You just arrive Beijing through Air China and begin your Beijing Tours, what is the first public transport you might use? I guess you might use the famous Beijing subway.
It is not a long story for Beijing subway. The first line opened in 1969 and the network now has 14 lines, 172 stations and 336 km of track in operation. It is the oldest subway in mainland China, and the second in length after the Shanghai subway. It is owned by the city of Beijing and has two operators, the wholly state owned Beijing Mass Transit Railway Operation Corp, and the Beijing MTR Corp., a public-private joint-venture with the Hong Kong MTR.
As a public transport system, Beijing Subway is considered as the real “public” transport. For fares, 2 RMB is the single trip with unlimited transfers applying to all lines. Most of the lines will start at 5 am and finish around 11pm. To use the underground, you can either buy a single ride ticket for 2 RMB or buy a Yikatong card which you can top-up as much as you want.
Now, you just buy a ticket and go downstairs to reach the platform. Stand there and wait for the train. When you walk into the train, you will find yourself located in a rather modern and new tube. In fact, most of the tubes of Beijing subway are quite new with air conditioning system except some tubes from Line 1. Compared with London underground, Beijing subway seems a little bit more young and modern.
Rush Hours
Coming to the well-known Line 1, it is considered as Beijing’s first subway line. At the same time, it is also famous for its squash. It is true that Line 1 is the only one crossing the city from west to east. In addition, a lot of people have to travel from east side of the city to west side for working during weekdays. Hence, the morning and evening rush hours of Line 1 seems quite horrible. Perhaps it is normal since China has a population of 1.3 billion. On the other hand, it might be a valuable experience to some extent. The truth is that you will never like to use Line 1 during rush hours. Besides, some of the tubes from Line 1 are still old style-using fans instead of air-conditioners.
It is admitted that Beijing subway system is rather convenient and fast. As a city with population reaching twenty million, it is quite easy to get traffic jam. As a result, people tend to use undergroung since subway will never have a “jam” situation though the tubes might become quite crowded.
All in all, it is quite convenient for people to use underground service in Beijing. So when you have booked China Hotels to see Beijing, just take the underground to start your journey.
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