2010-08-11 16:46

MEXICO CITY -- The city hall of Mexico City has tried to develop public transportation to help clean up the environment and ease traffic jams in the capital, said Armando Quintero, director of the city's Transportation and Road System.

Traffic jam is one of the biggest problems in Mexico City when some 250,000 cars are added to the heavy traffic flow each year, said Quinteroin in an interview with Xinhua on Tuesday.

Mexico City is one of the world cities with huge number of vehicles. An estimated 7 to 8 million vehicles are running in the city on an average day. Local residents have been used to spending hours commuting to and from work.

However, Quintero said the newly increased cars are not the only problem.

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"In Mexico City, the public transportation is the synonym of poverty. The middle and upper classes don't want to use public transportation. They think it (using public transportation) is losing face," Quintero said.

The city hall is trying to encourage residents to use public transportation. For this end, Mexico City "must have good public transportation which is comfortable, fast, safe and dignified," he said.

The city hall launched two lines of "Metrobus" last year, a kind of energy-saving buses running in the city from north to south and east to west.

The authorities are also building line 12 of the subway. The city hall has replaced 900 mini buses with 450 modern buses with greater capacity.

But these are still not enough, he said, describing it as a good idea to encourage residents to use "alternative" transportation such as bicycles and skates.

"It is an option, not something recreational. Riding a bike or a skate is not only leisure or sport, but also a good way to solve the traffic problem," he said.

The city hall has made some plans to encourage the use of bicycles and skates, including suggestions that the local government lend bicycles to residents for free.