The Daily Grind: Beijing Takes on Traffic in 2011

The same policy makers that only years earlier lowered taxes on new vehicle purchases in an attempt to strengthen an emerging national automobile industry, have begun 2011 with a drastically different approach to the number of cars on Beijing’s roads. With State supported incentives it took only a few years for the Chinese auto market to surpass the United States as the world’s largest.

As a direct result, Beijing is now tied with Mexico City for having the world's worst commute, and staggering pollution rates. Previous attempts to alleviate traffic have been installed; restricting which days vehicles can drive depending on the last digit of their license plate numbers.

As of January 1, 2011, the Beijing Municipal Government enacted controversial yet necessary new regulations that would drastically restrict the number of vehicle registrations allowed in the next year to 240,000, less than a third of the total number of vehicles registered in 2010.  In the last month of 2010 a record 30,000 new vehicles were registered in the city in anticipation for the new regulations.

During the first 11 hours of the new regulation's enactment, more than 36,000 Beijingers registered vehicles. Over the next year monthly registrations will be limited to 20,000, but for Beijing residents, simply submitting an application will not ensure that a registration will be obtained.  Instead each application will be placed in a lottery. Those who don’t receive license plates during that month will be placed in next month’s lottery.
Though the new licensing regulations and higher taxes for new vehicles have been met by many a disgruntled Beijinger, they will have a dramatic effect on both the city’s traffic and pollution levels. 

For the time being a significant drop in car sales is only expected to affect Beijing, while having little impact on the country as a whole. With countless rapidly growing cities though, similar regulations may be soon to follow in many of China’s densely populated metropolitan areas.