In rapidly developing countries, growth in the number of motor vehicles on roadways can outpace economic growth (Chia and Phang,. 2001). As China’s GDP has grown from 2.7 trillion USD in 2000 to 7.5 trillion USD in 2014, the number of automobiles has increased at an even faster rate (The World Bank). Ahead of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, city authorities worked to reduce the negative externalities associated with motor vehicle use through driving restrictions. The three papers outlined in this essay measure the effect of the post-Olympics Beijing driving restriction policy on reducing the negative externalizes associated with automobiles. Each paper uses different techniques, measures different variables, and interprets different data in order to draw their conclusions. Together, the three papers demonstrate that the post-Olympics Beijing driving restriction policy has the intended effects of reduced congestion and vehicle emissions, and also reduces negative health effects associated with vehicle emissions.
Driving restrictions to reduce congestion, smog, and the associated health complications in urban centers are not a recent phenomenon. Driving restrictions have been implemented in developing cities such as Caracas, Mexico City, and Sao Paolo since the beginning of the 1980s (Wang et al., 2014). From 2005 to 2012, the number of motor vehicles in Beijing grew from 2.583 million to 5.2 million. This sharp increase has contributed to worsening congestion within the fifth ring road in Beijing, where most commercial activity takes place. Chinese state media reports that traffic congestion costs the greater Beijing region 5% of its annual GDP (Wang et al., 2014, Zhong et al., 2017).
Noting the detrimental social and economic impact of increased congestion, Beijing authorities worked to test and implement traffic restrictions prior to the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Concurrently, the local government reduced fees for public transportation. A four day trial run of the driving restriction program was estimated to have removed 1.3 million motor vehicles from Beijing roads. Based on the success of this program, a new, permanent, driving restriction program was introduced in October of 2008. This new program assigns two numbers to each workday of the week: 1 and 6, 2 and 7, 3 and 8, 4 and 9, and 5 and 0. If a vehicle’s license plate ends in any of the two numbers assigned for that day, it will not be permitted within the fifth ring road. The numbers that are assigned to a certain day change every 13 weeks. Police and roadside cameras are used to find and fine violators. Small changes have been made to the program since its introduction, but the number system has remained (Wang et al., 2014).
In “Will a driving restriction policy reduce car trips? – The case study of Beijing, China” (2014) by Lanlan Wang, Jintao Xu, and Ping Qin, the results of the 2010 Beijing Household Travel Survey are used to determine the effectiveness of two years of the one-day-a-week driving scheme within the Beijing fifth road. The authors mention the failure of past driving restriction programs outside of China, noting that without strict and regularly enforced penalties, driving restriction polices tend to fail.
The authors use the results of the 2010 Beijing Household Travel Survey to determine which factors (sex, age, income, distance from city center, distance from public transportation hub, purpose and path of trip) were correlated with driving restriction violations. The paper concludes that of the drivers prohibited from driving on any given day, around 47.8% would drive in spite of the rules. Regression analysis of the data shows that proximity to public transportation does not correspond to lower levels of rule violation. This indicates that public transportation and automobile use are not interchangeable. Additionally, there is a correlation between “illegal” trips and peak travel times, when congestion is at its worst. “Illegal” trips increase in areas at the periphery of the driving restriction zone, consistent with the increases in police patrols and cameras towards the city center (Wang et al., 2014).
Although this paper gives significant insight into the effectiveness of the initial two years of driving regulations in Beijing, the survey results take place before the major regulation reforms of late 2010 and early 2011. In December of 2010, the Beijing municipality government enacted a lottery program for motor vehicle ownership and in January of 2011, they increased fines for restriction violations. The paper acknowledges these two developments, but arrives at the conclusion that Beijing driving restriction policies are not comprehensive enough to significantly alleviate congestion and pollution within the fifth ring road based off of the data collected from the 2010 Beijing Household Travel Survey.
Many of the shortcomings of Wang et al. (2014) are addressed in “Restricting driving for better traffic and clearer skies: Did it work in Beijing?” (2014) by Long Sun, Siqi Zheng, and Rui Wang. This paper quantifies the success of the post-Olympics driving restriction policy through the analysis of the Transportation Performance Index (TPI), a measure of congestion published by the Beijing Municipal Commission of Transport, and the Air Pollution Index, a measure of average particles of size PM10 over a 24 hour period, released by the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau.
