In many ways the commitment to serve the public, attention to detail, application of common sense and innovation between the major Chinese cities of Beijing and Shanghai is glaring, nay, even blinding on occasion.

Take the Metro rail system. The bone-shaking trip on Beijing's Metro with its' rat-tat-a-tat door closing mechanisms is the personification of that difference. It also seems difficult in Beijing to get the Metro platform height right.

In Shanghai, the floor level of the train matches the platform height to within millimetres and this makes for comfortable commuting. The unwary traveler in Beijing will, at selected stations, get that falling "into an abyss" feeling as their feet hit the deck much later than expected.

And those afflicted with a back ailment will get a nasty jolt to the spine from which it may take several minutes, if not half a day, to recover.

Not to despair, however. Three more Metro lines are under construction in Beijing. I will pray that they get at least the platform level right this time and that the carriages will be bought from Germany, like the smooth riding, modern ones in Shanghai

For a long time, Beijing used to be a capital city without a heart. There used to be scattered shopping complexes here and there and it took a lot of commuting to get from the one to the other. The mega shopping centre in Wangfujing, built by Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka Shing has put paid to that but at what a price.

Seen from Chang'an Avenue, this towering glass fronted monstrosity for which the largest McDonalds restaurant in Asia had to make way (30 counters), looks totally out of place in close proximity to Tian'anmen Square and the Forbidden City. City planning gone wild? I certainly think so.

In Shanghai, the location of the nearest police station seems often a closely guarded secret. Happily, in Beijing there are signposts everywhere pointing to the nearest police station. Nice for foreigners who are experiencing trouble and/or want to tell the Gong An where they are at any given moment as the Gong An sometimes like to know.

The 5th ring road in Beijing is now operational and traffic moves along at a brisk pace. But get onto the lesser ring roads and the traffic movement is atrocious at the best of times.

What is to be done? My recommendation, for what it is worth, is to make the situation worse first by having an exclusive bus and ambulance lane. Then position video cameras at convenient 100-metre intervals and automatically record any vehicles straying, even temporarily, into the forbidden lane. This recording may be facilitated by the electronic tagging of cars, similar to a system currently in use to locate sea containers in the ports.

Fines of, say, 200 yuan for a first offence would be in order, doubling every time for subsequent offences and 200 demerit points with a ceiling of 2,000 points before the driving licence is suspended for a year.

Then increase the trip frequency of buses and Metro trains, plan bus stations and covered access ways within 100 metres of any city residence and, hey presto, commuters may be able to reach any destination in a fraction of the time it takes now. The same measures should be taken in any other city afflicted with traffic jams and that includes Shanghai.

Very much so, of course.

And if the video camera and "talking tag" car-owner registration system is liable to bust the City Councils' Bank, then, as a temporary measure many of Shanghai's retrenched and jobless could be employed. Outfit them with one of those a natty brown traffic assistants' uniforms, macho huge buckled belt, not forgetting the authority engendering peaked cap plus an optional pair of sunglasses (now called "shades") and let them record all cars straying into the express lane.

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