The Modern Tianjin Highway Construction Research

The development of the road administration in modern cities covers many aspects, including the improvement of city’s image and citizens’ living condition. Therefore, it is meaningful and valuable to research on it. This thesis focuses on the road administration in the Chinese section of Tianjin from1882to1928, and summarizes its accomplishment as well as the reasons from the macroscopic point of view by analysing the process in the development and changes of the road administration in Chinese section of Tianjin. Moreover, the thesis also discusses the relations between the road administration and the changes in the social lives.Before road administration came into being in Chinese section of Tianjin, the roads were formed naturally without the government’s overall planning and administrating. Consequently, the quality of roads were at a low level-the roads were constructed with loess and lacked modernized infrastructure for road administration. Since the year of1860, with the emergence of concessions, the concept of modern road administration was introduced from the West to Tianjin. Inspired by road construction in concessions and the development of Tianjin city, certain progressives started to promote modern road administration. The history of road administration development in Chinese section of Tianjin may be divided by the year of1907into two phases. The period between1882and1907saw the continuous and increasing development of modern road administration, including the continuous perfection of road administration system, increasing promotion of road administration and large-scale development. After the year of1907, natural disasters, wars and the shortage of funds left the development of modern road administration in Chinese section of Tianjin into a tough period. However, it was temporary during this period. Since the year of1919, the recovery of business in Tianjin brought to life the development of road administration in Chinese section of Tianjin. And it had taken shape until1928.An overview of the history of the road administration in Chinese section of Tianjin shows that the development and accomplishment vary in different periods because of the political and economic factors then. Moreover, the development of road administration in Chinese section of Tianjin is directly related to the change of city life, and in turn, has a key effect on the citizens’ lifestyle and ideology.