No doubt responding to constituent demand, the folks at the European Union Chamber of Commerce are hosting a “Road Safety in China” seminar. The program’s stated goal “is to provide information and guidance in road safety for the employees of European companies in China, and help participants understand the various aspects of road safety . . . . as well as [provide] some useful recommendations for participants to improve their road safety awareness.”
To be fair, as anyone who lives here knows, Beijing is a challenging driving environment. It has a lot of old, narrow roads, and construction is a constant fact of life. Many of the city’s drivers are new — and bad. The streets are teeming with all manner of non-car vehicular transport, including bicycles, tricycle carts, pedi-cabs and horse-drawn wagons. Pedestrians traffic can be erratic — for example, the couple your correspondent saw jogging along the shoulder of Airport Expressway last week — and during rush hour, the waves of pedestrians crossing at major intersections can engulf cars. All these factors make China the world’s number one location for traffic deaths: about 9,000 in 2006, accounting for 15-20% of the total traffic deaths in the world.
Still, a seminar on “road safety” seems on par with a seminar on “grocery shopping”: it’s common-sensical and, if you can’t figure it out, you do deserve to die. Moreover, the seminar’s conclusion is obvious. In the interest of saving European Union Chamber of Commerce members 200 yuan, here it is: pretend you’re in Italy.
- European Union Chamber of Commerce: Road safety in China seminar details
- Xinhua (in Chinese): Treasure life: number of traffic accident deaths exceed those from natural disasters
- Treehugger.com (Image source): Beijing’s “no car” days: how to win friends and not influence traffic