Soils of greenbelts alongside in road system (urban trunk roads, belt highways and suburban roads) as well as of the Nanjing Botanical Garden cited as a clean zone were surveyed and assessed for heavy metals. The results show that the contents of most heavy metals in the soils of on the roadside are higher than in the soil of the clean zone. The highest concentrations of Mo, Zn, As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Fe and Mn are found in the soils alongside the belt highways, that of Pb in the soils along side the urban trunk roads and that of Al in the soils alongside the suburban roads. This phenomenon could be further confirmed with the Shannon Weaner Index, indicating a declining order of belt highways (0.293) > urban trunk roads (0.261) > suburban roads (0.238) > "clean zone" (0.236). This result reflects significant variation of soils accumulating heavy metals;The princi pal component plot reveals that the belt highways are areas high in heavy metals;the urban trunk roads areas high in Pb, the sub urban roads areas in Al and Fe, and the clean zone Botanical Garden an area low in heavy metals.