Jaywalking fines to boost local finance: police

Jaywalking fines collected during China's latest traffic campaign will be handed to local treasuries, a police official has said.

Fines from crossing violations will be managed by local governments and spent in improving transportation and safety facilities, the China Youth Daily reported on Thursday. It cited Wang Changjun, head of the Traffic Management Research Institute of the Ministry of Public Security.

China launched a campaign in April to hand out stronger punishments for pedestrians and drivers of non-motorized vehicles who violate road crossing rules, a move to ensure road safety.

In Beijing, pedestrians who cross the road when they are not supposed to or disobey traffic management risk fines of 10 yuan (1.6 US dollars). Those doing so while riding non-motorized vehicles face fines of 20 yuan, the municipal traffic control department said.

Beijing government statistics showed that 20,000 fine tickets were handed out in the capital in April, a month-on-month rise of 48 percent.

China's law allowed for such fines a decade ago, Wang said in the report, responding to some people's request for the legal grounds of such punishment.

A Chinese law on road transportation safety, which took effect in May 2004, said pedestrians, passengers and drivers of non-motorized vehicles who violated relevant traffic rules or laws will be warned or fined between 5 and 50 yuan.

Such a punishment can also be found in a regulation enforced in 1986.

Wang said the fine is not the purpose. "The purpose is to promote people's consciousness of traffic safety, and have orderly traffic," he is quoted as saying.

Beside the fine, transportation authorities will also try and thwart people by playing surveillance videos of jaywalkers in public places, according to Wang.

Wang said authorities will also enhance education among drivers of motorized vehicles and strive to improve road planning and signal light designing.

Read more: Beijing starts fines for jaywalking