Chinese city caps car-buying to battle congestion, pollution

The booming north Chinese port city of Tianjin has capped the number of car licence plates it will issue annually to 100,000 to curb congestion and air pollution.
The coastal city near here has become the fourth in China, the world's largest car-buyer, to announce a slew of measures to battle environmental damages caused by rapid development.
Tianjin will issue a total of 100,000 car license plates via a bidding and lottery system each year, and there will be no quota for government organisations and institutions, state-run Xinhua reported today.
According to the management plan, 60 per cent - or 60,000 plates - will be issued via lottery, including 10,000 for fuel-efficient cars and 50,000 for conventional cars. The remaining 40,000 plates for conventional cars will be auctioned, the report said.

A total of 88 per cent of plates will go to individual car owners, while non-individual applicants, such as companies, will compete for the other 12 per cent. No government organisations and institutions in Tianjin will be permitted to apply for new plates, it said.
The policy took effect just five hours after its announcement last week, which sparked overnight panic buying in the local car market.

Local people were seen queing up to buy cars in the city a day before it began imposing quota on its new car plates.
Tianjin has a permanent resident population of over 14 million. It has registered 2.36 million motor vehicles by 2012, up from 1.2 million in 2006. Travel speed in downtown areas has slowed 18 per cent compared with 2,000 levels.

Four other cities - Beijing, the commercial hub of Shanghai, Guiyang in the southwest and Guangzhou in the south - have imposed similar restrictions.