Shanghai's Hongqiao airport is to undergo large-scale reconstruction to help relieve mounting traffic pressure. The move is also being seen as an important step for the city to build itself into a regional transportation hub.

The reconstruction, which starts this Monday, is to last three months. One of the airport's two lounge room buildings will be closed to facilitate the project and daily operations will continue at their normal pace.

Funded by the Shanghai Airport Authority, the reconstruction is expected to cost 29 million yuan (US$3.5 million). And Hongqiao's capacity will increase by one third after the reconstruction is complete.

Hongqiao airport first started operating in 1921, and was adapted for civil use in 1964. The growing number of passengers traveling to and from the terminal has resulted in an inevitable problem: traffic congestion. Last year, the airport supported nearly 15 million passengers, well beyond its design capacity of about nine million.

Following the interior construction is a large-scale project to increase the number of runways in July.

Shanghai's second major airport, Pudong International Airport, completed a runway a week ago that can accommodate the world's largest commercial jet, the Airbus A380. But what's more significant is that the new landing strip increases the airport's capacity by more than half.

The expansion of both airports is part of the Shanghai Aviation Development Strategy, which aims to build Shanghai into the transportation hub for the Asia-pacific region.

According to the development strategy, Shanghai's two air terminals will expand four runways in the next ten years, which will be able to accommodate 100 million passengers and seven million tons of goods annually.

Shanghai is now one of the fastest-growing cities in China, and many international carriers have already set their sites on opening air routes to and from the city.

At the beginning of this month, the world's largest express transportation company, Fedex launched a flight from Shanghai to Germany's Frankfurt. This is the first direct express air cargo flight from the Chinese mainland to Europe .

However, negotiations between China and the European Union on opening the aviation market are still on the drawing board.

Shanghai Airports have flights to over 80 international destinations and during peak travel times, more than 1,000 flights land or depart from the two airports per day.

(CRI.com March 21, 2005)