Why emergency lanes are often regarded as "overtaking lanes"
Investigation on the Status Quo of Illegal Occupation of Emergency Lanes
● Emergency lanes are usually called "life rescue lanes."
Illegal occupation of the emergency lane or the use of emergency lanes to rush to drive will not only seriously affect the normal traffic order of the expressway, but also may hinder the passage of police cars, ambulances, and rescue vehicles, causing serious consequences
● Some drivers have a fluke mentality and a weak sense of safety, trying to use emergency lanes to achieve fast traffic.
However, the current penalties for occupying emergency lanes are relatively light, and the cost of illegal violations by drivers is low, which is not enough to attract attention.
● Intensify the investigation and punishment of illegal occupation of emergency lanes, and greatly increase the amount of fines. If the rescue work is affected by illegal occupation of emergency lanes, which causes serious consequences, the driver’s license for a period of time or even the driver’s license may be suspended
● To effectively combine daily supervision with illegal punishment, more intelligent collection equipment such as electronic police can be set up to effectively supervise emergency lanes
□ Our reporter Zhao Li and Han Dandong
□ The reporter's trainee reporter Zhang Shoukun
At about 15:00 on November 13, the section of the South Fifth Ring Road, Daxing District, Beijing was congested. Four or five car owners couldn't wait. They turned on the turn signal and drove into the emergency lane next to them and rushed away.
This scene was photographed by a Beijing netizen @深水幽幽 and uploaded via the WeChat mini program "Beijing Traffic Police Random Shooting".
Three minutes later, her "random shot" was adopted by the traffic control department.
@深水幽幽 found that this kind of emergency lane occupation is not uncommon. She has repeatedly exposed the behavior of occupying the emergency lane on Weibo. "The occupation of the emergency lane by the car owner has little effect on me personally, but it is likely to block the ambulance. Cars or fire trucks, this would be a big hazard."
Emergency lanes are often called "life rescue lanes."
Illegal occupation of emergency lanes or use of emergency lanes to rush to drive will not only seriously affect the normal traffic order of expressways, but may also hinder the passage of police cars, ambulances, and rescue vehicles, causing serious consequences.
However, why has the much-maligned problem of occupying emergency lanes hard to be cured for a long time?
A reporter from the Rule of Law Daily conducted an interview recently.
Occupy the emergency lane at will
Endanger the safety of life and property
At about 4:40 a.m. on May 5, about two kilometers away from the exit of Luofeng Tunnel of Guanghui Expressway, a small truck was parked in the emergency lane. After being hit by a van behind it, it was driven into the driveway. It was with 2 cars passing by. A collision occurred, causing 4 cars to collide.
It was later learned that the driver of the small truck wanted to "free his hands", so he parked the car in the emergency lane.
In the end, the traffic accident resulted in 1 person died on the spot, 1 person died of unsuccessful rescue, and 6 people were injured.
It is understood that the emergency lane is a lane used by vehicles performing emergency affairs such as engineering rescue, fire rescue, medical rescue, military personnel, police, etc., except for special circumstances such as vehicle breakdowns or sudden major illnesses of persons on board, any social vehicles are prohibited Drive into or stay in the emergency lane.
However, at peak travel times, once there is congestion on expressways and expressways, some people will occupy the emergency lanes with luck, which will seriously affect the order of road traffic.
Recently, reporters have repeatedly passed the emergency lane at the entrance of the Wugezhuang toll gate of the Jingping Expressway during the peak travel period, and the shunt road to the Capital Airport in Beijing, almost every time they saw vehicles staying here for no reason.
On the Beijing Airport Expressway, reporters have repeatedly seen vehicles driving on the emergency lane at high speed, leaving behind the vehicles that obey the rules on the main road.
Especially near the ring road or near the exit, due to the large number of vehicles and congestion on the road, you can often see multiple or even dozens of cars in long queues, taking the emergency lane to overtake in hurry.
