Sci-tech to be cornerstone of Songjiang New City

Songjiang New City will be developed into a scientific innovation center, traffic hub and smart, cultural and ecological city during the 14th Five-Year Plan period (2021-2025) based on its Yangtze River Delta G60 High-tech Corridor vision and city-of-railways economic development plan, Cheng Xiangmin, Party secretary of Songjiang District, said recently during a press conference.

By 2025, permanent residents of the area will reach 950,000, and its above-scale industrial output will increase by 8 percent annually, with annual industrial fixed asset investment rate reaching 20 percent and 3,200 hi-tech companies located in the region.

The city will be constructed as a world influential sci-tech innovation place of origin and comprehensive strategic city in the Yangtze River Delta area with its unique characteristics.

Its G60 High-tech Corridor vision (a cross-region development program between Songjiang and eight cities in the Yangtze River Delta) will become a sci-tech development impetus for the city. Urban and rural development will be balanced throughout the region.

The new city will be also constructed into a city of railways, with a railway station project consisting of 9 platforms and 23 railroad lines that will be completed by 2024 and expected annual passenger flow reaching 21 million. The station will connect Songjiang with more than 80 percent of the major cities in the Yangtze River Delta area.

The Songjiang traffic hub key functioning zone, covering about 2.47 square kilometers, will become a central business district in the area, functioning as a traffic hub, sci-tech film base and modern business, cultural, tourism and smart logistics center.

The hundreds of thousands of students and teachers from the 13 universities in Songjiang University Town will help drive the integration between industry and education.

The entire Songjiang District, benefiting from the vigorous development of the new city, will carry out the integration of industrial parks and cities in its northeast region, cultural and tourism integration in its northwest region and urban and rural co-development in the area south of the Huangpu River.

Relying on innovation as its impetus, the new city will cultivate industrial clusters worth tens or hundreds of billion of yuan, including new generation electronic information, new materials, new energy vehicles, biomedicine, integrated circuits, modern equipment and artificial intelligence.

The new city will strengthen a "four-network" comprehensive traffic system, including railways, highways, subways and tramcars. The Husong Expressway will become a main artery connecting the Songjiang and Hongqiao traffic hubs in west Shanghai. The western extension of Subway Line 12 will commence this year, and efforts to promote the western extension of Subway Line 23 are in the works.

Commercial facilities and housing supply are improving to match new industrial distribution and population growth.

Forty-eight schools in the region will be built or renovated during the 14th Five-Year Plan period. The new city will collaborate with East China Normal University, Shanghai International Studies University and Shanghai Normal University to set up several experimental and model high schools.

A group of new hospitals, including the Songjiang branch of Shuguang Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine's Songjiang Research Institute, the Songjiang Branch of Shanghai Ninth People's Hospital, as well as the district public health center, dental clinic and eye clinic, will be set up in the region.

Large sports events, including World Golf Championships and the Sheshan International Half Marathon, will be organized with high standards and careful preparations.

Cultural and ecological aspects of the new city will also be cultivated. To maintain and improve its identity as a national civilized city, Songjiang will expedite construction of its cultural activity center – a new cultural landmark in the district – enrich the construction of its Guangfulin Cultural and Relics site and build other new cultural landmarks.