Unique Liziba metro station inside a residential building in the Chinese city of Chongqing

While rushing to work in the morning, have you ever thought that it wouldn’t hurt to have a tram or metro stop right in your own entrance? In the Chinese city of Chongqing, this idea was actually brought to life. A unique metro station was opened here, the platform of which is located directly inside a residential building between the 7th and 8th floors.

In Chongqing, the traffic problem is very serious. Just think: its area of 82,500 square kilometers is home to more than 49 million people! In addition, this metropolis is also unique in that it was built right on the mountain spurs, which is why local authorities sometimes have to work very hard to competently design the city’s transport infrastructure.

In Chongqing, monorail rather than rail rolling stock is used. The width of the two tracks is almost 2 meters less than the same rail tracks, and in the conditions of Chongqing this is a panacea. But due to the use of the monorail, the tunnels, although narrower, are much higher than traditional ones.

In 2005, a unique metro station appeared in Chongqing - Liziba station. The city authorities did not demolish the 19-story building, but laid a monorail through the building. The line is built so that it passes through an opening in a residential building.

The metro station occupies two floors of an apartment building - the sixth and seventh. The nearest walls of the apartments are in contact with the tunnel, and the distance to the side and bottom windows does not reach even a meter. Residents can go on a journey by literally stepping out onto the landing.

A reasonable question arises: what is it like for the residents of the house to be in such an unusual proximity to the metro? Engineers assure: during the construction of the Liziba station, the most modern noise-absorbing and vibration-dampening technologies were used, and therefore residents do not experience any discomfort. However, we can only guess how things really are.

The Daily Mail claims that this sound bothers residents no more than the operation of a dishwasher, but, according to other sources, residents still complain about the noise and frequent headaches.

Could you live in such a house?