THE city is planning to renovate Longda and Nanguang expressways to ease traffic congestion, the Shenzhen Special Zone Daily reported yesterday.

Traffic flow on the 25.6-kilometer Longda Expressway and the 31-kilometer Nanguang Expressway has soared since the two expressways became toll free Feb. 7 last year, leading to frequent traffic jams at the toll stations during rush hours.

During the city’s “two sessions” this year, some lawmakers suggested that the city government turn the two expressways into municipal roads and dismantle the existing toll stations to ease the congestion.

According to the city’s transport commission, traffic flow on the two expressways went up by at least 40 percent after they removed the tolls. The commission said the long-term measure to tackle the problem has been to rearrange the toll stations and renovate the expressways into municipal roads.

The commission said the existing toll stations will be removed by next September, while the construction of three new toll stations is under way. One of them will be completed by the end of the year, and the two others will be done in the first half of next year.

According to the commission, the renovation work on Longda Expressway is expected to begin in 2019 and conclude in 2021. The six-lane expressway will be expanded to eight lanes, while six interchanges will be built connecting the expressway with other roads and two interchanges will be built at Loucun and Guangming exits.

The renovation work on Nanguang Expressway is expected to begin in 2019 and conclude in 2023. Four interchanges will be built to connect the expressway with other roads and five interchanges will be built at the Xiacun, Tangming, Zhoushi, Baoshi and Baimang exits, according to the report. (Zhang Yang)