A Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority executive says he is working on an agreement with his counterpart in Beijing that will lead to an exchange of technical expertise and joint research projects on traffic jams.
"Clearly there are things to learn on both ends," said Randall Crane, an urban planning professor at the University of California, Los Angeles who’s working on a book about Chinese urbanization. "Beijing planners are desperately trying to adjust to an increasingly car-oriented world, where people don’t live where they work. At the same time, LA wishes it had as good of a transit infrastructure – and as many people wanting to take transit."
Associated Press reports that Beijing went from having almost no private cars 15 years ago to having vehicles snarl to a crawl for most of the day.