As I cycled into the office this morning, smog mask clamped firmly in place, the traffic was certainly lighter. Beijing's first red alert means half of all cars must stay off the roads; odd numbered license plates today, even numbered ones tomorrow.
But although the air is indeed an unpleasant, filthy grey, the pollution index is actually a good deal lower than it was this time last week, when the quantity of dangerous particulate matter (PM 2.5) surged to around 40 times the World Health Organisation's maximum guideline. Today, it is a mere 10 times that limit.
So why red now? Well, the lack of any previous red alerts has been met with increasingly loud howls of derision. What would it take, people wondered last week - as their children felt their way to the still open schools through the poisonous gloom - for the government to act?
Perhaps it is the growing public pressure that has finally made the difference this time round.