TRAFFIC accidents killed 416 people in Shenzhen last year, 15 fewer than in 2015, the city’s traffic police said.

    This was revealed at a meeting reviewing the work of traffic police in 2016. At the meeting it was also revealed that more than 10,000 motorists were caught driving under the influence of alcohol last year, as the police tightened a crackdown on drunk driving.

    Police imposed penalties on 3.87 million violations last year, including 3,895 cases of drunk driving. A total of 8,032 drivers were detained, an increase of 241.8 percent from 2015. A total of 4,188 motorists were criminally charged, a rise of 137.4 percent from a year ago.

    The traffic police also revealed that 308 intelligence analysts were deployed to look into big data to help police find vehicles with fake or duplicate license plates. With the analysts’ help, the city is now almost free of vehicles with fake or duplicate license plates, which used to run rampant.

    The city had 3.24 million vehicles on its streets as of the end of last year. Vehicle density exceeded 510 per kilometer of road.

    Shenzhen Municipal Traffic Police Bureau said that it had introduced various innovative measures last year to ease traffic congestion. Reversible lanes and other measures were taken at 36 crossings where congestion frequently occurred. An automatic “tidal lane” was introduced near the Buji Checkpoint and a lane for high-occupancy vehicles (HOV) was designated on Binhai Boulevard. A two-tiered traffic light system was tested at two crossings on Nanhai Boulevard.

    (Lin Min)