Expressway under Construction in SichuanA 74.4 kilometer-long expressway was opened to traffic Tuesday in a mountainous region in southwest China's Sichuan Province.The expressway, which cost 1.26 billion yuan, is part of an artery linking the cities of Ya'an and Panzhihua in the province. Local sources said the artery is mainly designed to improve the business environment of Panzhihua, a major industrial and tourist city. With an annual average temperature of 18.5 degrees Celsius, the city, which is also the country's largest energy, iron, steel, vanadium and titanium production base in the southwestern area, has unique local customs, cultural relics and diversified biological resources. As an important communication hub linking Sichuan and Yunnan provinces, Panzhihua is a major stopover for tourists to go to Chengdu, the provincial capital of Sichuan and the tourist cities of Dali and Lijiang in Yunnan. Last year it hosted 820,000 domestic and overseas tourists. |
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