BUS travelers from Shanghai to Ningbo will take only two and half hours to reach the Zhejiang city after the Hangzhou Bay Bridge opens to the public on May 1, Jiefang Daily reported today.

The 36-kilometer-long Hangzhou Bay Bridge, which starts in southern Shanghai and ends in Ningbo, will shorten the trip between the two cities by more than 120 kilometers, the report said.

Using existing routes, a train trip or a bus trip to Ningbo both take about four hours.

The bridge is a six-lane highway construction with an overall length of 36 Kilometers, which makes it the longest ocean-crossing bridge in the world.

The number of daily shuttles from Shanghai to Ningbo will be doubled to more than 60.

The station will also extend the departure time of the last shuttle to Ningbo to 9:30pm, two hours later than the current arrangement, the report added.

Construction on the 11.76 billion yuan (US$1.68 million) bridge started in June 2003.