A resettlement housing project located in the Water-diversion Beautiful Garden for the massive water diversion project between the Yangtze and the Huaihe rivers — the second north-south waterway running over 1,000 kilometers after the existing Beijing-Hangzhou Canal, has ushered in its topping-out.
The No 2 Bid of Water-diversion Beautiful Garden housing project, which can accommodate 934 families with housing units upon completion, greeted its full top-out on August 10 in Feixi Economic Development Zone located in Hefei’s suburban Feixi County. The project is being built by the Construction Engineering Co of China Railway No.4 Engineering Group Co., Ltd. (CREC4).
The entire resettlement housing project for the No 2 Bid of Water-diversion Beautiful Garden, with a total building area of around 192,000 million square meters, covers 16 high-rises, one floor of underground garage, and two auxiliary buildings.
The Yangtze-to-Huaihe Water Diversion project, which started its construction on Dec 29, 2016 and an expected total input of 91.27 billion yuan ($13.2 billion), is expected to finish after a construction period of six years.
The project will cover 12 of Anhui’s 16 prefecture-level cities, and two of Henan’s 17 prefecture-level cities, benefiting some 50 million people living in these 14 cities of the two neighboring provinces.
The project is a large-scale undertaking aiming to support the urban and rural water supply for the 14 cities, as well as to develop shipping between the Yangtze and Huaihe rivers. While the Yangtze is China’s longest, the Huaihe, originating in Henan province, flows eastward through Henan, Anhui, and Jiangsu provinces before emptying itself into the Yangtze at Sanjiangying after running for 1,000 kilometers.
As one of the country’s 172 major water-conservancy undertakings, the water diversion project is dubbed the “No 1 Project” for Anhui’s infrastructure construction. The Yangtze traverses through southern Anhui for some 400 kilometers while the Huaihe runs through northern Anhui.
From south to north, the project is divided into three sections: water diversion from the Yangtze to Chaohu Lake in central Anhui, canal link between the Yangtze and Huaihe rivers and northward water transmission.
The total length of the water transmission line is 723 kilometers (of which 587.4 kilometers are in Anhui), including 88.7 kilometers of newly-dug canals, 311.6-kilometer routes from existing rivers and lakes, 215.6 kilometers of dredging and excavation routes, and pressure pipelines at 107.1 km.
With the top-out, the No 2 Bid of Water-diversion Beautiful Garden housing project housing project will enter a stage of internal construction.