Many in China itching to get behind wheel
By Los Angeles Times
Monday, May 24, 2004
SHANGHAI, China -- For Lu Fenglin, getting her driver's license was like getting all dressed up for a party with nowhere to go.
Even though the kindergarten teacher, 28, has earned the right to hop into any car and cruise, she hasn't touched a steering wheel since the day she left driving school four months ago. Most of her friends don't own cars -- and those who do are reluctant to lend. Buying her own is beyond her means.
"My dream car is a small car, maybe the Chinese-made QQ or the Volkswagen Polo, because they are so cute and relatively more affordable," said Lu, who is between jobs. "But everything is too expensive for me now. I have no chance at all to practice driving."
Many people among China's emerging middle class are newly minted members of the driving club -- creating a whole class of people called "benbenzu," or the licensed generation. Yet, they remain carless, and when these novice drivers do hit the road, they tend to make the unruly Chinese streets even more dangerous. Hence their other nickname: road killers.
Throughout the country, traffic accidents killed more than 104,000 people last year -- nearly 300 a day. The fatality rate in the United States is less than half that, even though the nation's traffic volume is far higher.
Benbenzu drivers are a big part of the problem. In Shanghai, they were responsible last year for 33 percent of the city's traffic accidents. About the same proportion of those that resulted in death were attributed to the benbenzu.
A widely known incident here involved a wealthy businessman who had a license but never drove because he had a chauffeur. One day he was in a good mood and asked the chauffeur to move over. Confusing the gas pedal with the brake, the businessman plunged his Audi A6 into the river and drowned.
It wasn't long ago that rush hour in China meant a boulevard crammed with clunky bicycles with very few four-wheelers in sight. Today, China is home to the world's fastest-growing automobile market. Car sales have soared in the past few years because of falling prices and rising incomes. The nation last year became the world's third-largest car market, behind the United States and Japan. And most auto industry experts believe it will surpass Japan within a few years. General Motors Corp. Chief Executive Rick Wagoner recently said China could become the world's largest car market within the next generation.
The growth rate is staggering. Globally, automakers are happy to see annual sales growth in the 4 percent to 6 percent range. In China last year, it was 75 percent. Passenger vehicle sales have quadrupled since 1998.
In 1990, the Chinese bought about 6,000 passenger cars, and most were sold to government agencies and high-ranking government and business figures. Last year, Chinese consumers bought 2.1 million passenger vehicles, and about 70 percent were private purchases. Development of a private automotive culture in China "is a new revolution for the country," said Michael Dunne, a Beijing-based auto industry researcher whose company, Automotive Resources Asia, has been tracking the Chinese car market for the past decade.
The result of such torrid growth is a potentially overheating market, severe traffic congestion and worsening air quality for a country already considered one of the most polluted in the world. Some people in the West also are worried that China's newfound love affair with the automobile could further hike rising world energy prices.
The United Nations has warned that if China's per-capita car ownership were to match that of the West, the nation would need to produce 650 million vehicles to meet demand and would consume more metal and oil than the world could supply. Despite the rapid expansion of private auto ownership, the freedom of the road remains well beyond the reach of most Chinese.
"There about 200,000 people in Shanghai getting their driver's licenses every year, but only about 80,000 people could afford to buy cars. The rest are just itching to drive," said Shao Weijie, 35, founder of Coco Automobiles Club, which provides members with a rental car and a coach who gets paid by the hour to baby-sit shaky new drivers.
"I'm not ready to buy a car yet," said Cheng Zhengmin, 40. "But I still want to drive. The coach gave me a lot of confidence."
"Just because someone has a license or even a car doesn't mean they are ready to drive," Shao said. "That's why they really need a re-education. We are here to provide that critical service."
palmbeachpost.com |
