"The Sanqing Mountain is in the best time of development with the best outer environment in history," said Liu Shuzong, secretary of the local Party committee.
Enticing scenery of Sanqing Mountain in Jiangxi Province
Construction of the Sanqing Mountain Scenic Spot started just 20 years ago. But with improvement of the spot's tourism infrastructure, the number of tourists to the mountain has increased steadily in recent years.
In 2003, the number of visitors to the scenic spot hit 150,000. The number rose dramatically, to 450,000 in 2004 and 670,000 in 2005.
The surging number of tourists has brought considerable income to the scenic spot and improved local people's life.
Bottleneck and blueprints
However, the visitors also resulted in great pressure on the spot's natural environment and caused some problems, such as inadequacies in accommodation, transportation and car parks.
For example, the spot has only one cableway that can carry at most 4,000-5,000 tourists daily. Considering thousands of tourists swamped into the mountain in peak seasons, the inadequate transportation capacity has become a bottleneck for the spot's development.
To alleviate the pressure and achieve sustainable development, the authorities of the city of Shangrao and the Sanqing Mountain have mapped out an ambitious plan to build the mountain into a first-class global tourist attraction.
According to the plan, a series of large infrastructure construction projects, including service facilities, four-star hotels, water supply and drainage systems, and a new cableway in the east of the mountain, will be completed in five years.
As the most important part of the plan, the Jinsha Service Center at the foot of the mountain began construction in February last year.
Upon completion, the center will greatly improve the scenic spot's capacity for receiving tourists. With an investment of 1.6 billion yuan, the center boasts some of the best tourism facilities in the nation, such as a group of modern hotels, a camping base, a shopping mall and a food street.
The Jinsha Cableway, which connects the Huangmaogang and the Goddess Peak, will be put into use in May. The cableway, with an investment of 106 million yuan, is the third largest in China,
"We will insist on sustainable development of the scenic spot and keep balance between tourism development and environmental protection," Liu said.
In recent years, people in the mountain have adopted many measures to protect the natural environment.
The local authorities invested 150 million yuan on building a beautiful green belt and safety facilities along the 92-kilometer round-the-mountain road.
To reduce human beings' impact on the mountain's water system, a sewage treatment plant that can dispose 300 tons of wastewater daily is being built near the Sanqing Palace. A 5.6-million-yuan water plant aims to ensure water supply for tourists, along with 10 standard public toilets.
In recent years, the scenic spot has dismantled 56 illegal buildings, stopped building three large hotels and closed 26 unlicensed mines around the mountain.
"We spend one third of our income on environmental protection every year," said Yang Sha'ou, head of the scenic spot's management committee. "The spot's forest coverage rate has risen to 88.11 percent."
Situated near Shangrao City in East China's Jiangxi Province, the Sanqing Mountain is a national key scenic and historic spot, a national AAAA scenic resort, a national geopark and a national educational base of patriotism.
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