing the devices have been completed. Until now, the public’s use of these devices in expressway exits and entrances reached 43.51% and 43.13% respectively. We had a target to install such devices on over 80 percent of registered automobiles by year-end with the usage rate reaching 90%.
Second, the project is being implemented across the nation. To remove toll booths at province borders, the first job is to dismantle them and then construct more ETC lanes. These are both construction projects.
Third, many portals need to be installed to guarantee the smooth operation of the ETC system. It should be installed at around every ten-kilometer stretch of road to make the billing more accurate. This is also a construction task.
Fourth, we are promoting the improvement of policies and the amendment of laws and regulations. To accomplish this task, we need to complete the Green Channel policy and the toll free policy on holidays and festivals, rationalize local preferential policies and adjust the weighting modes of trucks. These works are all under progress.
According to the general plan of removing expressway toll booths at provincial borders, we should accelerate all the tasks in October and start joint adjustment and test work in November.
