With the Spring Festival squash just around the corner, getting to and from Nanjing became significantly easier Tuesday, with the opening of Nanjing South Railway Station’s southern gate.
Since its inauguration some four and a half years ago, passenger numbers utilising what is the world’s second largest railway station in terms of Gross Floor Area, have swelled enormously. As anyone who has approached the station by four-wheeled vehicle recently will testify, the drop off zone outside the northern gate becomes all but gridlock, especially during peak periods. As such, and given the impending Chinese New Year, the opening of the southern gate could not have come at a better time.
On the face of it, the new gate best serves those living in Jiangning district, as a multitude of new elevated approach roads have been built, accessing Hongjun Da Dao that links Huashen Da Dao and Shuanglong Da Dao. However, people in the know from all over the city are likely to make use of the new facility as a way of avoiding the blissfully-unaware crowds that will still flock to the northern gate, for the time being at least. Finally, we can also expect some rearrangement of platform allocation over the longer term. Commuters to destinations between Nanjing and Shanghai will have noted their high-speed trains tend to leave from one of the lower number platforms, very often platform 4. In order to alleviate pressure on the over capacity northern gate, some such popular services may well be reallocated higher platform numbers, nearer the new southern gate.
As close to a replica of the northern gate as it can be, aside from the mystical yet missing statue of Piqui, the creature thought to ward off evil and bring luck, this first day of operation for the new gateway got off to a very gradual start, with this correspondent noting a solitary taxi as the only vehicle to arrive during his time on station. All that is set to change, as the next week will see millions take to the iron road for what is for some, their annual migration home; for others, a well-earned getaway break.
The new southern gate at Nanjing South Railway Station braces itself in anticipation.
