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our reporter sun lichao reports from beijing

a subway project that had complete approval procedures and started construction at the end of 2022 has been suspended for a long time since the end of 2023. the reasons behind this have attracted attention from all parties.

recently, many citizens have asked relevant departments on the wuhan city message board, the official platform of the wuhan municipal mass work department, about the suspension of construction of wuhan metro line 3 phase ii for more than half a year. wuhan metro group co., ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "wuhan metro group") responded on july 11: "currently, line 3 phase ii is in the early stage of pipeline relocation and construction. line 3 phase ii is an investment and construction project of the economic development zone and caidian district. the construction agency agreement between the metro group and the economic development zone and caidian district is still being signed, and the construction funds have not been secured. after the construction funds are secured, construction will be fully carried out."

in response to a netizen’s comment on august 7, “has the construction of phase ii of metro line 3 (fengshu 1st road station) been suspended?”, wuhan metro group further admitted that “the actual situation is that the construction has been suspended.”

a wuhan municipal government official said in an interview with a reporter from china business news that the project was able to start construction in the early stage mainly because the economic development zone and caidian district governments allocated a small amount of funds to wuhan metro group, and wuhan metro group also advanced part of the funds, allowing the project to start smoothly at the end of 2022. since then, because the construction agency agreement has not yet been signed, wuhan metro group has advanced more and more funds, so it has slowed down the construction speed.

"the main reason why the construction agency agreement has not been signed is that the economic development zone wants to add a station after the project started." the above-mentioned wuhan municipal government official said that once a station is added, the project construction plan and investment amount will change, and it will have to go through a strict demonstration and approval process. currently, the wuhan municipal government, the economic development zone, and the caidian district government are actively communicating and coordinating with the wuhan metro group to strive to restart the project as soon as possible.

information released at the official level also shows that wuhan economic and technological development zone intends to add more stations. on june 4, the official wechat account of wuhan economic and technological development zone released an article titled "guo xuling district to be connected to the subway", saying that the second phase of the metro line 3 project plans to add a new checheng south road station in the guo xuling district of dunyang street.

on june 25, the wuhan economic development zone management committee responded to a question from netizens on the "wuhan city message board" and clearly stated: "since the preliminary plan for metro line 3 has been approved, our district intends to add a station at checheng south road on line 3, and is currently actively coordinating with the metro group to promote it."

information on the official website of the wuhan municipal urban construction bureau shows that the second phase of wuhan metro line 3 officially started construction on december 30, 2022.

according to the reporter, before and after the start of construction in 2022, the planning scheme, feasibility study report and environmental impact assessment report of the second phase of wuhan metro line 3 have been approved.

a local development and reform commission official familiar with the subway approval process told reporters that the construction of a subway first requires the national development and reform commission to approve the relevant construction plan, then the provincial development and reform commission to approve the project feasibility study report, and the local environmental protection department to approve the environmental impact assessment report. for urban rail transit construction plans that have been approved by the state, they should be strictly implemented in accordance with the plan and should not be changed in principle. in the actual promotion process, if special circumstances are encountered and the plan is changed, if the investment and line length change does not exceed 10%, the local provincial development and reform commission will be responsible for the change approval.

"in the case of wuhan metro line 3 phase ii, after the line completed all the approval processes, it wanted to add more stations. on the one hand, it needed the hubei provincial development and reform commission to approve a new feasibility study report; on the other hand, it also needed to submit additional environmental impact assessment materials to the local environmental protection department." the above-mentioned local development and reform commission official said that although adding a station does not require re-approval procedures at the national development and reform commission level, the process of preparing additional materials and re-approval by the provincial development and reform commission usually takes at least half a year.

on september 11, the reporter wrote to the publicity department of wuhan economic and technological development zone regarding the reasons and procedures for adding sites, but no reply was received as of press time.

in august 2022, the "announcement on social stability risks of the phase ii project of wuhan metro line 3" (hereinafter referred to as the "announcement") released on the official website of hubei engineering consulting co., ltd. showed that the phase ii project of wuhan metro line 3 starts from wenling station, and the line runs along zhiyin lake avenue, quanli 3rd road, and dongfeng avenue, and ends at chunyang avenue station (not included). the total length of the line is about 12.0 km, all underground, with 5 stations (fengshu 1st road station, fengshu 5th road station, quanli 2nd road station, quanli 3rd road station, wenling station), all of which are underground stations.

more than 70% of the phase ii section of line 3 is located in the economic and technological development zone, and the remaining sections are in caiden district, and investment is also mainly in the economic and technological development zone.

the announcement stated that the phase ii project of line 3 is scheduled to start construction at the end of december 2022 and be completed and opened to traffic in june 2026, with a total construction period of 42 months. the total estimated investment in the project is 9.607 billion yuan, of which the government investment is 3.843 billion yuan, accounting for about 40% of the total investment, and the remaining 60% is bank loans.

in august 2022, the phase ii project of line 3 was approved by the national development and reform commission as one of the projects of the "adjustment of the fourth phase construction plan of wuhan rail transit (2019-2024)". on january 29, 2023, the "environmental impact report of the phase ii project of wuhan rail transit line 3" submitted by wuhan metro group to the wuhan municipal ecological environment bureau was approved.

the official level has not announced the approval time of the feasibility study report of the phase ii project of line 3, but in september 2023, the hubei provincial government issued the "opinions on the joint handling of proposal no. 20230216 of the first session of the 14th provincial people's congress", which clearly mentioned that the feasibility study report and preliminary design report of the phase ii project of metro line 3 have been reviewed and approved by the hubei provincial development and reform commission.

(editor: wu jing, reviewer: du lijuan, proofreader: yan jingning)