(Xinhua)
Updated: 2007-10-18 22:35

BEIJING -- Construction experts are to scan the ruins of Beijing's Old Summer Palace, or Yuanmingyuan, with three-dimensional laser technology in order to rebuild some of the original buildings.

The laser scanning had helped complete the final reconstruction of a bridge in the old imperial gardens, parts of which workers had failed to integrate due to differences between the design and its original appearance, said Professor Zang Chunyu, of Tsinghua University's Urban Planning and Design Institute.

Experts with the institute carried out laser scanning on the ruins of the Bilan brige twice and then reconstructed it with a computer model, Zang said.

The laser scanning, which requires no contact with the relics, can reduce the damage and make reconstruction more faithful to the original, Zang told a seminar marking the 300th anniversary of the start of the construction of Yuanmingyuan.

Located in northwest Beijing, construction of the imperial summer resort began in 1707 and was finished in 1744. It was burned down by the British and French troops in 1860.  It was sacked and burned down again, after a partial restoration, in 1900 when the Eight-Power Allied Forces - - troops sent by Britain, the United States, Germany, France, Tsarist Russia, Japan, Italy and Austria -- occupied Beijing.

The 170,000-square-meter palace is composed of Yuanmingyuan, and Changchunyuan and Yichunyuan gardens.