Subways vs. Cars in China
It was obvious that China’s big cities were going the LA route years ago, meaning more expansion, outlying suburbs, more roads, and more traffic.
An an LA native, I can’t say I’m in favor of this sort of development strategy for a host of reasons, including air quality.
Keith Bradsher, currently in HK for the New York Times (he also held an earlier post with the Times in Detroit, and knows a thing or two about cars) has some info on the subject:
At least 15 cities are building subway lines and a dozen more are planning them. The pace of construction will only accelerate now that Beijing is pushing local and provincial governments to step up their infrastructure spending to offset lost revenue from slumping exports.
Western mass transit experts applaud China for investing billions in systems that will put less stress on the environment and on cities. But they warn that other Chinese policies, like allowing real estate developers to build sprawling new suburbs, undermine the benefits of the mass transit boom.
In other words, thanks for all the new subways, but these are not being built to minimize automobile use, but in addition to an auto infrastructure.
China has reason to worry. It surpassed the United States in total vehicle sales for the first time in January, although the United States remained slightly ahead in car sales. But in February, China overtook the United States in both, in part because the global downturn has hurt auto sales much more in the United States than in China.
Remember that the auto industry has been targeted by the government as a key to the nation’s economy, and Beijing is not about to alter policies that will have a negative effect on domestic automakers. I recall writing about the dangers of the auto industry’s political influence in China way back when I was writing the China Blawg in 2003. If anything, the political situation (along with the air quality and traffic) has gotten worse.
The rest of the article, which focuses on subway construction in Guangzhou, is also quite interesting.
I agree that there is more and more urban sprawl, and the upper middle class is definitely in love with cars.
Having said that, it seems to me that the vast majority of “normal” urban Chinese either still doesn’t own a car, or doesn’t insist on using it to get to work if there is a convenient subway connection at a low price (and taking into account that roads in many major cities are jammed during rush hour).
Maybe it will eventually turn out like much of Europe: In Munich, for instance, most households have one or two cars. But few people actually use it to commute to work. That’s what subway and light rail are used for (though people from the suburbs do use their car to drive to the nearest light rail station).