Flood path villagers moved to new residential area

Almost 2,000 people who live at Yellow River Beach in Dongping county's Gengshankou village will no longer live in fear of persistent flooding after being relocated to a new residential area recently.

The new residential area for Dongping county's Gengshankou village. [Photo by Li Jize/ dzwww.com]

The 1,726 villagers and 615 households of Gengshankou have endured more than 40 floods in the past 70 years.

Geng Zhongcheng, a 60-year-old villager, said he was pleased to be allocated two new houses, one for himself and one for his son. Many villagers have been busy packing their belongings and moving to their new residences.

Gengshankou village is less than one kilometer from the Yellow River, which means it is often affected by flooding. "When I was young, villagers took it in turns to monitor the Yellow River bank during the flood season," said a 30-year-old villager.

"This is not the first relocation of the village," Geng said. "We used to build our houses on the hill to avoid them becoming submerged in the floods."

To ensure the safety of the people living in Yellow River Beach, Shandong province carried out a pilot project in 2015 to relocate local villagers and construct residential houses for them.

In October 2015, the construction project for the new community of Gengshankou village was officially launched. After two years of construction, 31 residential buildings have been built. The first villagers from Gengshankou village moved to the new residential buildings on Oct 15, 2017, to start a new page in their life.

According to Sun Yunjian, deputy director general of Dongping county's development and reform bureau, the Dongping county government will relocate 6,604 households including 20,602 villagers to the new residential area by 2020.

At present, the first batch of 783 households and 2,331 villagers has been relocated. The second phase of the relocation, involving 699 households and 2,105 villagers, is underway in accordance with the schedule.