With traffic only getting worse in Shanghai, it’s time for us to look for solutions! And one company in Guangzhou has quite a quirky one – a “3D fast bus” that lets private cars pass underneath it as it continues in a virtually traffic free zone overhead.
From China Hush (who calls it, in my opinion, the much more aptly named “straddling bus”):
Proposed by Shenzhen Hashi Future Parking Equipment Co., Ltd, the model looks like a subway or light-rail train bestriding the road. It is 4-4.5 m high with two levels: passengers board on the upper level while other vehicles lower than 2 m can go through under. Powered by electricity and solar energy, the bus can speed up to 60 km/h carrying 1200-1400 passengers at a time without blocking other vehicles’ way. Also it costs about 500 million yuan to build the bus and a 40-km-long path for it, only 10% of building equivalent subway. It is said that the bus can reduce traffic jams by 20-30%.
Apparenty Beijing’s Mengtougou District will try it out in the near future. Hopefully it works out there. The problem I can see for it here is that Shanghai has a lot of much smaller streets than both Beijing and Shenzhen (something most of us, I believe, actually like about our city). While this might work around the outer areas, can you imagine one of these things on the Yan’an Elevated Highway? Or the French Concession?