"Social vehicles occupying the emergency lane may delay emergency rescue, causing the vehicles performing emergency tasks to be unable to arrive at the scene in time to deal with the accident, to remove dangers, to divert, and to rescue the wounded, and even cause the wounded and the patient to die due to the lack of timely treatment. At the same time, it will increase road congestion." Wang Haibo, a civilian policeman from the Fourth Division of the Traffic Management Bureau of the Shandong Provincial Public Security Department, told reporters that when a traffic accident occurred in the front or when the car was driving slowly, some drivers walked back and forth in emergency lanes and traffic lanes and congested. The continuous change of routes interferes with the normal traffic flow, increases the degree of traffic congestion, and is very easy to cause accidents.
"Emergency lanes must be strictly guaranteed. Except for traffic police or highway staff who command some vehicles on the spot to bypass obstacles to borrow emergency lanes, it is not allowed to occupy emergency lanes under other circumstances." Tongji University Railway and Chen Xiaohong, Dean of the Urban Rail Transit Research Institute, said.
Low cost of illegality, difficult to obtain evidence
Hard to get a cure for a long time
According to the regulations of the Implementation Regulations of the Road Traffic Safety Law, motor vehicles are not allowed to drive or stop in emergency lanes when driving on expressways and in non-emergency situations.
According to relevant laws and regulations, violators will be punished with a fine of 200 yuan and 6 points.
On the one hand, it is expressly prohibited, on the other hand, illegal acts are frequently committed. What are the reasons behind it?
According to Chen Yanyan, Dean of the School of Urban Transportation of Beijing University of Technology, many expressways and expressways with emergency lanes are currently congested seriously. Some drivers have fluke psychology and are weak in safety awareness. They try to use emergency lanes to achieve fast traffic. Purpose.
Dong Laichao, the chief lawyer of Beijing Kaiya Law Firm, feels the same.
He said that during holidays or rush hours, there are many vehicles on the road, and most of the emergency lanes are idle. Therefore, some people think that taking emergency lanes can save a lot of time, and “not all places on high speeds have probes. It’s okay to see the emergency lane as a “passing lane”.
However, the current penalties for occupying emergency lanes are relatively light, and the cost of illegal violations for drivers is low, which is not enough to attract attention.
During the interview, the reporter also found that some drivers had deviations in their understanding of traffic laws, thinking that "watching a navigation", "resolving a hand", "taking a phone call" and so on are all "emergency situations" that can occupy the emergency lane, but in fact It does not meet the regulations of the traffic control department; some drivers did encounter an emergency and needed to occupy the emergency lane, but they did not set up warning signs or turn on the hazard warning lights as required, and the people in the car did not quickly move to the right shoulder or emergency In the lane.
Some drivers do not know how to deal with them safely in accordance with the law after encountering vehicle breakdowns or accidents.
These are the reasons for such violations.
In addition, obtaining evidence is also a big problem.
Lin Qing, Deputy Chief of the Traffic Management Section of the Traffic Police Detachment of Fujian Ningde Expressway, said: “Although some sections of the expressway have been electronically monitored, most sections have not invested in scientific and technological forces for traffic management. The main focus is on point management and control. To focus on the surface, the level of scientific and technological management is not high."
“Due to insufficient police force and insufficient control and control, the public security traffic management department cannot fully grasp the overall road surface information in real time. When the emergency lane is illegally occupied, the traffic management department cannot detect, correct and deal with it immediately. Some drivers have a fluke mentality. Even if the emergency lane is illegally occupied, it will not be punished, resulting in illegal occupation of the emergency lane from time to time." Wang Haibo said.
Technology helps traffic governance
Illegal behavior was exposed
In fact, the traffic control department has been paying attention to the problem that emergency lanes are often occupied, and trying to use technology to solve this stubborn disease. Traffic illegal "snap shots" is one of them.
At about 16:00 on October 5, a man encountered a traffic jam ahead when he reached the Siyang section of the Huaixu Expressway. An ambulance took the emergency lane to the scene of the accident for rescue. Later, some traffic jammed vehicles followed behind the ambulance and were in an emergency. Driving in the lane.
As a result, the man used his mobile phone to take photos of the vehicles illegally occupying the emergency lane and reported to the traffic police in Suqian, Jiangsu.
The Fourth Brigade of Suqian Traffic Police Expressway immediately organized police to investigate the violation of the 93 vehicles occupying emergency lanes reported by the man.
