China is investigating that weird, traffic-straddling bus, which in retrospect was totally a scam

0
148

Last year, the internet briefly caught fire when pictures of a weird, elevated bus that glides above traffic began circulating around. The so-called “straddling bus” was held up as a solution to China’s notorious traffic problems, but all anyone wanted to talk about was how it looked like the bus was eating cars, or how insane anyone would have to be to actually drive underneath.

But as the months ticked by, the Transit Elevated Bus (as it was known) failed to stand up to much scrutiny. Jalopnik noticed how shabby the thing looked on closer inspection. And when CNN sent its reporters to investigate further, all they discovered was a “hulking eyesore” that was causing traffic rather than shuttling passengers above it.

Police in Beijing are investigating the elevated bus company

Now it seems like the local authorities have finally caught on. According to Quartz, police in Beijing are investigating whether the company behind TEB was illegally raising money through an online portal. This news comes a week after the government announced that it planned to remove the 300-meter track the bus was supposed to run on by the end of the month.

Citing sources on the microblogging site Weibo, Quartz reports that Bai Zhiming, chief executive of TEB Technology Development, a Beijing-based company that purchased the patent for the elevated bus, was among 30 people detained by police in connection to the alleged scheme. Days before his arrest, Bai told Chinese media he planned to move the bus to another city.