Residents of north China's Tianjin City reportedly rushed to buy cars following a notice on Sunday evening that the local government would limit the number of new car license plates it issues in a drive to fight traffic jam and air pollution.

The city was to impose a quota on its new car plates starting yesterday, requiring buyers to join a lottery or bid at auctions to acquire a plate.

The notice did not give details on the quota or how many plates will be available in the lottery compared with the auction.

In the last five hours before the restrictions took effect, long queues of local residents could be seen at car markets. Roads leading to the markets were overcrowded and salesmen were called in to work overnight to meet the heavy demand.

The reason behind the rush was obvious: If they bought the cars before Sunday midnight, they would get a plate along with the vehicle. Otherwise, it was all down to luck or bid.

Several car dealers, who had only sold 10 to 20 cars a day before Sunday, reported up to 200 to 300 on the day. A salesman compared customers buying cars to those buying apples, Beijing Evening News reported.

A salesperson at a Buick store revealed that even the printing machine broke down due to processing too many invoices. At around 11pm on Sunday, more than 40 people were still waiting to pay at the nearby Chevrolet store, the newspaper added.

Car buyers said the notice was issued so late they had no time to figure out a better solution.

Meanwhile, some netizens accused the city government of making the public a scapegoat for the worsening air pollution.

"Why not close factories or stop real estate projects? Why can't they slow down the economic growth to make a better environment," according to one online comment.

Besides the restriction on plates, Tianjin will also follow Beijing's step in adopting a traffic restriction scheme, which blocks cars from streets depending on the last digit of their plates, with two numbers banned each workday.

The ban, to take effect from March 1, is expected to take one fifth of the city's private cars off the road on workdays.