Beijing General Facts

Beijing Background

Beijing is the capital of the People's Republic of China and a municipality directly under the Central Government. While serving as the national political and cultural center and the national center of economic decision-making and international exchanges,it is the best-developed industrial and commercial city in north China. With a history of 3,000 years and a history of 800 years as the national capital in separate historic periods, Beijing has been seen as historical and cultural city most reputed worldwide. Under the planning of the Central People's Government, Beijing, while retaining its classical demeanor, is to develop into a modern international metropolis featured by a booming economy and a stable social order with public utilities, infrastructure facilities and ecological conditions meeting the top international standards.

Administrative Divisions

Beijing covers a land area of 16,808 square kilometers, of which 10.4-17.5 square kilometers or 62% are mountainous. The plain area covers 6,390.3 square kilometers, accounting for 38 percent of the city's total area. The city proper covers 1,040 square kilometers. The Beijing municipality is divided into 13 districts and five counties. These are: Dongcheng District, Xicheng District, Chongwen District, Xuanwu District, Chaoyang District, Haidian District, Fengtai District, Shijingshan District, Mentougou District, Fangshan District, Tongzhou District, Shunyi District, Changping District, Daxing County, Huairou County, Pinggu County, Miyun County and Yanqing County.

Geographical Position

Beijing lies at 39°56'N and 116°20'E, with an elevation of 43.71 meters above the sea level at its center. The area joins the highlands of Shanxi Province and Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in the northwest and North China plain in the south, while close to the coast of the Bohai Sea in the east.

Natural Conditions and Climate

Beijing has a warm temperate semi-humid climate, featured by clear-cut seasons with short springs and autumns and long summers and winters. The annual temperature averages 13°C. January is the coldest month, with the temperature averaging 3.7°C. In contrast, the temperature averages 25.2° C in July, which is the hottest month. The annual rainfall averages 506.7 mm and the frost-free period lasts 189 days.

Tourist Resources

As early as 500,000 years ago, the Zhoukoudian area on the southwest skirts of Beijing was the home to Peking Man, the primeval ancestry of the Chinese nation.

From 221 BC when Emperor Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor in feudal China, unified China, to 937 AD, Beijing was a major stronghold in North China and served alternately as capital of several local regimes. In 938 AD, Beijing (called "Yanjing" at that time) became the provisional capital of the Liao Dynasty, which ruled the North China. In the succeeding dynasties of Yuan, Ming and Qing, it remained the capital for over 650 years.

Beijing was endowed with abundant tourist resources by its centuries-old history of high cultural and aesthetic values, such as the Forbidden City, the Summer Palace, the Temple of Heaven and the Great Wall which are well known to the entire world. Among the 7,309 historical and cultural sites in Beijing, there are more than 200 sites open to tourists.

Now, Beijing is recognized as one of the hottest tourist destinations across the world. In 1999, Beijing played host to 2.524 million overseas tourists and 92.60 million domestic tourists.

Infrastructure Facilities

Among the 50 cities rated as most powerful economically, Beijing ranks second. It takes the lead among the 40 fine cities rated as most attractive to investors.

The Capital Airport of Beijing, 23.5 kilometers to the downtown area, is the national center of civil aviation, the largest and best-equipped airport on the China mainland and an important terminal for air traffic. Some 98 international flight routes link Beijing with 56 cities in 39 countries and regions. Domestic air routes number 757, reaching all parts of China with Taiwan Province as the only exception.

Beijing is also the largest hub of railway transport in northern China, where trunk lines such as the Beijing-Jiujiang, Beijing-Guangzhou, Beijing- Shanghai and Beijing-Harbin railways converge. Roads in Beijing total 3,800 kilometers in length, their surfaces covering 42 million square meters. A network of highways that total 12.306 kilometers in length services the urban and rural sectors of the municipality. For every 100 square kilometers under Beijing's jurisdiction,there are highways of 79 kilometers.

Currently, Beijing's subway system has two lines in operation, the Straight Line and the Loop Line, totaling 53.7 kilometers in length. Construction is began in 2000 on a new line from Bawangfen to Tongzhou, which is 17.22 kilometers long. Construction began earlier in the year on the 27.7 kilometer No. 5 line. A 40.5 kilometer urbanrailroad broke ground in December of 1999. Along Beijing-Tianjin-Tangshan Expressway, it takes only an hour's drive to get to the Tianjin Port, one of the largest international container terminals in China, it takes only 15 minutes to drive from the entrance of the Airport superhighway to the Capital Airport. It takes no more than 40 minutes to drive from the city center to the Badaling Section of the Great Wall along the Beijing-Changping Expressway. Beijing has become an international postal and telecommunications center, where direct dialing is possible to 240 countries and regions throughout the world and to 2,290 cities in China. The local telephone service has been upgraded from the 7- digit to the 8-digit system, making Beijing the world's fifth metropolis using 8-digit telephone numbers.

By 1999, Beijing's telephone capacity had reached 7.43 million lines, the city's telephone availability rate standing at 62 phones per one hundred people. Moreover, the city now boasts a fairly complete networking communication system. China's four trunk networks, namely Chinanet, CSTnet, Cernet and China GBW, are all based in Beijing. Beijing's telecommunications network is comparable to those in developed countries of the average level in terms of capacity and technological levels.