The big port in north China
3 min readTangshan has a 229.7 km-long coastal line and a mudflat with an area a quarter larger than the city’s total area. Sun Yat-sen, forerunner of the great national revolution, visited Tangshan in July 1894 and September 1912. His “Strategies for Nation Development: Industrial Plan”published in 1919 elaborated a grand vision of “building an ice-free deepwater port in the Zhili Bay, and developing it within a limited period to make it comparable with New York.”
Due to historical reasons, the big northern port Sun Yat-sen planned experienced various tribulations. In June 1929, the Nanjing National Government determined to practice Sun’s Strategies for Nation Development and established a “Big Port Preparation Office.”However, successive wars hurt the national treasury and financial power. Sun’s vision had to be shelved indefinitely. However, Tangshan people’s determination to follow Sun’s last wish of a northern big port never faded.
In the 1980s, with the integration of the global economy, Tangshan decided to push economic development toward coastal regions and build itself a port city. With the unremitting effort of Tangshan CPCCommittee and Municipal Government, Jingtang Port was completed and put into operation at the site selected by Sun Yet-sen, fulfilling Sun’s last wish and ending Tangshan’s history”with a sea but without a port”. When it opened in July 18,1992, the Jingtang Port had 18 berths ranging from 1.5 to 10 tons and routes to more than 120 ports in 30-plus countries by the end of 2006. It has a large transport network for coal, ores, steel and other goods and become one of the key domestic ports.
The development of the ocean economy, especially logistics, brings an inevitable trend of vessel upsizing. The capacity of ore ships is 200,000 to 300,000-tonnage or even greater. The Jingtang Port islimited by natural conditions and cannot load and unload vessels of large size. Tangshan cast its eyes on Caofeidian,a four square kilometer sand island 18 km to the mainland. In March 2003, Caofeidian Port unveiled the construction. In December 2005, two 250,000-tonnage ore terminals opened to navigation, marking the initial step of Caofeidian toward becoming a “diamond-level port”.A new economic growth point of Hebei surged in the Bohai Bay.
Caofeidian,80 km to downtown Tangshan,220 km to Beijing,120 km to Tianjin and 170 km to Qinhuangdao, boasts convenient traffic. East-west railway arteries include Beijing-Shanhaiguan, Beijing-Qinhuangdao and Dalian-Qinhuangdao. South-north railway branches include Qiancao, Tangzun, Beishi, Hannan and Luangang. Tangshan-Caofeidian Expressway links with Beijing-Shenyang, Tang.
shan-Tianjin, Tangshan-Dagang, Coastal and Tangshan-Chengde Expressways. Ores, crude oil, coal, bulk goods and containers at the Caofeidian Port realized domestic and international navigation access. As for international shipping, it is 400 nautical miles to Incheon of Korea,680 nautical miles toNagasaki and 935 nautical miles to Kobe of Japan. The sea routes to ore exporters including Australia, Brazil, Peru, South Africa and India are fairly smooth. Thus,a convenient and cost-efficient integrated water-land transshipment system came into being.
On July 11,2012, the State Council officially approved to “establish Caofeidian District in the city of Tangshan”, marking a new historical period for the development and opening-up of Caofeidian.
More than a hundred years have passed. Although Sun Yat-sen’s dream of a big northern port sank into the sea, the Tangshan people salvaged the dream and made it a fantastic truth. Today, Caofeidian is no longer a heavy historical memory but far beyond Sun’s vision. It is becoming a New York port of the new century and a Rotterdam in northern China. An ecological, new-type modern industrial park and coastal city like a rising sun over the Bohai Rim Economic Zone to attract more domestic and foreign investors to forge a more promising future.
