Foshan West Station is a national key construction project, positioned as one of the important railway passenger stations in the Guangzhou-Foshan metropolitan area and even the Pearl River Delta region. It is located in the central part of Shishan Town, Nanhai District, Foshan, adjacent to Foshan Airport, and together with Guangzhou North Station, Guangzhou Station, Guangzhou South Station and Guangzhou East Station, it forms the "four main and one auxiliary" pattern of railway hub passenger stations (Foshan West Station is one of the main stations).
Five years ago, Foshan West Station was approved for construction; five years later, it was completed and opened to traffic, with high-speed trains reaching more than 20 cities in five countries and four provinces. As the "west gate" for Foshan to connect with the Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou high-speed rail economic belt, Foshan West Station undertakes the role of connecting various resource elements such as industry and technology. Since its opening, 104.5 pairs of high-speed trains have been running daily between Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Yunnan and other places. Foshan West Station, expected to send more than 54 million passengers annually in the initial stage of operation, adopts the "down-in, down-out" design concept, allowing transfers within a 50-meter walk, making it a representative of China's new generation of high-speed rail stations.
Connecting Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou to Boost Cross-regional Industrial Upgrading
On August 18 this year, Foshan West Station was officially opened to traffic. At present, it is connected with the Guiyang-Guangzhou and Nanning-Guangzhou railways as well as the Foshan-Zhaoqing intercity railway, and trains can directly reach Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou regions such as Guangxi, Guizhou and Yunnan; in the future, the Guangzhou-Foshan circular intercity rail and the Guangdong western coastal high-speed rail will be introduced, thoroughly opening up to western Guangdong regions such as Jiangmen. The completion and opening of Foshan West Station is of great significance.
On August 7, at the opening ceremony of the Third Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou High-speed Rail Economic Belt Cooperation Joint Conference and the Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou High-speed Rail Economic Belt Cooperation Pilot Zone (Guizhou Park) Construction Work Site Meeting held in Duyun Economic Development Zone, Qiannan Prefecture, Guizhou, Foshan signed agreements with Nanning and Guiyang to establish friendly high-tech zone cooperation projects.
It is worth mentioning that this is another layout for Foshan to connect with the Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou region after signing a friendly high-tech zone cooperation project agreement with Liuzhou High-tech Zone. These are microcosms of Foshan actively promoting Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou regional cooperation based on the cooperation framework of the Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou high-speed rail economic belt.
Even before Foshan West Station was completed and opened, it had already been entrusted with important tasks. In September 2015, a series of activities including the Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou High-speed Rail Economic Belt Cooperation Pilot Zone (Guangdong Park) Construction Work Site Meeting, the First Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou High-speed Rail Economic Belt Cooperation Joint Conference, and the Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou High-speed Rail Economic Belt Investment Fair were held in Foshan, involving a total investment of over 100 billion yuan, and 71 cooperation projects were signed.
All these plans are inseparable from Foshan West Station. The Foshan West Station Hub New City, built around Foshan West Station, will become the core development and construction area of the Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou High-speed Rail Economic Belt Cooperation Pilot Zone (Guangdong Park). According to the "Implementation Plan for the Overall Development Plan of the Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou High-speed Rail Economic Belt Cooperation Pilot Zone (Guangdong Park) (2015-2030)" (hereinafter referred to as the "Plan") issued by the Provincial Development and Reform Commission, with the Foshan West Station Hub New City as the core area and the Nanhai Park of Foshan High-tech Zone as the main area, the construction of the pilot zone will be promoted in five years.
According to the "Plan", the regional industrial cooperation fields involve finance, exhibition, logistics, culture and tourism, etc. Foshan, a city built on manufacturing, achieved a total industrial output value above designated size of 1,072.525 billion yuan in the first half of this year, with the secondary industry, mainly industry, contributing 54.7% to the city's economic growth; the other side of the developed secondary industry is the weakness of the tertiary industry. With the Guangdong-Guangxi-Guizhou region as the hinterland, connecting talents, creativity and other elements to achieve local industrial structure upgrading—all of this is gradually being realized with the opening of Foshan West Station.
10 Platforms and 23 Tracks to Build a Pan-Pearl River Delta Railway Network
Foshan West Station is one of the important railway passenger stations in the Guangzhou-Foshan metropolitan area and even the Pearl River Delta. According to the "13th Five-Year Plan" for the Development of the Comprehensive Transportation System of Guangdong Province, in the future, Guangzhou Station, Guangzhou South Station, Guangzhou East Station, Foshan West Station and Tangxi Station will be promoted as the main passenger stations, and Guangzhou North Station, Xintang Station and Nansha Station as auxiliary passenger stations, to build a "five main and three auxiliary" pattern of Guangzhou railway passenger transport hub, and to build Guangdong Province into a world-class railway hub integrating national railway trunk lines, intercity railways, urban rail and other transportation modes.
