The mileage of toll roads increased last year-


　　traffic revenue declined instead of rising


　　 Our reporter Qi Hui

　　Recently, various localities have successively released the 2020 toll road statistical bulletins in their respective administrative regions.

Judging from the newly released statistical bulletin, compared with 2019, the national toll roads in 2020 will show an increase in mileage, an optimized structure, a significant reduction in main line toll stations, and a decline in maintenance and management expenses.

　　Communiqué data shows that as of the end of 2020, the total mileage of toll roads nationwide has reached 179,200 kilometers, a net increase of 8,149 kilometers or 4.8% from the end of 2019.

Among them, the expressway mileage increased by 1,079 kilometers, an increase of 7.1%, which was higher than the average level of previous years.

At the same time, a net decrease of 1,214 kilometers of primary roads, a decrease of 6.5%; a net decrease of 760 kilometers of secondary roads, a decrease of 8.8%; a net increase of 44 kilometers of independent bridges and tunnels, an increase of 4.3%.

　　According to Liu Pengfei, spokesperson of the Ministry of Transport, the main reason for the higher increase is that 2020 is the final year of the "Thirteenth Five-Year Plan" and there are more completed and open-to-traffic projects.

With the continuous increase of expressway mileage and the gradual decrease of the first and second toll roads, the toll road mileage structure has been further optimized, and the proportion of expressway mileage has increased from 83.5% to 85.3%.

　　The mileage of toll roads has increased, but the total revenue from tolls has decreased.

The data shows that the total revenue of toll roads across the country in 2020 will be 486.82 billion yuan, a net decrease of 106.97 billion yuan from 2019, a drop of 18%.

The total expenditure was 1234.64 billion yuan, a net increase of 155.87 billion yuan over 2019, an increase of 14.4%, and the annual revenue and expenditure gap was 747.82 billion yuan, an increase of 262.84 billion yuan over 2019, an increase of 54.2%.

　　In this regard, Liu Pengfei explained that there are two main reasons for the expansion of the revenue and expenditure gap. First, to support the prevention and control of the epidemic, the toll-free policy for small passenger vehicles during the Spring Festival holiday has been extended twice, and the policy will be extended from February 17 to 5, 2020. On May 5, the national toll road vehicle tolls were exempted, and the total free amount was 161.3 billion yuan.

Second, due to the increase in the debt balance and the concentration of part of the stock debt, the toll road debt service expenditure increased by 183.18 billion yuan compared with the previous year, reaching 1024.13 billion yuan; of which, the debt principal repayment was 718.01 billion yuan, and the debt interest repayment was 306.13 billion yuan. Yuan, an increase of 28.4% and 8.7% respectively.

　　In addition, the cumulative total construction investment and debt balance of toll roads across the country continued to grow.

Liu Pengfei said that as of the end of 2020, the total construction investment of toll roads nationwide reached 10.81 trillion yuan, a net increase of 1.3 trillion yuan from the end of 2019; the debt balance was 7.07 trillion yuan, a net increase of 0.91 trillion yuan from the end of 2019.

　　Also noteworthy is the significant reduction of toll stations on the main line.

At the end of 2020, there were 965 main-line toll stations on toll roads across the country, a net decrease of 302 from the end of the previous year, a decrease of 23.8%.

Among them, the number of toll stations on the main line of the expressway was reduced from 753.5 to 484, a net decrease of 269.5, a decrease of 35.8%.

　　"The main reason for the reduction of toll stations is the cancellation of the national expressway toll stations at 0:00 on January 1, 2020, and the realization of'one network operation and integrated services'." Liu Pengfei introduced that the total abolition of expressway provinces Toll gates, vigorously develop ETC electronic non-stop fast toll collection, and the simultaneous implementation of non-stop weighing detection at the entrance of closed expressway toll stations. These measures have played a comprehensive role, resulting in improved road network operation efficiency, maintenance and management cost savings, and over-limit overload The rate drops.

Qi Hui