Upon review, the fact that 85 of the vehicles illegally occupied the emergency lane is clear and has been entered into the road traffic violation information management system as evidence for penalizing violations.
With the launch of the "Shooting" traffic violation reporting platform in many places, more and more behaviors of occupying emergency lanes have been exposed.
According to statistics from Hubei Expressway Traffic Police, during the "October" period of this year, 2,359 enthusiastic people participated in the co-governance using "Shishou Pai" and provided more than 11,000 reports in 7 days.
In addition, the high-speed traffic police will also patrol and control vehicles at any time, and through video inspections, electronic police recording warnings, and investigate and deal with illegally occupying emergency lanes driving and parking vehicles.
By continuously increasing police patrols, we will strengthen the management of illegal occupation of emergency lanes for driving and parking, and use tweeters to shout and large display screens to release text messages to remind drivers not to occupy emergency lanes and consciously drive in a civilized and law-abiding manner.
“The total mileage of expressways is long. In the past, only manual patrols and interceptions were used, and the efficiency of law enforcement was relatively low. Moreover, the fully enclosed expressway has no breaks. Inspection vehicles cannot turn around when they pass. The traffic police takes a lot of time for each round of inspection.” Tianjin City Said Zhang Tongxin, head of the Order Management Brigade, Highway No. 2 Detachment of the Public Security Transportation Administration.
According to Zhang Tongxin, since 2018, Tianjin Expressway Traffic Police has changed the way that traffic police used to control emergency lanes mostly relied on "manual", that is, simply driving on the road to patrol the road. At present, there are two electronic monitoring points per kilometer along the expressways in Tianjin. For vehicles occupying the emergency lane illegally, the traffic police can see clearly in front of the monitoring screen.
Take multiple measures to form a joint force
Effectively maintain traffic order
Modern technological facilities have brought great help to traffic management, but there is still a long way to go to eradicate the problem of occupying emergency lanes.
Experts interviewed by reporters believe that although a series of rectification measures have significantly improved the behavior of occupying emergency lanes, if this problem is to be effectively solved, the rectification measures should be further followed up.
"It is very difficult to rely on the traffic police alone to form a joint force to control the occupation of emergency lanes." Lin Qing believes that the high-speed traffic police should work with the high-speed transportation comprehensive management department, rescue units and adjacent brigade to carry out joint logistics and joint defense work to achieve information sharing and communication. Smooth traffic, actively implement wrong-time patrols, and promptly detect and eliminate illegal acts of occupying emergency lanes.
At the same time, we will do our best to manage and control emergencies, strengthen emergency lane management, and prevent traffic accidents or delays in rescue missions caused by crowding emergency lanes.
Dong Laichao suggested to improve the laws and regulations of emergency lane management, further refine the emergency lane management rules, and clearly stipulate the nature and use rights of expressway emergency lanes.
Although the Road Traffic Safety Law and other laws and regulations have clearly stipulated that in non-emergency situations, driving or stopping in the emergency lanes of expressways is not allowed, but the regulations on what is an emergency situation are relatively vague.
When formulating road traffic safety laws and regulations in their respective regions, the scope of emergency regulations is also different.
In reality, drivers may face various complicated situations, so it is particularly important to further clarify what kind of situation is an emergency through legal forms.
Many car owners interviewed suggested that the investigation and punishment of illegal occupation of emergency lanes should be increased, and the amount of fines should be greatly increased. If the rescue work is affected by illegal occupation of emergency lanes, the driver's license may be temporarily suspended for a period of time or even be revoked. driver license.
Zhang Zhuting, director of the Development Research Center of the School of Management Cadres of the Ministry of Transport, pointed out that solving this problem requires the joint efforts of multiple parties and comprehensive management: news media, schools, etc. need targeted publicity and education to increase people's importance of emergency lanes. Relevant departments need to increase law enforcement efforts. Once violations are found, they should be dealt with in strict accordance with existing laws and regulations; more monitoring equipment should be installed on emergency lanes such as expressways and urban loops to prompt The public consciously abide by it, and at the same time strengthen social supervision.
"To effectively combine daily supervision with illegal punishment, more intelligent collection equipment such as electronic police can be installed to effectively supervise emergency lanes." Chen Yanyan said.