On August 27, 2025, the Hegang Luobei Airport in Heilongjiang Province officially commenced construction. This aerial gateway, carrying the transformation dreams of a resource-depleted city, has moved from blueprint to reality after a decade of meticulous planning.

As a key project under China's "14th Five-Year Plan" for civil aviation development, the airport is being built to 4C standards with an investment of 10.66 billion yuan. It will feature a single runway measuring 2,500 meters in length and 45 meters in width, designed to handle 450,000 passengers and 1,600 tons of cargo annually, with operations scheduled to begin in 2027.

According to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) classification, the digit "4" represents a runway length of at least 1,800 meters, while the letter "C" indicates compatibility with aircraft having wingspans of 24-36 meters and main gear widths of 6-9 meters. This category includes common commercial aircraft such as the Boeing 737 and Airbus A320, which can carry 150-200 passengers with moderate range capabilities, allowing direct connections to hub cities like Beijing and Shanghai.

Once completed, the airport will fill the gap in Hegang's air transportation network and fundamentally reshape the city's development landscape.

**Industrial Renaissance: "Dancing in the Clouds" as Black Gold Takes Wing**

Hegang once prospered due to coal but later experienced transformation challenges as resources became depleted. In recent years, the city's leadership has pursued a "four-wheel drive" development path, using coal as the foundation, strategic emerging industries like graphite as the new engine, modern agriculture as new support, and cultural tourism plus northward opening as new momentum.

Hegang boasts abundant graphite resources, ranking first nationally with proven reserves of 2.289 billion tons of ore. These resources are characterized by large reserves, high grade, excellent quality, easy extraction and processing, and wide applications. Leveraging this strategic resource, Hegang is building a "graphite new materials industrial cluster."

In 2019, the city successfully attracted China Minmetals Corporation, establishing Minmetals Graphite Company with a 7 billion yuan investment in an integrated graphite industry project. Currently, Hegang has gathered 37 graphite enterprises, forming a complete industrial chain from mining to anode material deep processing for graphite new energy materials. The city is developing a national-level zero-carbon industrial park with Hegang characteristics, centered on the high-quality graphite utilization industrial park.

The Luobei Airport site is located just 70 kilometers from Asia's largest single graphite mine. Once operational, it will significantly optimize conditions for high-end business travel and precision equipment transportation, providing crucial acceleration for "China's Graphite City" to integrate into the global new energy supply chain and injecting strong momentum into Hegang's transformation into an "industrial transformation demonstration city."

**Green Urban Living: "Home in the Park" Where Visitors Forget to Leave**

While promoting industrial transformation, Hegang's leadership has earnestly implemented the people-centered city concept, directing over 80% of fiscal expenditure toward public welfare, working to improve urban living environments and promote green urban transformation to build an "ecologically harmonious and livable city."

By the end of 2024, Hegang's built-up area achieved a greening coverage rate of 43.55%, with 23 parks, 24 squares, and pocket parks scattered throughout the city corners. The total green space in the built-up area reached 2,252.005 hectares, including 32 parks and squares transformed from former coal subsidence areas and shantytown renovation sites, achieving 15.59 square meters of park green space per capita.

Additionally, the magnificent Dragon River Three Gorges, precious birds in Duluru River wetlands, tranquil primitive red pine forests, and the ecological reputation as "the northernmost home of Oriental White Storks" collectively weave Hegang's urban image as a "home in the park."

The dual-drive approach of national-level "summer resort destination" status and burgeoning ice and snow tourism projects has boosted visitor numbers by nearly 50%. The airport's completion will break transportation bottlenecks, making the ecological treasures hidden in the northern frontier more accessible to national tourists and bringing strong passenger flow to Hegang's cultural tourism industry.

**Northern Migration: "Building Warm Nests for New Dreams" to Attract Investment**

Hegang, once famous for "cabbage-priced" housing, is now writing a comeback story. Under the combined effects of industrial transformation and ecological value enhancement, the city has launched a "six benefits, six sharing" policy package, providing comfortable conditions for new residents to settle in Hegang, continuously releasing urban livability attraction.

Commercial housing sales area soared from 35,800 square meters in 2019 to 147,000 square meters in 2024, with a further 37.1% year-on-year increase in the second quarter of 2025. New commercial housing average prices steadily climbed from 3,046 yuan per square meter to 3,860 yuan per square meter over five years.

From 2019 to 2024, Hegang's second-hand housing transactions increased from 6,953 units to 16,304 units, a 134% increase, showing continuously improving market activity. Meanwhile, out-of-town property purchases expanded significantly, rising from 1,134 units (16.31%) in 2019 to 5,680 units (34.05%) in 2024, nearly quadrupling—meaning one in every three property transactions involves new Hegang residents.

Low living costs combined with increasingly comprehensive public services continue to attract "digital nomads" and entrepreneurs seeking high cost-performance living to settle down, injecting fresh vitality into the city. The efficient connectivity brought by the airport will further break geographical barriers, spreading Hegang's unique "livable" city brand even farther.

**Boundless Territory: "New Space-Time of Openness" as Border Areas Break from Cocoons**

The airport's establishment completes the final piece of Hegang's three-dimensional transportation puzzle. As a major China-Russia border town, Hegang has a 235-kilometer border line and two national first-class ports. The completed airport will work together with existing highway networks and the Jiamusi-Hegang Railway (46-minute direct service to Jiamusi, 3.5 hours to Harbin) to construct a comprehensive water-land-air transportation system, deeply integrating Hegang into Harbin's two-hour economic circle.

This not only strengthens Russia-China border trade logistics efficiency but also opens broader space for cross-border tourism and industrial cooperation, fully releasing the border city's opening potential.

**Soaring Ambitions: "Ten Years of Sword Sharpening" Finally Reveals the Blueprint**

Hegang Airport project planning began in 2015, and it was included in the "National Civil Transport Airport Layout Plan" in 2016. In 2017, the airport site selection received approval from the Civil Aviation Administration of China. In 2021, the National Development and Reform Commission organized pre-feasibility study evaluation. In 2022, Hegang Airport received joint approval from the State Council and Central Military Commission for project establishment. In 2023, project land pre-approval was granted by the Ministry of Natural Resources. Since 2024, airport construction has entered the fast track overall, with feasibility studies, master planning, and preliminary design receiving successive approvals.

On August 27, the new Hegang Luobei Airport officially began construction. This represents a decade-long journey of breaking through barriers. From coal mine tunnels to graphite research centers, from resource depletion labels to "home in the park" livability reputation, the airport runway extension represents the city's growth rings.

For Hegang, the airport's significance for a resource-based city far exceeds transportation itself—it symbolizes transformation confidence and serves as a key leverage point for factor agglomeration. Now, with airport construction as the engine, Hegang is striving to write a chapter of struggle transforming from a "coal city" to a "beautiful city."

Under blue skies, Hegang's transformation journey sets sail once again.