Kunming's status as one of the cities with the highest vehicle ownership rates in the country is in no imminent danger – the city now has 1.1 million registered motorized vehicles, with 900 vehicles being registered daily, according to a Dushi Shibao report.

Kunming car sales have rebounded from a several-month slowdown caused by the global financial crisis. Statistics provided by the Kunming Public Security Bureau's Vehicle Management Department show that car sales are approaching the all-time high experienced in late 2005 and early 2006, when nearly 1,000 vehicles were being registered daily.

Despite being relatively small in comparison to other Chinese cities – it is China's 23rd-largest city – Kunming became the ninth Chinese city to have one million registered vehicles last year.

Conditions are ripe for auto sales in Kunming to continue to increase in the coming months. The recent completion of the city's double-decker second ring road, the local economy's recovery from the effects of the global economic downturn and a growing second-hand car market have made the idea of purchasing a vehicle more feasible to the average Kunming resident.

Ramifications of the growing number of vehicles on Kunming's streets are apparent. In addition to increased air pollution, the Chinese saying "many monks, not much porridge" (僧多粥少) aptly sums up the parking situation throughout the city. Many of the city's parking lots are filled during the day, leading to many Kunming drivers parking illegally, often in bike lanes or on sidewalks.

To address this problem, the city government has recently announced that automobiles parked on sidewalks that block the yellow ground tiles intended for blind people will receive 50 yuan parking tickets on the spot. Whether the city has the ability – and will – to enforce this new regulation should be apparent soon, just as it was with last year's ill-fated attempt to ban the unnecessary use of car horns.

Image: poco.cn

After an absence of nearly one year due to the renovating of the city's second ring road, no-car days will return to Kunming next Tuesday. City officials said the day would be used to promote health and environmental consciousness by encouraging Kunming residents to walk or ride bicycles.

Kunming became the first Chinese city to hold monthly no-car days in 2007, with all private cars being banned within the first ring road – and sometimes as far as the second ring road - on the last Saturday of each month.

No-car days were suspended in the autumn of 2008 after the government determined that banning private cars for a day was untenable given the large-scale traffic infrastructure overhaul taking place across the city.

This coming Tuesday (September 22) will mark the first no-car day held on a weekday, which will have implications for people who are accustomed to driving to work.

From 8:00 am to 8:00 pm, buses and taxis will be the only motorized vehicles allowed within – but not including - the city's first ring road. The first ring road consists of Huancheng Xi Lu, Huancheng Nan Lu, Huancheng Dong Lu, Huancheng Bei Lu and Yieryi Dajie.

Kunming, often derided by locals and local media as ducheng (堵城, or 'Traffic jam city'), has one of the highest car ownership rates and some of the worst traffic among Chinese cities.

The effect of the rapid increase in car sales in Kunming was compounded by ineffective governmental road planning, best exemplified by the corruption case of Hu Xing (胡星).

Hu was deputy director of Yunnan's Transportation Bureau and Kunming Deputy Mayor from 1995 to 2006 and was responsible for road construction and city planning. He was sentenced to life in prison in 2007 for taking more than 40 million yuan in bribes after being arrested in and extradited from Singapore.

One dead, three injured in airport brawl
An argument at a ticketing counter at Kunming Wujiaba International Airport late Monday night ended in bloodshed when a man who was pushed to the ground got up and stabbed four people before being arrested. 41-year-old Wang Wenyan died on Tuesday morning from injuries sustained in her fight with Liu Yong, who has reportedly confessed to stabbing Wang and three others. Both Wang and Liu had allegedly been drinking Monday night.

City address parking problems with new garages
The Kunming municipal government is seeking investors to help build 26 multi-story parking garages throughout the city to alleviate traffic problems related to insufficient parking spaces. The garages will be spread out over the city's four main urban districts: Guandu (two garages), Panlong (nine), Wuhua (seven) and Xishan (eight).

Contracts for five garages have already been signed, with an investment of 100 million yuan. These first garages will add 1,000 new parking spaces to the city and will be located at or near First People's Hospital of Yunnan, Green Lake View Hotel, the Ark Building, Kunming Zoo and Luosiwan wholesale market.

Kunming has one of the highest car ownership rates in China – in 2008 the number of registered automobiles in the city surpassed the one million mark. It took 43 years for the city to register its first 100,000 cars – now it takes around half a year.

Kunming drivers offered subsidies for fuel-efficient cars
Kunming residents shopping for new automobiles are being offered a government subsidy of 50,000 yuan (US$7,300) to purchase fuel-efficient cars including hybrids, electric cars and cars powered by fuel cells under a new Finance Ministry scheme.

The program is also being implemented in 12 other cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing, Changchun, Dalian, Hangzhou, Jinan, Wuhan, Shenzhen, Hefei, Changsha and Nanchang. Such energy-efficient cars are performing poorly in the Chinese market due to high price tags.

Under the scheme, Chinese city governments are also being encouraged to switch to fuel-efficient buses, taxis and postal and urban sanitation vehicles. Details of how cities will be encouraged to do so have not been released.

Yu'an Mountain fire
Just before noon on Wednesday, a portion of Yu'an Mountain (玉案山) caught fire, threatening to spread quickly across the mountains in Kunming's western suburbs with the aid of dry conditions and strong winds. More than 300 firefighters were dispatched to put out the blaze, which was extinguished early afternoon, saving the mountain's forests and the Bamboo Temple. Officials reportedly suspect the fire was started by two children.

Ground was broken yesterday on a new bicycle and pedestrian path that will encircle Dianchi Lake and will be off limits to motorized vehicles, according to Kunming media reports.

The so-called "Dianchi Landscape Path" (环滇池景观道) will be a total of 75.75 kilometers (47 miles) long. In addition to offering views of the heavily polluted, occasionally miasmatic but generally scenic Dianchi Lake, the path will also be accompanied by a landscaped green belt. It is scheduled for completion within two years.

The path's construction comes at a time when fewer Kunming residents are riding bicycles and more are driving their own cars or riding electric bicycles. Not so long ago, a two-day bicycle ride around the lake on the roads encircling Dianchi Lake was a popular weekend getaway for university students to get some exercise, or more often, for young lovers to escape from the lack of privacy of dorm life.

Today, local media often refers to Kunming as Ducheng (堵城), loosely meaning "Congestion City", as cars have taken over the city. Car ownership rates are climbing quickly and at last count more than 560 motorized vehicles were being registered in the city each day.

With most of the city's road resources being mobilized to deal with more and more cars, the Dianchi Landscape Path is a rare investment in Kunming's cycling and pedestrian infrastructure.

Not surprisingly, the path's construction is the lesser half of the 8.8 billion yuan (US$1.3 billion) "Two Rings" construction project that also includes renovation of Huanhu Lu (环湖路), the road that encircles Dianchi Lake, which will be constructed into an eight-lane highway.

Image: ncic.ac.cn

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