GUANGZHOU, July 3 -- The Shenzhen-Zhongshan Link, a mega cross-sea passage in south China, had handled 305,000 vehicles as of 3 p.m. Wednesday, 72 hours after its official opening, data from Guangdong Transportation Group showed.

Spanning 24 km, the link features two bridges, two artificial islands, and an underwater tunnel. It drastically reduces travel time between the city of Zhongshan and the technology hub of Shenzhen, which are located on opposite sides of the Pearl River Estuary in Guangdong Province. The link cuts the duration of the journey between the two destinations from two hours to around 30 minutes.

"The link has already accounted for about 25 percent of the daily traffic passing through the Pearl River, which promotes market integration in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA)," said Lin Feiming, head of the Guangdong provincial department of transport.

The GBA, encompassing Hong Kong, Macao and nine cities in Guangdong, boasts a combined population of over 80 million. It achieved a total economic output of over 14 trillion yuan (around 1.96 trillion U.S. dollars) in 2023.

Before the inauguration of the new link, there were three cross-sea links, but congestion had become a major issue for the transportation of both people and goods in the area.