Joined-up thinking for local streets

A total of 13 streets along the border between Jiading and towns in Jiangsu Province have been connected to promote urbanization and integrated development in the region.

Jiading is accelerating a merger with Kunshan and Taicang towns in Jiangsu to promote integration.

Compared to achieving economic advantages or coordination in social governance, connecting streets is a prerequisite to the merger of other aspects, such as further opening-up and breaking down boundaries.

At the intersection of Hejing Road in Jiading’s Anting Town and Shengxiang Road of Kunshan’s Huaqiao Town, there is no barrier, no fence or tollbooth.

People from both sides look like they’re in the same village. At a residential quarter in Huaqiao, about 10 percent of the 1,200 families come from Shanghai.

Huaqiao residents speak the same dialect and go to a wet market in Anting more often because it is closer than the one in their town. They also frequent restaurants and a shopping mall in Anting.

The acceleration requires management and services details to be increasingly refined.

Previously, there was a tollbooth and a section of highway behind Xiangyang Village of Anting and under the administration of Huaqiao.

It was later closed, but the area nearby became a temporary parking place for container trucks from Shanghai to Jiangsu.

When the trucks pass through a buffer zone, the noise seriously annoyed local residents. Huaqiao authorities then moved the buffer zone elsewhere.

For Huaqiao residents working at enterprises in Anting, mobile roaming charges were once a problem. Both Huaqiao and Anting governments then reached an agreement with telecom operators to abolish roaming charges.