‘Carmageddon’: China’s 50-lane traffic jam is every driver’s worst nightmare

The traffic jams on the Gardiner Expressway in Toronto don’t even come close to what Chinese motorists had to face this week.

As the seven-day national holiday known as the ‘Golden Week’ wrapped up in China, thousands of motorists trying to return to the capital were stuck in a 50-lane traffic jam on the Beijing-Hong Kong-Macau Expressway.

The shocking scenes captured by aerial footage show Beijing-bound vehicles in complete gridlock, a traffic jam caused by a new checkpoint added recently on either side of the toll booth. It reduced the 50-lane road to less than 20 lanes, according to the Daily Mail.

Many motorists can be seen leaving their vehicles and taking a stroll just to kill the time.

According to the National Tourism Administration in China, the number of Chinese people traveling during the ‘Golden Week’ was expected to reach a record high.

The China Tourism Academy estimated that almost half the country’s population would be traveling during the seven-day long week holiday. That’s more than 750 million travelers.

Apparently this was nothing compared to what happened in 2010, when another traffic jam in China took 12 days to clear up.