Spatial and economic effects of the Bohai Strait Cross-Sea Channel on the transportation accessibility in China

The Bohai Strait Cross-Sea Channel (BSCC) is a mega-strategic project that connects the Shandong Peninsula and northeastern China. After half a century of research, this project has entered its preliminary planning phase. Based on the Chinese modern transportation system database, this paper applies Dijkstra's algorithm to study the impacts of the BSCC on the structure of Chinese transportation accessibility and discusses the spatial and temporal changes and the strength of economic linkages among the eight affected coastal urban agglomerations before and after the construction of the BSCC. This study concludes that: (1) the BSCC will open up a northeast–southwest traffic artery in coastal areas of China that will significantly improve the transportation accessibility of both these coastal areas and northeastern China as a whole, which cover an area of 2.18 million km2, and on average will reduce the travel time of nationwide prefecture-level cities by 16 min; (2) the BSCC will significantly improve the total economic linkages (TELs) of urban agglomerations of the Central South Liaoning, the Shandong Peninsula and the Harbin–Changchun transport link and will decrease the spatial differences in the strength of cities' economic linkages, which will benefit the integration of the Bohai Economic Circle; (3) the BSCC will eliminate the segregation between the two coastal economic groups brought about by the Bohai Strait. This will promote the revitalization of the old industrial base in northeastern China by expanding the radiation scope of the Yangtze River Delta and the Shandong Peninsula across the Bohai Strait into northeastern China. Additionally, the BSCC will enhance the economic linkages between urban agglomerations in northeastern China and the western shore of the southeastern coast, Pearl River Delta, and North Gulf of Guangxi on the southeastern coast. Finally, it will create northeast–southwest economic integration in these coastal areas. This research will assist decision-making for the BSCC project and other cross-sea tunnels in China.