Privately-owned cars in Beijing reached 1.04 million by the end of July, accounting for nearly half of the motor vehicles in the Chinese capital, Beijing Daily reported Thursday.

On the average, Beijing has one vehicle for every seven residents, according to the paper. In the first six months of 2004 Beijing reported 166,000 newly registered cars.

"The capital has taken the lead in entering an auto era among all other major Chinese cities," the paper said.

Although private cars have been blamed for traffic jams in Beijing, the municipal government has said repeatedly that it does not consider taking measures to restrict the number of private cars, according to the paper.

Currently, one out of four permanent residents in Beijing holds a driver's license, statistics from the Beijing communications authorities show.

Beijing is now leading Shanghai and Guangzhou in the ownership rate of private cars, according to a survey AC Nielsen conducted in the three cities.

The survey shows that the amount of people who own a car in a city is largely decided by the price of cars. The average price per car in Beijing is 139,000 yuan (16,808 US dollars), Shanghai, 220,000 yuan, and Guangzhou, 190,000 yuan.

(Xinhua News Agency August 13, 2004)