The reporter learned from the Tibet Autonomous Region government that during the "13th Five-Year Plan" period, the region added 38,300 kilometers of new roads, creating a plateau miracle of building an average of 7,660 kilometers of roads per year, with annual new road mileage exceeding the combined length of the Sichuan-Tibet and Qinghai-Tibet highways.

Xu Wenqiang, director of the Tibet Autonomous Region Department of Transport, said that the "13th Five-Year Plan" period was the period with the largest investment in and greatest improvement of highway construction in Tibet. The region completed more than 251.5 billion yuan in highway and transportation investment, 3.7 times that of the "12th Five-Year Plan" period. By the end of 2020, Tibet's road mileage reached 116,600 kilometers, an increase of 48.9% over the end of 2015.

From 78,300 kilometers to 116,600 kilometers, the change in Tibet's road mileage data clearly reflects the upgrading and improvement of the road network structure on the "Roof of the World": growth of 5.3% in 2016, 8.8% in 2017, 9.4% in 2018, 6.3% in 2019, and 12.2% in 2020.

Road network construction is accelerating, and there are more and more high-grade highways. "Five years ago, Tibet had only one 38-kilometer-long high-grade highway; now it has 688 kilometers. After the high-grade highways under construction to Shigatse, Nagqu and other places are opened to traffic, Tibet's high-grade highway mileage will reach 1,100 kilometers," Xu Wenqiang said.

Over the past five years, rural road construction in Tibet has also proceeded "without stopping," and more and more remote farming and pastoral areas have escaped the predicament of being cut off by heavy snow. At present, the road access rates of townships and incorporated villages in the region have reached 100% and 99.96%, respectively; 654 townships and 4,094 incorporated villages have paved roads, with access rates of 94.1% and 74.8%, respectively.

Rural roads and high-grade highways link the high mountains and deep valleys, vast grasslands, towns and villages of the snowy plateau. Plateau farmers and herdsmen have escaped the millennia-old predicament of difficult travel, and historic changes have taken place in their production and lives.

In the early morning, a beef and mutton sales point in the northern suburbs of Lhasa welcomed a large number of consumers. Danba, a herdsman vendor selling yak meat, was busy cutting and weighing meat. "The roads are good now, and yak meat can also fetch a good price. In Lhasa, I can sell each jin for 3 yuan more than in the county town," said Danba from Puya Village, Yangbajing Town, Damxung County, Lhasa. Their village is more than 70 kilometers from Lhasa, and now it takes only a little over an hour by car.