Ministry sees buses and trams as best way to tackle worsening traffic congestion
Public transport is to be made more attractive in an attempt to ease bumper to bumper congestion in big cities by 2010, the Ministry of Construction has announced.
At the National Urban Public Transport Priority Development meeting, which ended yesterday, the ministry set itself the target of raising public transport usage to 30 per cent within five years, from the present 10 per cent across the nation.
Complaints of city buses and trams frequently being behind schedule have soared in recent years.
With national policies encouraging people to buy cars, growing car ownership in big cities has resulted in new roads being built and old ones being broadened, creating room for more cars to compete with buses, thus exacerbating traffic and pollution problems.
According to data provided by the World Bank at the meeting, the average vehicle speed during peak hours on arterial roads between Beijing's second and third ring roads was 45km/h in 1994. Last year it was below 10km/h, slower than the average speed of bicycles.
The ministry's urban construction department deputy director, Wang Fengwu , said: 'In any city, road broadening efforts will never be able to catch up with the growth in vehicle ownership. It's unrealistic to solve traffic jams by broadening roads. We must work to develop a mass transit system.'
