The Longest Traffic Jam In History

China is a great automotive market and will remain so as long as more and more manufacturers are attracted by cheap labour costs and state incentives. But the downside of this breathtaking boom is the increasing number of cars that ply public roads in China. If we are to trust the estimates, not less than seven million cars are expected to be on the road by 2015 in Beijing.

Nearly 14 million cars are bought each year, while 650,000 vehicles enter the road every month. It’s like saying: “Hey, everybody in Beijing must have a car. No, make that two!”.

Authorities have tried to stop residents from buying so many cars, mostly in an attempt to reduce pollution and ease traffic, but their efforts are almost useless. Beijing drivers, for example, must leave their cars at home one day per week, based on a scheme that involves the last digit of the number plate, again in an effort supposed to ease traffic on Chinese roads. Still, local reports claim that Chinese drivers spend two or three hours per day in traffic, just because of the huge number of cars.

Well, the inevitable happened in the end and it’s hard to find someone to blame. Back in August 2010, China was crowned the unofficial “host” of the mother of all traffic jams, with a huge car panorama that stretched for more than 62 miles (100 km) and lasted for 12 days.

It all happened on the Beijing-Tibet Expressway near Beijing and, ironically, the cause of the huge traffic jam was the road work on the highway. Trucks carrying construction supplies to Beijing, most of them supposed to be used on the expressway in order to ease traffic, were blocked at the exit, thus causing a traffic jam that lasted for more than 12 days. Twelve days in a traffic jam is a lot, that’s pretty clear, and even if some drivers already had bread and cigarettes as a method of precaution, everybody had to buy at least a cup of water.

Of course, the Chinese living in the area tried to take the most out of this unfortunate moment and raised prices as much as possible, with reports claiming that a cup of water cost 3 yuan, which is 0.4 American dollars. If drivers were starving, they had to pay 2 yuan (around $0.3) for an egg, while those who wanted cigarettes were almost ripped off: the price was nearly $8 a packet. Lorry drivers were the ones most affected though. Water and food were very expensive, but some of them were robbed during the night.