I don't know if you have ever had such an experience, sometimes the high-speed rail tickets to be purchased are sold out, and the software will automatically push alternatives, and some cities that are not too far away may have long-distance buses in the alternatives. At this time, you may still complain, "It's 2023, who still takes the bus".
Admittedly, it's 2023, nowHigh-speed railWith such good development, being able to reach every province in China is far more efficient, safe and comfortable than buses, and sometimes even cheaper. How many people have never sat on the high-speed rail since it openedLong-distance busesEven the younger generation living in the city may have never been on a bus.
PlusPrivate carpopular, as well as highly developedRide-hailingservices, even short and medium-distance passenger cars have little business to do.
The Great Depression of the entire passenger transport industry can be seen directly from the performance of large listed companies. For example, those who sell busesYutong bus, the profit has shrunk nearly in 5 years9 into, do passenger transportFulin Transportation, the annual profit has also decreased from the peak, the stock price also fell to one-sixth of its peak.
Unable to make money, the bus stations closed their doors one after another. In the past decade, China's road passenger traffic has fallen by 80%. In 2021, Guangdong Province alone was shut down42 passenger terminals80% of Beijing's passenger terminals are either closed or on their way. According to this trend, it is not impossible for the passenger station to completely withdraw from the stage of history.
In fact, the disappearance of the passenger station is not painful for many of us, and the pattern is enlarged, and even a good thing, after all, there are high-speed rail for travel, which does not mean that China's public transportation is developing better and better
The number of rural passenger stations is increasing, is it profitable?
But an unexpected reversal has emerged, in contrast to the constant closure of passenger stations in these big citiesIn some rural areas, the number of passenger stations is increasing. From 2015 to 2020, the number of rural passenger stations across the country has increased by more than that70,000。Isn't this unbelievable statistic proving that the rural passenger transport business is more prosperous than the urban one?
What is even more surprising is that in fact, rural passenger transport is more bleak than urban passenger transport, and in some rural areas, a 17-seater passenger car has few passengers, and even the fuel money is not enough. As a last resort, many rural passenger routes have been curtailed, for example, Mianyang, Sichuan, has reduced 91 routes in 2 years.
This increase and decrease operation is true to people can't see it, what the hell is going on?Actually,The increase in rural passenger stations is due to the fact that local governments are constantly giving subsidiesSo why does the state want to do this kind of loss-making business?
Because, when we rejoice in the rapid development of cities, we never think that behind the development of cities and transportation, there are thousands of themVulnerable groups, still counting on the vanishing passenger station to embark on the way home, they seem to have become progressive"Victim".
At the beginning of this year, a local villager sent a letter of suggestion to the local transportation bureau, and mentioned in the letterIt is hoped that the relevant authorities will relax the supervision of black cars。Why would this villager make such an unreasonable and strange request?
It turned out that the village where the villager lived did not have any public transportation or bus station, even if the nearest town was far from their villageIt is 14 kilometers awayThe entry and exit of villagers without private cars has become a big problem. Either you have to rely on black cars, or you can only rely on the surrounding villages and townsThree or four trips
However, the transfer is not as easy as imaginedWaiting for a bus is much longer than taking the bus. What's even more frustrating is that after waiting on the road for most of the day, whether you can wait depends on luck. In the past, when the passenger business was good, the rural lines were busy, and there were some popular flights, and you could wait for a train in fifteen minutes.
However, in the current situation of passenger transportation, many villagers in large villages have to wait on the side of the road for an hour or two if they want to travel, and they basically can't wait for a bus after three or four o'clock in the afternoon.
In fact, this situation is not unique in our country. There are many families in our country that are formed by a dozen to dozens of families gathered togetherNatural Village, according to incomplete statistics, at least exceeding2 million, and all of them are quite scattered, and there may be more than a dozen small natural villages in a single county.
Young people with conditions canBuy a car or motorbike to travelBut for the elderly and children, this is not possible. The closed loop thus formed isThe vulnerable groups who are often trapped and unable to travel are the elderly who often need to go out to see a doctor and the children who go to school.
Many villagers also mentioned in the suggestion letter sent to ** that because there are fewer or stopped buses in rural areas, the elderly at home can only give up traveling.
The elderly really can't go out and can still do it, and it is troublesome for the children who go to school. There is a high probability that there are a large number of these villages with closed trafficLeft-behind children, and the one-way distance to and from school is reachedTens of kilometers
Without proper transportation, their only option is:Black school bus。A 7-seater passenger car, often at a timeIt is necessary to carry more than 20 peopleSecurity is a concern
In this case, even at a loss, the state is doing its best to maintain the operation of the line from the countryside, but even if it has already been built330,000 passenger terminalsThere are still many villages that are not covered. For many villages, the relevant departments also said that they are indeed unable to add new passenger routes at present.
This is really embarrassingThe development of high urbanization has made many people not even realize that the passenger station has disappeared, let alone have an impact on their lives, and for those vulnerable groups who are easy to be ignored, this is a matter of livelihood, relying only on ** subsidies, let alone covering all rural areas,How long can the existing line last?
In fact, the inevitable problems brought about by this development have appeared in many developed countries, and it is not only a traffic problem that is reflected behind it, but in the final analysis, it is still reflectedThere is an imbalance between urban and rural developmentproblems.
Over the past few years, China has put a lot of effort into poverty alleviation in rural areas, and has also made considerable achievements, with nearly 100 million rural people successfully lifted out of poverty, and the overall life in rural areas has become much richer than before. At the same time,The state has also continued to make efforts on the road of balanced urban and rural development, and has introduced a series of policies to help rural areas.
However, it must be admitted that the gap between urban and rural areas cannot be eliminated for a moment. There are still more and moreYoung adults in rural areas are more willing to leave their hometowns to work in big cities。In 2022, the number of migrant workers in our country has beenIt's approaching 300 million people
The reason why cities can develop at such a high speed and why infrastructure construction can be so developed and convenient cannot be separated from the hard work of hundreds of millions of rural migrant workers. The outflow of a large number of young and middle-aged laborers from rural areas has not only brought inThe land is deserted, and rural industries cannot be developedThe problems have also brought a myriad of themLeft-behind elderly and childrenTo solve these problems, there are more and grander social issues in front of us.
Therefore, the disappearance of passenger stations, the inconvenience of travel in the countryside, these distant and small voices are not unrelated to us.
It may take some time for the country as a whole to completely eliminate these problems, but it will take them apart and put them on everyoneWe are not just bystanders, but we should pay more attention to this phenomenon, speak up for their vital rights and interests, and actively disseminate information on rural construction, all of which are indirect help.
Just like the previous establishment of Xiamen University called"This little fish cares a lot".In the bursary program, there are thousands of "small fish" in the torrent of the times, and we really can't pay attention to each one, but we care about every one that is helped.