>>>Special report:2008 Olympic Games

Olympic host city Beijing and six co-hosts are making last-minute efforts to overhaul public transport systems in order to support the upcoming Olympic Games.

China's Ministry of Railway on Wednesday announced that a rapid railway linking Beijing with the co-host city Tianjin will be officially operational on Aug. 1, one week before the Games begin.

The 120-km Beijing-Tianjin Intercity Railway would be able to run at an operational speed of 350 km per hour, MOR Vice Minister Wang Zhiguo told a press conference in Beijing.

He said the ultra-modern line would cut the traveling time between the two cities from the current 70 minutes to about 30 minutes, giving passengers including Olympic athletes and sports officials an easier commute.

"The opening of the railway before the Olympics is a good news for all of them," Wang said.

Tianjin will hold 12 Olympic football matches between Aug. 6-15.

The newly-built state-of-art Beijing South Railway Station, with a capacity to handle over 10,000 passengers per day, will also be put in service on Aug. 1.

Besides Beijing and Tianjin, the national railway network has detailed plans to serve Olympic events in other co-host cities such as Shenyang, Qingdao and Shanghai, said Zhang Shuguang, MOR's deputy chief engineer.

A total of 16,000 athletes, coaches and officials from around the world will attend the Beijing Olympics, which is also expected to attract some 500,000 tourists from overseas.

Ensuring the safety of public transport has become the top priority of all cities, particularly after two bus explosions in southwest China's Kunming city on July 21, which killed two passengers and injured 14 others.

Chinese police have yet to find who is behind the explosions, but denied claims by a Uygur separatist group over the weekend that it carried out a series of attacks in several Chinese cities, including Kunming.

In Shanghai, China's economic center and the venue of some Olympic football games, video cameras for the purpose of security monitoring are being installed on more than 1,600 buses passing the Shanghai Stadium, People's Daily reported on Wednesday.

Metro trains and stations in the metropolis of over 17 million people will also be equipped with video cameras, X-ray scanners and masks as precautionary measures.

East China's coastal resort Qingdao, which will host the Olympic sailing events, also increased anti-terror measures on all buses and taxicabs.

Local police have carried out trainings among drivers and conductors, teaching them how to spot suspected people and items such as explosives.

The Olympics and the following Paralympics provide host cities a chance to improve transport infrastructure that will benefit both athletes and residents.

Shenyang, capital of northeast China's Liaoning Province, plans to put more buses in use when 12 Olympic football matches are held.

The city's public transport system is ready to operate at least 4,300 buses on 150 routes, 360 buses on 12 special Olympic routes, and 100 buses on 40 night routes.

Traffic police in Tianjin also use the Olympics as an opportunity to increase the awareness of traffic laws among motorists and pedestrians.

Ignorance of traffic rules such as jaywalking and drunk driving is often blamed as the main cause of accidents and congestions on China's roads, which are already crowded because of the rapid growth in the number of cars.

The police have identified about 150 "hot spots" of traffic congestion across Tianjin, where measures would be taken to ensuresmooth flows of cars. They also vowed to increase punishment of unlawful behavior of road users, People's Daily reported.

Editor: Yan