Sun et al. acknowledge the difficulties of concluding that the Beijing traffic restriction policy has had an impact. In an environment with a stable level of pollution and car ownership, one could compare the levels of congestion and air pollution in the period before and the period after a given policy to determine whether or not the policy is effective. In Beijing’s case, the rapid increase in number of cars, and the large amount of non-motor vehicle particle emissions make this infeasible. Instead, Sun et al. take advantage of a unique Chinese superstition surrounding the number four. Because the number four is deemed unlucky, very few license plates contain or end with the number four. Therefore, on “4 and 9” restriction days, there is up to a 14.3%. increase in the number of automobiles allowed within the fifth ring road (Sun et al., 2014).
Sun et al. determines that there is a lack of any statistically significant difference in particle emissions between “4 and 9” restriction days and the other days, despite an increase in congestion on “4 and 9 days.” This disconnect could be attributed to a variety of factors. Among these, the effect of traffic on PM10 could be marginal, there could be a time lag, drivers could have adapted by requesting license plates ending in the number four, or lessening of congestion could result in greater mileage driven, increasing particle levels in the air. The authors cite other papers to disregard all but the last explanation. But, they conclude that although the driving restriction policy is effective in reducing congestion, no impact on levels of PM10 emissions can be determined. The paper acknowledges that access to information on levels of a greater number of air pollutants would prove to be beneficial. Specifically, measures of PM2.5, NO2 and CO would provide a more comprehensive account of vehicle emissions (Sun et al., 2014).
Together, Wang et al. (2014) and Sun et al. (2014) demonstrate the success of the Beijing traffic restriction policy on congestion while bringing to light many of the behaviors that drive people to avoid compliance. Sun et al. (2014) takes advantage of the unique cultural aversion to the number four in order to quantify the impact of the traffic restriction policy on congestion. Wang et al. (2014) shows that without appropriate enforcement methods, the benefits of non-compliance with the Beijing driving restriction policy outweigh the potential costs associated with fines. Together, the two papers demonstrate that the Beijing driving restriction is effective, but can be further refined to appropriately motivate individuals to comply with the regulations. But, neither paper conclusively addresses the impact of the driving restrictions on pollution, and both fail to address the impact of traffic restrictions on health.
While Sun et al. (2014) finds no impact from the “4 and 9 day” on pollution, “Traffic Congestion, Ambient Air Pollution, and Health: Evidence from Driving Restrictions in Beijing” (2017) by Nan Zhong, Jing Cao, and Yuzhu Wang is able to draw conclusive results. In addition to quantifying the impact of driving restrictions on pollution, Zhong et al. (2017) finds a correlation between pollution levels and health. Little has been published about the health effects of automobile air pollution in China. Using the same “4 and 9 day” comparison technique developed by Sun et al. (2014), Zhong et al. (2017) analyzes a greater amount of air quality data and pairs it with data provided by EMT call centers.
In order to determine the effect of the driving restriction policy on air quality, Zhong et al. (2017) uses data from the Beijing Environmental Protection Bureau (EPB) and the US embassy in Beijing. The data was collected in 2012, after enforcement of driving restrictions was strengthened. The pollutants measured are PM2.5, SO2, PM10, and NO2, the later of which is most often associated with automobile emissions.
Data collected by the Beijing Emergency Medical Center on the type of emergency and timing of EMT calls in the year 2012 were used to quantify negative health effects of pollutants. Heart related-symptoms, coronary heart disease and fever were the three variable conditions, compared to injury, the control group.
Zhong et al. ( 2017) finds that in addition to an average increase in congestion by 22% (based on the Beijing Transportation Research Center), there is an estimated increase in NO2 concentrations by 12% on “4 and 9 days.” Similar to the results of Sun et al. (2014), Zhong et al. (2017) is unable to find statistically significant increases in PM2.5 and PM10. SO2, associated with the burning of coal, does not show any statistically significant changes. In the 24 hours following noon of “4 and 9 day,” there are observed increases of 3.3% for heart-related symptoms, 19.5% for coronary heart disease, and 11.7% for fever, with no change for the control variable, injury (Zhong et al., 2017). Zhong et al. (2017) demonstrates that increased automobile pollution correlates with an increase in health complications, and that reduction of automobile pollution through policy is an effective method of reducing the negative health complications associated with pollution.
