Officials in the Vietnamese coastal city of Da Nang have signalled approval for a South Korean plan to link its city centre to its beaches and airport with a $3bn tram and metro system.
Vice chairman of the city council, Dang Viet Dung, has approved in principle the plan put forward by Seoul Metro Corporation, and has asked the Da Nang Department of Transport to support it, local media report.
If built, the mass transit system would boost the status of Da Nang, a city of around 900,000 people, as a tourist hotspot.
Kim Tae-ho, chief executive of Seoul Metro, said in January that it would also connect the city to the economic corridor that links Thailand, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam.
Seoul Metro Corporation owned by the Seoul Metropolitan Government.
The main element of the scheme would be a $2.3bn metro running from the Thanh Khe and Hai Chau Districts in the centre of the city to the popular East Sea Park on the shore.
The projected east-west tram line would stretch 8.4km, and would require investment of about $170m; this would link the eastern bank of the Han River and Ngu Hanh Son, or Marble Mountains. There would also be a similarly priced 8.8km-long north-south line that would connect the western bank of the Han River to Da Nang International Airport.
The final elements of the plan are another east-west tramline running for 8.2km between My Khe Beach and the airport, and a 13.4km north-south line linking the beach with the southeastern region of the city. These are expected to cost $210m and $245m respectively.
According to the city’s masterplan, it will also develop five bus rapid transit routes by 2020. At present the city has only 48 buses traveling along five routes.
Image: View of Da Nang from Son Tra Mountain (Fa2f/CC BY 3.0)
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