Floods have long plagued the lower reaches of the Yellow River in Shandong Province, where they are at their worst.

The Jinan Weir project, the brainchild of Li Diankui, the vice-chairman of the Shandong People's Political Consultative Conference, is aimed at turning the calamity into something good for local people.

According to Li, the project will distribute floodwater to parts of Jinan, the capital of the province. The water will be used in Jinan and on the Lubei Plain. It will also help to rejuvenate the city's springs, for which Jinan has been famous for a long time.

The project is based on the Dujiang Weir in Sichuan Province, which was built more than 2000 years ago. The water from the Minjiang River in western China that the weir distributes has made Sichuan a "land of abundance."

"The Yellow River after Jinan and the Lubei Plain is similar to the Minjiang River after it passes the Dujiang Weir and the Chengdu Plain," said Li, "and the high sand content in the former can be solved by engineering works, so it is possible to build the Jinan Weir in the same way as the Dujiang Weir."

It is estimated that the weir will be 1 kilometer wide, 50 kilometers long and contain 200 million cubic meters of water.

"Jinan Weir will help the city control floods, which have always inhibited its development," Li said.

The Yellow River in the lower parts of Jinan even rises above some buildings. When the river floods, the entire city is threatened. The weir will deal with the very heart of the problem. The project is part of Jinan's 10th five-year plan and the preliminary design is now being drawn up.

(China Daily 12/11/2000)