Beijing-Tibet expressway faces 9-day traffic jam stretching 62 miles

Tired of being stuck in LA traffic or traffic on the New Jersey Turnpike – well, after reading this, you might feel a little better about our rush hour traffic woes. Thousands of vehicles were tied up Monday in Beijing in a traffic jam that stretched more than 62 miles long and lasted 9 days.

What was the cause of the jam? According to the local state-run newspaper, the Global Times, the Beijing-Tibet expressway slowed to a snails crawl on August 14 due to a spike in traffic by cargo-bearing heavy trucks heading to the capital. It got worse when road maintenance began work five days later. The stretch of highway between Beijing with the northern province of Hebei has become prone to massive traffic jams as the capital with a population of more than 20 million people expecting huge shipments of goods.

The newspaper said that the jam running between Beijing and Jining city gave birth to a mini-economy with local merchants selling water and food at inflated prices to stranded drivers.

– By: Stephen Calogera

Source: Yahoo