The Beijing municipal government thought it's finally about time to slash the 3-5 yuan price tag off the local subway system. After all, the Olympics is less than 52 weeks away and the smog that engulfs Beijing every day isn't going away.
The result: at least a 33% discount on a ticket. All one-way tickets will now cost only 2 yuan. But compare that to Shanghai (3-9 yuan), Shenzhen (2-4 yuan) and Guangzhou (2-12 yuan) metros. It's actually not that much cheaper, or at least not nearly cheap enough for the mid/upper class to squeeze themselves in with everyone else on their way to work every day.
