Nanjing Metro

Nanjing Metro

A Line 1 train at Sanshan Street Station
Overview
Locale	Nanjing, China
Transit type	Rapid transit
Number of lines	7 metro lines
Number of stations	139
Daily ridership	1.96 million (2015 avg.) 2.9962 million (2016 record)
Annual ridership	717 million (2015)
Operation
Began operation	3 September 2005
Number of vehicles	202 trains
Technical
System length	260.5 km (161.9 mi)
Track gauge	1,435 mm (4 ft 8 1⁄2 in) standard gauge
Electrification	5 kV DC overhead lines
System map

The Nanjing Metro is the metro system serving Nanjing, the capital of Jiangsu Province, China. It opened in 2005, and currently there are 7 lines traveling on 260 km of route. The total length of the system ranks fifth in China, after Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen.

In 1984 the first serious proposal for construction of a subway appeared in the Municipal People's Congress. On April 1986, the Nanjing Integrated Transport Planning group was established to research on how to implement a subway system in Nanjing. On December 1986 the team published the "Nanjing Metro Initial Phase". The phase consists of a north–south line, east–west line and a diagonal Northwest to Southeast line. The three lines meet in the city center forming a triangle. A revision of the "Nanjing City Master Plan" in 1993 added another line through the urban core, and three light metro lines connecting Nanjing's suburbs in Pukou and the proposed new airport. In addition a suburban railway to Longtan was proposed. A 1999 report on "Nanjing city rapid rail transit network planning" further proposed six subway lines, two subway extensions and three light metro lines.

In 1994, the State Planning Commission approved the preparatory work for the subway only to have the entire metro project postponed in 1995 amid a national freeze on new metro projects.

Major changes were made to "Nanjing Urban Rail Transit Network Planning" in 2003. The new master plan consisted of 13 lines, of which nine are subway lines and four are light metro lines. The new Line 6 will be a loop line connecting all the urban radial lines. The plan retained the original lines 1, 2 and 3 from the previous plan. According to the new plan, the initial phase would consist of the completion of Metro Line 1 and 2 by 2010. Together the two lines will form a basic "cross" network. By 2020 the completion of Lines 1, 2, 3, and 4 was to form a more robust "pound" (#) network. Longer term plans include the construction of a loop line connecting all existing lines. The plan also identified four subway lines crossing the Yangtze river.