China sleeper bus will disappear after 5 years due to safety issues

Each year, it carries hundreds of millions of passengers, but it is "blocked" because of security problems.

Sleeper bus will disappear after 5 years or will disappear from the passenger market

On June 3, Beijing Yinyu, Liuliqiao long-distance passenger station, crowded, 32-year-old Mu Qing holding a ticket to a sleeper bus in Huan County, Qingyang City, Gansu, quietly waiting. From school to work, in 10 years, Mu Qing can't remember how many times he took the coach to and from Beijing and Beijing.

“Take the bus for 15 hours to get to the house. Take the train first and then take a detour to Xi’an, then transfer to Qingyang, and then ride to the county. It takes about 22 hours.” said Mu Qing, “The sleeper bus is comfortable and the price is fair. The source is relatively abundant.” Like Mu Qing, there are not many people who choose to ride a sleeper bus because of fares, no transfer, and comfortable sitting.

However, due to the “7.22” passenger car burning accident in 2011, the competent department considered that the sleeper buses had multiple safety restrictions. According to the provisions of document No. 632 issued by the Ministry of Industry and Public Security, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has suspended the application of the “Announcement” on the application of new products for sleeper buses before the revised safety technical standards for sleeper buses were issued; since March 1st this year, the production and sales of related sleeper buses have been suspended, and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has Suspend the "Announcement" of all sleeper bus products, and public security agencies and traffic management departments suspended registration of sleeper buses. This means that according to the normal retirement time of sleeper buses, the operating sleeper buses on the passenger transport market will disappear in about five years.

30,000 sleepers carry hundreds of millions of passengers per year

At present, there are a total of nearly 30,000 sleeper buses operating in the country, with nearly 1 million passengers and more than 5,000 passenger lines. They mainly undertake long-distance passenger transportation of 800 km or more and some 400-800 km of domestic lines, as well as some foreign road transportation routes. It covers 31 provinces (autonomous regions, municipalities directly under the Central Government). In 2010, the number of passengers in passenger sleepers in China reached 180 million passengers. During the Spring Festival alone, the number of passengers in passenger sleepers reached 40 million passengers.

Ningxia Leopard Motor Transport Co., Ltd. currently operates 48 sleeper bus lines and reaches more than 20 cities across the country. A deputy general manager of the company complained to reporters: “Some of the vehicles in these lines are approaching the renewal stage. Stopping the renewal of sleeper vehicles will lead to an increase in the service life of vehicles and a decline in technical conditions, which will directly affect the safety of sleeper buses.”

Shijiazhuang Feilu Passenger Transport Co., Ltd. is a private enterprise. Speaking of the “Announcement”, Vice Chairman of the company, Gao Gengwu, worried: “More than half of the vehicles in our company are sleeper buses, and the attendance rate is over 70%, and sleeper buses suspend production and sales. The influence of the card on the company was too great. Our company purchased 10 sleeper buses by March 1, but this number is not enough for us."

Huang Zheng, general manager of Guangxi Yunde Group Fengfengling, said in a telephone interview that replacing sleeper buses with seat passenger buses would reduce the ride comfort. “One size fits all across the sleeper bus” is not only the loss of passenger transport companies, but also affects the Quality of life for passengers."

According to the survey data, 60% of the passengers served by sleeper buses are low- and middle-income workers such as farmers, migrant workers and individual practitioners. In the past five years, the total operating mileage of China’s railways has increased by about 23,000 kilometers, but the number of sleeper buses has basically remained at around 30,000. Many self-employed individuals believe that the high-speed rail fares are expensive and that the amount of baggage they carry cannot be too high. The first choice is still the sleeper bus.

Is it safe to save your time?

At 4 a.m. on July 22, 2011, a 35-odd passenger bus from Weihai heading for Changsha broke out in the Mingyang section of Beijing-Zhuhai Expressway in Xinyang. The accident caused a total of 41 deaths and 6 injuries. Subsequently, the operating long-distance sleeper buses of Shandong Province and other provinces were suspended.

Wu Zhenqing, deputy secretary-general of the China Road Society Bus Division, said that the Ministry of Public Security and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology believe that the accident rate of sleeper buses is high. However, from the statistical data of major road traffic safety accidents, the accident rate of sleeper buses is not higher than that of passenger cars. From 2004 to 2010, in a major road accident with 10 or more deaths in the road transport industry, accidents related to sleeper buses accounted for approximately 19.4% of the total, which is equivalent to the proportion of bus passengers in operation. According to the investigation and analysis of several large road passenger transport companies conducted by the China Road Transport Association, the accident rate of sleeper passenger vehicles in 2010 was 0.004 times/million vehicle kilometers, and the casualty rate was 0.003 person/million vehicle kilometers, which was lower than all The rate of accidents and death rates of vehicles on the class line; from accident statistics, the accidents caused by mechanical reasons of vehicles were only 0.4%. Collisions, car crashes, and fire burning were the main forms of accidents in sleeper buses, accounting for 41.7% of the total. 33.3%, 16.7%, basically a secondary passive accident.

According to the report of the “7.22” special sleeper bus burning accident investigation team at the Beijing-Zhuhai Expressway in Xinyang, Henan Province, the passenger car burning accident was caused by a large fire caused by dangerous chemicals that were illegally carried and transported on the vehicle, and there were major hidden dangers in vehicle design and manufacturing. The key factors and links, such as overloading of vehicles, loading and unloading of people outside the station, are another important reason.

The accident was caused by poor safety awareness

Yu Weijiang, director of the Vehicle Management Department of the Department of Transport of the Ministry of Transport, explained that the report indicated that the design of the double aisle of sleeper buses had potential safety hazards, and the single door design was not conducive to escape. The reporter saw in the report of a sleeper bus escape test provided by Yutong Bus Company that a safety accident occurred, the vehicle was deformed, the doors were generally not opened, and passengers could not escape from the number of doors.

In Yu Weijiang's view, China's road passenger traffic safety management and vehicle models are not related to the degree, the crux of which lies in poor awareness of active safety. According to investigations and accident analysis, the problem of road passenger safety work exposure is not solid. In these years, the transportation, public security, and safety supervision departments have carried out special rectification activities for many times. During the rectification period, they worked well, but the high-pressure situation was relaxed and often presented. Concentration of accidents broke out.

When receiving an exclusive interview with this newspaper, Feng Zhenglin, the deputy minister of transportation, said that during the rectification activities, it can effectively curb accidents caused by serious illegal activities such as overcrowding and fatigue driving, but it can not fundamentally solve the problem that the safety level of the operating driving team is not high and the vehicle safety performance is low. It is not strong, and the underlying issues such as the weak foundation of corporate security management."

"The sleeper bus cannot stop. At this stage, under the conditions of China, the public has an objective demand for the existence of sleeper buses." Zhen Zhenqing appealed.

Next:Installation, use and regulation of marine diesel generator sets
Prev:Henan Provincial Coal General Hospital "spoiled wall collapse" Suspected of neighbors digging pit