Safety push targets driving offenses

A minibus occupies a bicycle lane in violation of parking rules on Beitucheng East Road in northern Beijing on Tuesday. Feng Yongbin / China Daily

A nationwide road safety campaign launched on Tuesday is targeting speeding, the offense that causes most accidents, along with six other common violations.

The others are overloading, driving while drunk, driving under the influence of drugs, running red lights, occupying emergency lanes and failing to give way to pedestrians at zebra crossings.

These seven types of violation account for a quarter of all the violations, according to the Ministry of Public Security's Traffic Bureau. Many violations do not cause accidents but are nevertheless illegal, such as failure to wear a seat belt.

The campaign was launched by the bureau on National Traffic Safety Day.

China has more than 260 million vehicles, more than other nation, and it also has the highest number of drivers, more than 300 million.

More vehicles on the road results in more accidents and traffic jams. In addition, they create more environmental pollution.

Xu Ganlu, head of the bureau, said drivers and pedestrians must realize that road safety concerns everyone, and each individual should behave responsibly.

Last month, a collision between a truck and a minibus killed 11 kindergarten children and a driver in Shandong province.

Police said the minibus, hired by the kindergarten, was designed to carry eight passengers, but was overloaded at the time of the accident.

Every year, 60,000 people die in road accidents and more than 200,000 are injured. Around 90 percent of fatal accidents are caused by violations, the bureau said.

However, the number of severe accidents - those that kill 10 or more people - has been reduced from 80 in 1996 to 16 in 2013.

A nationwide traffic management website, www.122.cn, was launched on Tuesday to help private car users. The site will pass on road safety information and advice to the public.

It will supply real-time data about road conditions based on information gathered by the country's 270,000 traffic policemen and video surveillance networks, the ministry said.