Developing Multi-City Cities to Crack Beijing Congestion Needs Prescription

The Hong Kong South China Morning Post reported on February 6th: The traffic jam in Beijing is getting

Unless Beijing changes its urban model -- that is, it sets up several central business districts instead of one -- and it doesn't rely too much on the loop system, the problem of traffic congestion in the city will continue to deteriorate. Beijing’s car ownership has reached approximately 5 million vehicles.

Beijing's Will Hao said: "I don't want to drive to work. I'm so guilty." He parked his car at home because spending three hours on the road made him unable to stand.

The Beijing Municipal Government knows well about the problems that existed. In the past few years, it has taken several measures to ease traffic congestion. Now it has implemented a very unpopular policy: limit the number of newly registered vehicles. Beijing will limit the number of new vehicle licenses this year to 240,000. In 2010, sales of new cars in Beijing reached 891,000.

However, relevant experts called for more extreme solutions: the city is divided into multiple business districts. They said that this is the only way Beijing Municipal Government can overcome the structural problems in Beijing's transportation. Beijing's transportation network is built around the current ring of vehicles that are often full of vehicles.

Zhao Hong, director of the Institute of Economic Research of the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, is advocating that experts at the level of urban planning should develop comprehensive solutions. Zhao Hong said that urban planning, transportation systems, and urban order are all interconnected, and the (excessive) expansion of loop systems is caused by the lack of policy makers' deep understanding of this point.

Like Beijing, many European cities have also built loops when population is small and new vehicles are growing slowly. However, most cities abandon this model when the number of entrances and vehicles reaches a certain level.

The Beijing Second Ring Road, which is considered as the center of the city, was built in the 1960s, when the bicycle was the main means of transportation. However, in the past 20 years, Beijing’s population has grown rapidly and so has the number of vehicles.

In response to the increase in population and vehicles, the government built a loop. Beijing has now been repaired to the Sixth Ring Road. The outermost ring road is about 20 kilometers from the city center.

Beijing has a population of 22 million. Many of them often have to cross Beijing's only central business district because they cannot use the loop system. Thousands of vehicles need to constantly search for imports and exports on the congested Second Ring Road.

Despite the problem of traffic congestion and the growing discontent among commuter families, traffic problems and urban planning are not the focus of the government's work.

Chen Gong, an advisor to the Beijing Emergency Command Center, said that there is not enough communication among various government departments. For example, the transportation department never communicates with the officials responsible for urban planning. Different committees only plan according to their own scope of work, and they do not coordinate with each other. They plan a more comprehensive plan for the development of the city.

This does not mean that the government has turned a blind eye to this issue. In the past 10 years, Beijing has substantially expanded its subway network to solve traffic problems.

It is too late for Beijing to solve the traffic problem because of its large area and large population. Therefore, the development of public transport is not the only solution.

Zhao Hong said that Beijing should consider the construction of railways to solve the traffic problem when the population is 78 million. He said that now that the expansion of the subway system will not solve the problem of travel, it will also be of no avail to put more buses into operation.

Chen Gong said that it is difficult for Beijing to solve its own traffic problems by building more subway lines because Beijing has an area of ​​16,000 square kilometers. Subway investment in Beijing will be very large, and the railway network will not be able to cover all important areas of the city. He said that a better way is to develop a multi-city model.