The present layout of the city is like a set of concentric circles, with the inner city being at the heart and a large number of residential areas set around the fourth and fifth ring roads. Such a pattern leads to a tide-like flow between the inner city, where most residents work, and the outer circles, where they live, causing great tension on the city's traffic network.

"We should put a stop to building large-scale shopping centers in the inner city," Liu said. "As residential areas are moving outward, why cannot we also move commercial, medical and educational establishments to the outskirts of the city?"

Other factors contribute to the traffic headache in Beijing as well, such as people's disobedience of the traffic rules, the unscientific design of the roads and inefficient traffic management methods, said Song of the BTMB.

Public transport

As the city is witnessing rapid economic development and the approach of perhaps the most significant international event ever held in the country-the 2008 Olympic Games-Beijing is feeling pressed to solve, or at least ease, the chronic transportation problem.

Many transportation experts have reached the consensus that developing public transport is vital to resolving the problem in Beijing. "I think it is essential to promote public transport to alleviate the city's traffic pain," said An Shi, a professor at Harbin Industrial University.

Liu Xiaoming of the Traffic and Transportation Administration Committee of Beijing Municipality noted that the road resources taken up by cars are five or six times that of public transport vehicles. With the same number of passengers, cars occupy 68.9 percent of the road resources while public transport only takes up 10.2 percent.

In 1996, the country's public transport use ratio stood at some 20 percent, while today the ratio has fallen to 10 percent. Meanwhile, in Beijing the ratio has dropped to 20 percent from 30-40 percent a decade ago, a huge disparity from that in some developed countries, which reaches about 70-80 percent.

In this regard, the Beijing Municipal Government and the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad (BOCOG) released the Beijing Olympic Action Plan back in 2002. A guideline for the future social and economic development of the city and for the preparation of the Olympic Games, the plan embodies the concept of "development for the Olympics, the Olympics for development." One important part of the plan is to boost the development and management of public transit system.

The plan said it will promote the modernization of the road network construction and traffic management in Beijing, aiming at providing convenient, quick, safe, orderly and efficient services. The construction of a rail transport system, urban road systems, inter-city transport systems and city transport hubs will be accelerated.

According to the plan, the city will focus on the construction of an urban rail network consisting of such projects as the Beijing Urban Light Rail, Batong Subway Line, Subway Line No. 5, Subway Line No. 4, the Olympic Subway Line and the express rail from Dongzhimen to Beijing Capital International Airport. By 2008, 148.5 km of new rail transport will be added, reaching a total of 202 km, and the subway will carry about 10 percent of the passengers in the city.

The plan also said it will continue to optimize the public transport network by developing BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) and setting up more bus lanes on the roads and more bus routes.