Vehicle registration slumps in 2016

The number of newly registered motor vehicles in Macau dropped by more than a third in December 2016, according to information published yesterday by the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC). According to the DSEC, the number of new registrations fell by 35.5 percent year-on-year to 1,208 in December.

Meanwhile, for the whole year of 2016, new registrations of motor vehicles declined by 29.1 percent to 13,935, with that of motorcycles (7,784) and light automobiles (5,395) falling by 23.8 percent and 38.6 percent respectively.

As of the end of December last year, the total number of licensed motor vehicles reached 250,450, up slightly by 0.6 percent year-on-year. The number of motorcycles (131,139) rose by 1.2 percent while that of light automobiles (111,545) edged down by 0.5 percent.

For the whole of 2016, there were 15,342 cases of traffic accidents, down by 2.9 percent year-on-year according to the data published by DSEC. These accidents resulted in some 4,600 casualties, nine of which were fatal.

Also released in yesterday’s figures were the cross-border traffic statistics for December 2016 and the whole year.

In terms of vehicle traffic, 405,150 cross-border trips were made in December 2016, down by 9.6 percent year- on-year, driving the annual decline to 1.2 percent year-on-year at about 5.07 million trips. More than three-quarters of cross-border vehicle traffic passed through the Border Gate.

Passenger ferry movements between Macau and both mainland China and Hong Kong rose slightly by 0.9 percent in December, while it declined for the whole of 2016 by 5 percent to 138,164 ferry journeys.

By contrast, although commercial flight movements at the Macau International Airport were down in December by 3.6 percent year-on-year, their frequency increased by 2.7 percent throughout 2016 to 53,617.

Flight movements to and from South Korea, Thailand and Taiwan grew by 38.3 percent, 8.3 percent and 7.7 percent respectively, while movements to and from mainland China and Vietnam dropped by 4.4 percent and 0.5 percent respectively.

Helicopter flight movements increased by 19.4 percent year-on-year to 1,276 in December, while movements for the whole year fell by 17 percent to 11,657. DB