Clinching the winter olympics will provide hefty economic opportunities for Beijing and its surrounding regions, analysts say.
Seven years after the capital successfully hosted the summer olympics,Beijing's victorious winter olympic bid last Friday has triggered a string of investment in venues, transportation and environment.
According to Beijing's bid committee, the budget for the winter games is projected at 1.56 billion US dollars, with a further 1.51 billion used on infrastructure renovation.
With a rich legacy left by the summer olympics, China plans to re-use the existing 11 venues and only needs to build a new rink for speed skating, effectively easing possible problems of facilities being left idle after the games.
On transportation, a high-speed railway linking Beijing and Zhangjiakou, where some of the skiing events will be held, is expected to be constructed around 2019 to cut travel time between the two cities to 50 minutes.
As air quality and snow conditions are regarded as two of the major challenges for Beijing's Winter Olympic Games, investments will be made to address the issue.
Beijing began implementing a five-year plan from 2013 that cost 130 billion US dollars to upgrade heating systems, cut car emissions and close heavy-polluting plants. Neighboring metropolitan Tianjin and Hebei province have adopted similar measures.
A second five-year plan to further improve air quality is being studied, according to Beijing Mayor Wang Anshun.
The policies are already producing notable effects. Concentration of PM2.5, airborne particles measuring less than 2.5 microns, has been reduced by 15.2 percent year-on-year in the first half of the year in Beijing, according to statistics from the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau.
