This paper explores a new phenomenon of tram development in Chinese cities where tram is used as an alternative transport system to drive urban development. The Suzhou National High-tech District tram was investigated as a case study. Two key findings are highlighted. Firstly, the new tramway was routed along the “path of least resistance” – avoiding dense urban areas, to reduce conflict with cars. Secondly, regarding urban transport integration, four perspectives were evaluated, namely planning and design, service operation, transport governance and user experience. Findings show insufficient integration in the following aspects, namely tram and bus routes and services, fares on multi-modal journeys, tram station distribution, service intervals, and luggage auxiliary support. The paper argues there is a need for a critical review of the role of tram and for context-based innovative policy reform and governance that could possibly facilitate a successful introduction and integration of tram into a city.

Introduction

The past decade has seen rapid development of urban rail systems in the People’s Republic of China (hereafter referred to as China). By 2015, more than 3600 km of urban rail tracks had been constructed in 26 Chinese cities. By comparison, tram development is in its infancy, with only 161 km of tramways in ten Chinese cities (CAMET, 2016). However, more than 2000 km of new tram networks are currently being planned across the country, as a result of supportive national policies and gradual cost reduction through consolidation of the tram-building industry. Since the economic reform of 1978, urban transport network in China has been rapidly developed to cater for economic and industrial development, which often did not coordinate well with wider urban development strategies, whereas transport had significant impacts on urbanization patterns. After an era of massive construction of highways in the 1980s, the automotive industry was designated as one of the key pillar industries for the national economy in the mid-1990s. Around this time, because of increasing problems with traffic congestion, several large cities began developing metro systems. However, public urban rail development was not officially regulated on the national scale by the Central Government until 2003, and was not advocated until the early 2010s. Smaller Chinese cities could not justify the construction and operation cost of urban rail, and so instead began planning tram networks. There has been relatively little research examining how new trams have been introduced into cities and whether these tramways provide an effective alternative to private car use. This article therefore explores the role of new tramways in Chinese cities, how well they integrate with other urban transport systems, and any particular issues and challenges. To do this, I focus particularly on a case study of the Suzhou National High-tech District (SND) tram. This article is structured into four main parts. Section 2 reviews key policies and mechanisms underlying urban rail development and decisionmaking in the Chinese context. Section 3 provides a background introduction to the wider context of rapid urbanization and rail development. Section 4 focuses on the SND tram, to gain insights into the uniqueness of Chinese approaches, including the motivation for choosing a tram over other options, and the current approaches to urban transport integration and its impacts. Section 5 summarizes the issues identified and discusses implications.