Traffic!
It is common that we rant and whine about traffic congestion all the time.
When we’re late to dinner:
“在三环上堵死了！” “We got stuck on the third ring road!”
When we’re late to a client meeting:
“打不到车！太堵了！” “We couldn’t get a taxi, traffic was too horrible!”
Also:
“车又打不到，地铁又挤不上，公交又不来！” “Couldn’t get a cab, couldn’t squeeze into the subway, and the bus didn’t come!”
However, due to several client events that required me to be on the road for the past two days, I’ve noticed that the situation has been more severe than usual, and this has been confirmed by several others:
Colleague: 我等了老半天都没有出租车！连一辆黑车都没有！平时都会有四五辆黑车再烦我。昨天一辆都没有！过后去了一号线，等了五辆车在终于挤得上去。我的快疯了！I waited forever and there was not a single cab! Not even an illegal taxi! Usually, there’d be 4 - 5 illegal taxis on my tail, bugging me to get on. Yesterday, there wasn’t even one! Later, I went to the No.1 subway line and I could only get on the 5th train that came because it was too crammed. I was going nuts!
Two Taxi Drivers: 你是最后的乘客了，我都快被饿疯了！都几点了，我连午饭都还没吃呢。你说今天难打车啊？我也不知道为什么，今天打车的人都好像特别多，忙死了！你看，那边还有那么多人在等。而且路又堵得不得了。你说是不是？我不行了。送了你我马上得去吃饭。
“You are my last passenger because I’m dying from hunger! What time is it already and I haven’t eaten my lunch. You said it was difficult to get a taxi today? I don’t know why but there were so many people hailing taxis today as well which is unusual! So busy! Look, there are more people waiting there. Also, traffic was so bad. Don’t you think so? I can’t take it anymore. I’m gonna go eat as soon as I drop you off.
For me, I’ve had to wait for about 30 minutes twice in the past two days for a taxi. I’ve also had to be creative and walk an extra 10 - 20 minutes to strategic corners away from the line of people waiting at designated stands. My colleague and I also experienced 4 - 5 empty taxis ignoring us on the street, probably because they were rushing off to feed themselves.
Listen
Finally, after 30 minutes of walking and waiting around the Wangfujing/Jinbao Avenue area, we climbed into a cab:
Friend: They say that if Beijing doesn’t take more effective measures to solve this problem, in XX years’ time, this will be the highest speed our vehicles would be able to move (it was about 15 - 20km/hr). I don’t understand why the Beijing municipal government is so behind places like Shanghai in terms of controlling traffic.
Me: Yea, and the government continues to preach about the booming economy as evidenced by the increasing number of vehicles Chinese consumers are buying. And where do all the cars go? This bloody road!
Taxi Driver: 政府真的把老百姓蒙骗了! (The Chinese government has really fooled its people!)
It has been complete chaos the past few weeks.
A May 2010 article reported that the Chinese bought 13.6 million vehicles in 2009 and the market is forecasted to grow to 15.5 million units in 2010. Oh, good luck to us.