China opens its first self-driving test road for complicated traffic situations in Shanghai, one of the many attractions as the 2022 World Artificial Intelligence Conference kicks off on Thursday.

Located in downtown of Pudong New Area, the test roads run across Jinqiao town in the middle of Pudong New Area, with Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park on its south and Huangpu River at its north, and visitors of WAIC can experience autonomous driving cars among these 12 test roads.

With a length totaled to nearly 30 kilometers, the test roads contain 57 smart-controlled crossroads and are classified as level 3 of the four-level risk assessments for open test roads.

The area will serve as the first testing field to many application of intelligent connected vehicles such as autonomous parking spot survey.

"Such a smart parking system can be applied to a much larger area, but an integrated development of 'car-road-cloud' has to be realized first," said Yan Junjie, deputy director of Jinqiao Management Bureau of Shanghai Free Trading Area.

China has allowed autonomous driving road tests in restricted areas of major cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen since 2018. It has since then expanded to open road tests on expressways. 

The country also encourages the use of autonomous vehicles as taxis in easily controlled scenarios in low traffic situations, according to a draft seeking public advice by the Ministry of Transportation published in August.