By Zhou JianFeng
Translated by Chen Shuling
The Fourth Comprehensive Transportation Research in Shanghai would be started from the middle of this September in full swing. The civilians' opinions would be collected on the current situation and development direction of all kinds of traffic management policies such as the vehicle license auction, road congestion charges, etc. in the traffic research. Chinese Version>>
As soon as the information is known, all the comments on the Internet showed people's complaints about the traffic situation and the discontent with current policies. Such mood is quite understandable as so far the 'good methods' taken by our management department is all connected with 'money' while it's always the ordinary people who pay for it. The vehicle license price has kept rising since 2000. The statistics showed that the average prices from 2002 to 2008 were all over 30000 yuan and it even reached 47970 yuan in 2008. It can't be denied that the only vehicle license auction system in China has somewhat relieved Shanghai traffic pressure, otherwise the amount of private vehicles in Shanghai wouldn't be the over 700 thousand of today. Meanwhile, it has also become the forever-lasting pain on the vehicle buyers' hearts in Shanghai. Buying such a piece of 'expensive metal' turned Passat into Lavida, Skoda Haorui into Skoda Mingrui, Mazda Zhisheng into Focus, Magotan into Sagitar and New Regal into Cruze. Then, the public was confronted with a new noun, 'road congestion charge', which was undoubtedly learned from the foreign countries' advanced experience to control the amount of private vehicles. But it's really a big trouble for vehicle owners that the 'advanced' experience of collecting money is learned from foreign countries too fast.
As the times are developing, Shanghai is also developing. With the improvement of living standards and the increase of people's material demands, private vehicles have become the main transport means for more and more Shanghai citizens to go out. The sale of vehicles in 4S shops is increasing every month, and the speed of road construction cannot catch up with that of vehicle increase at all. Although people are appealed to give up driving one day every week, it seems that such means which mostly depends on self-consciousness would not lead to practical effects. Our traffic is facing a severe challenge that better policies are needed to solve the problem of traffic jam. The management department has also realized it. It's very wise to lower their positions and ask for the public's suggestions.
First, it can help them to get the first-hand information and find out the crucial cause of traffic problems. For the management department, only seeing the phenomenon of traffic jam but not the real reason to it, they may not suit the remedy to the case. Thus, the problem won't be relieved fundamentally. The research about transport habits, driving routes and traffic violation driving will be useful foundation for transport improvement.
Second, to draw on all the wisdom and invite more insightful people to give their advice and suggestions. The traffic is for all the public. There is no doubt that no one is willing to face situation of congested traffic. So these insightful people are believed to use their intelligence and provide some constructive opinions to improve the traffic situation, and to find out a new solution to the traffic jam instead of the old way paved with 'money' , so that all would win as a result.
Third, it gains public opinions and gives us an opportunity to express our ideas, which fully shows the respect and regards to us. The transparent and open process and result of the investigation give us not only the expectation about the result but also the confidence to improve our traffic. In this case, expressing our wishes rationally is the attitude we will take. The only reason is that for our common harmony of traffic.
Fourth, it ensures traffic for Expo. During the Expo, about 70 million tourists around world would come to Shanghai, which will certainly challenge our traffic. By getting ready in advance and showing Shanghai with its best appearance, we will have a good traffic condition as the most direct explanation of the theme of this Expo, 'Better City, Better Life'.