While Wang et al. (2014) and Sun et al. (2014) establish the foundations for understanding the impacts and shortcomings of the post-Olympics Beijing driving restriction policy, Zhong et al. (2017) provides a comprehensive analysis of the policy’s environmental and health effects. The analysis of NO2 levels, associated closely with vehicle use, provides more conclusive results than PM10 measurements, which are not closely associated with vehicle use. The inclusion of EMT call data is a significant contribution to Beijing traffic studies. Although previous links had been drawn between vehicle emissions and health complications, by showing the impact of traffic restriction policy on health, Zhong et al. are able to quantify the reduction in negative externalities on health through government intervention.
Zhong et al. (2017) is much more comprehensive than both Wang et al. (2014) and Sun et al. (2014). Despite this, there is still research to be done on the impact of Beijing driving restrictions. Wang et al. (2014) comes to the conclusion that access to public transportation is not a statistically significant indicator of whether or not an individual would choose to break the traffic restriction policy. Now that policy violators face steeper fines, does proximity to public transportation correlate with propensity to obey traffic restrictions?
Additionally, an analysis of economic losses attributed to the driving restriction policy could prove useful. A comparison on revenue collected by retailers within the 5th ring road on “4 and 9 days” compared to on other days of the week could reveal some of the economic changes correlated with the Beijing driving restriction policy.
Finally, in the long term, if public transport is not easily available and Beijing’s economy continues to grow at its current rate, there may be changes in property use and prices as the cost of transportation continues to rise. An analysis in changes in the price of property outside but adjacent to the fifth ring road as well as property prices within the fifth ring road would contribute to creating a fuller picture of the effects of the Beijing driving restriction policy. All else equal, one would expect commercial land prices outside, but adjacent to the fifth ring road to increase in value as customers from outside the 5th ring road could travel to these locations unrestricted, any day of the week. But, Beijing is expanding quickly, leading to increasing peripheral land prices regardless of driving restrictions. More work remains to be completed to quantify the economic impact of the Beijing driving restriction policy.
The three papers demonstrate that the post-Olympics Beijing driving restriction policy has been effective in reducing congestion and vehicle emissions, in addition to reducing the negative corresponding health effects. By providing evidence of the effectiveness of the Beijing driving restriction policy, these papers add legitimacy to future legislation proposing urban center traffic restrictions. As more Chinese cities chose to implement driving restriction policies modeled after Beijing, these papers work to show the effectiveness of legislative attempts to correct the negative externalities associated with urban traffic congestion.
Citations:
Wang, Lanlan, Jintao Xu, Ping Qin. Will a driving restriction policy reduce car trips? The case study of Beijing, China. Transportation Research Part A 67 (2014): 279-290.
Sun, Cong, Siqi Zheng, Rui Wang. Restricting driving for better traffic and clearer skies: Did it work in Beijing? Transport Policy 32 (2014): 34-41.
Zhong, Nan, Jong Cao, Zuzhu Wang. Traffic Congestion, Ambient Air Pollution, and Health: Evidence from Driving Restrictions in Beijing. Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists vol. 4 no. 3 (2017): 821-856.
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Chia, Ngee-Choon, and Sock-Yong Phang. "Motor vehicle taxes as an environmental management instrument: the case of Singapore." Environmental economics and policy studies 4, no. 2 (2001): 67-93.
Note: Zhong et al. (2017) cites both Wang et al. (2014) and Sun et al. (2014).
Wang et a;. (2014) cites:
Wang, Y., Hao, J., McElroy, M. B., Munger, J. W., Ma, H., Chen, D., and Nielsen, C. P. Ozone air quality during the 2008 Beijing Olympics: effectiveness of emission restrictions, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 9 (2009): 5237-5251.
Which is in turn cites:
Murphy, J. G., Day, D. A., Cleary, P. A., Wooldridge, P. J., Millet, D. B., Goldstein, A. H., and Cohen, R. C. The weekend effect within and downwind of Sacramento – Part 1: Observations of ozone, nitrogen oxides, and VOC reactivity, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 7 (2007): 5327-5339.
Which in turn cites:
National Research Council. Air quality management in the United States. National Academies Press, 2004.
Which in turn cites:
Chia, Ngee-Choon, and Sock-Yong Phang. "Motor vehicle taxes as an environmental management instrument: the case of Singapore." Environmental economics and policy studies 4, no. 2 (2001): 67-93.
The Chia and Phang article is used as a case example in Environmental and Resource Economics (10th edition).