Bus-only lane crackdown

[Anchor]

During this vacation season, there have been repeated violations of the bus-only lanes on congested highways.

The police conducted a focused crackdown ahead of the vacation season, and in just two hours, over 60 vehicles were caught violating the rules.

Reporter Yeo So-yeon has the details.

[Report]

A van drives in the bus-only lane as a patrol car behind it sounds the siren.

[“Please open the window, the window. How many people are in the car? Five? Please pull over.”]

This vehicle is in violation of regulations.

Only vehicles with more than 9 seats are allowed to use the bus-only lane.

For vans with 12 seats or fewer, the number of passengers also matters; they must have at least 6 passengers to be permitted to use the dedicated lane.

[Driver of the violating vehicle/Voice altered: "The car is eligible, but I wasn’t sure about the number of people, whether it's five or six."]

If caught violating the rules, passenger cars must pay a fine of 60,000 won, while vans face a fine of 70,000 won.

[Driver of the violating vehicle/Voice altered: “I have to get there by 10:30. I know it’s wrong, but I was in a hurry… I’m sorry.”]

As a result of the focused crackdown by the police from the Anseong Interchange on the Gyeongbu Expressway to the southern end of the Hannam Bridge, 67 vehicles were caught in just two hours.

60 of them were vans carrying five or fewer passengers, and 7 were sedans.

This month alone, the number of violations of the bus-only lane caught by the police has exceeded 1,000.

[Jeong Seung-hee/Chief of the Highway Patrol Division, National Police Agency: "We will continue both awareness campaigns and enforcement efforts to create an orderly road environment."]

Police plan to continue cracking down on so-called "five major traffic violations" through the end of the year, including illegal U-turns, improper lane use, tailgating, aggressive merging, and traffic violations involving emergency vehicles.

This is KBS News, Yeo So-yeon.