Specifically, Foshan West Station currently has a total scale of 10 platforms and 23 tracks, connecting to the west with three national railways—Guiyang-Guangzhou, Nanning-Guangzhou and the western coastal railway—and one intercity rail, Guangzhou-Foshan-Zhaoqing; to the east, it connects with two intercity rails of the Guangzhou-Foshan circular line, as well as Metro Lines 3 and 4 under preparation, and in the future will build a "one vertical" and "two horizontal" transportation network in the Guangzhou-Foshan integration construction.
"One vertical": built from south to north along Nanhai Avenue and Guihe Road, running through Guicheng Subdistrict, Dali Town and Lishui Town, with the southern end connecting and transferring to Foshan Rail Transit Line 3, and the northern end connecting and transferring to the Guangzhou-Foshan circular line, quickly reaching Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport and Guangzhou North Station.
"Two horizontal (southern section)": built from west to east along Bo'ai Road and Guangfo Road, running through the core area of Foshan High-tech Zone in the south, with the western end connecting and transferring to the Guangzhou-Foshan-Zhaoqing intercity rail, and the eastern end connecting and transferring to Guangzhou Rail Transit Line 5, quickly connecting to the central area of Guangzhou.
"Two horizontal (northern section)": running through the core area of Foshan High-tech Zone, with the western end connecting and transferring to Foshan Rail Transit Line 3, and the eastern end connecting and transferring to Guangzhou Rail Transit Line 12, realizing rapid connection between Foshan West Station and the areas along the rail lines with Guangzhou Baiyun New City.
It can be seen that Foshan West Station not only undertakes the important task of Foshan's "west gate", but has also become an important part of Guangdong's transportation system. It is estimated that in the initial stage of operation, Foshan West Station will send more than 54 million passengers annually, and with economic development and network improvement, Foshan West Station will bear more travel pressure.
High-speed Rail "New Star"—A New Model of Fourth-Generation Railway Passenger Station
In August this year, Foshan West Station opened to traffic, with seamless connection and convenient transfer... The "new star" of high-speed rail stations, Foshan West Station, combines the strengths of many and has become a new model of China's fourth-generation railway passenger station.
According to reports, Foshan West Station integrates long-distance bus stations, bus yards, taxi yards, social parking lots and other facilities to create a comprehensive transportation hub. At the four corners of the waiting hall, bus yards, taxi yards, social vehicle yards and mixed taxi-social vehicle yards are respectively set up. The four yards are all within a 50-meter walking distance from the ticket gates and exits, greatly facilitating passengers and achieving true "zero transfer". The station halls of Metro Lines 3 and 4 are located directly below the waiting hall, making transfers convenient.
In addition, the design of Foshan West Station fully considered the adverse effects of railway stations cutting off urban functional areas in the past, and the Foshan municipal and district governments hoped that Foshan West Station would not only be an external transportation hub but also an urban functional area. Besides passengers, they hoped to attract city residents to shop, consume and relax there. Therefore, the passenger activity platforms on the east and west mezzanines, in addition to connecting various transportation modes, will also extend north and south, crossing the south and north roads of the West Station, connecting the commercial groups on the south and north sides and the Guangdong Convention and Exhibition Center on the south side. In addition to the second-floor corridors, four underground passages have been built under the south and north sunken squares of the West Station to cross the south and north roads of the West Station, building a slow-traffic system on the second floor and the first basement level, creating a 1-square-kilometer hub business district.
Project Decoding
China's Largest Down-in, Down-out High-speed Rail Hub
It is reported that Foshan West Station has a total scale of 10 platforms and 23 tracks, with a station building area of 68,000 square meters. It is currently China's largest down-in, down-out high-speed rail transportation hub, integrating conventional bus systems, long-distance highway passenger transport, taxis, city terminals, individual transportation modes, etc. It is a new type of urban complex station under the latest pilot construction after China's railway reform.
What is the "down-in, down-out" design? According to Yu Tian, project manager of Foshan West Station of the Fourth Survey and Design Institute of China Railway, this design concept means that all entry and exit stations and waiting facilities are set up below the railway viaduct. Designers make full use of the space under the bridge, setting up entry and exit passages in layers, saving passengers time to enter the station and board. In addition, various transportation modes are set up in layers under the bridge, so that passengers can complete transfers within a 50-meter walk, greatly intensifying the use of urban land resources and saving construction costs. It is a representative of the new generation of high-speed rail stations.