Beijing urban rail transit picks up pilot project for deliveries

Video by Chen Meiling and Wang Songsong / for chinadaily.com.cn

On Monday afternoon, four express boxes were transported through subway line 4 in Beijing.

The boxes were loaded at the National Library Station and unloaded at the Haidian Huangzhuang Station. On the train, they were placed on the vacant space at the back of the last carriage, escorted by a subway security worker.

The capital city kicked off the pilot project of using urban rail transit to transport parcels on Saturday during off-peak hours, the first of its kind in the country, aiming to improve utilization efficiency of urban rail transit resources, alleviate urban traffic congestion and lower carbon emissions, according to the Beijing Municipal Commission of Transport.

The express boxes get on the train at the stations of Xidan, National Library and Weigongcun, and get off at Haidian Huangzhuang on subway line 4 at around 12: 30pm and 15:30pm on weekdays, said Zhao Chunbo, group station manager of subway line 4 from the Beijing MTR Corp Ltd.

"We selected this time period because the average load factor is lower than 50 percent, so it will not affect travel of passengers," he said.

The subway line 9- Fangshan line-Yanfang line pilot program kicked off on Saturday to transport newspapers by China Post. The papers will be loaded at Liuliqiao Station of line 9 at 9am, when the average load factor of the train is lower than 20 percent, and be unloaded at the Yanshan Station of Yanfang line, according to the commission.