Call me a Luddite, but sometimes I feel like destroying a piece of machinery. In this case, it’s the electric bicycles that have taken China by storm. I know all the arguments in favor of them. They’re convenient. They’re inexpensive. They’re good for the environment. (Supposedly; more on that later.)
They’re also silent. And deadly. At least the way people ride them in Beijing.
About the only great reason to work late in the office is the opportunity to cycle home in the evening. In the winter especially, the streets are wonderfully quiet, and there’s a poetry in watching the air frosting over. In the summer, after the dinner hour, cyclists pedal side by side at a leisurely pace, sometimes three or four across the path. The bicycle ride is the Beijing equivalent of the Brooklyn front stoop, a time to catch up on gossip with friends or neighbors as the day winds down.
But increasingly, cycling at night is fraught with near-death experiences, thanks to the eBike, a vehicle whose popularity grows leaps and bounds every year. (Recent estimates put the number of electric bikes at 140 million on China’s roads.)
Against the flow
For some reason, eBike riders tend to zip around heedless of road rules. They especially like to go against the flow of traffic. In the bike lane. Without headlights. In the dark, they’re not so easy to spot. And they’re definitely not easy to hear. Countless times, I have come close to colliding with them as we each round the same corner from opposite directions.
I have been lucky. According to the most recent statistics available, more than 3,000 people were killed from eBike accidents in 2008, up from just 34 in 2001. The rate of eBike casualties is growing much faster every year. And given that China registers some 90,000 deaths from traffic accidents a year, that’s not an insignificant percentage for a tiny vehicle.
Authorities are aware of the problem. Last December, the central government announced tough new restrictions on speed and weight, and that licenses were imminent for electric bicycles used across the country. The news triggered a heated debate that was played out all over the Chinese-language media and on the Internet. Eventually, the government backed down, and it’s been left up to industry groups to figure out new guidelines.
Green? Maybe not
Sitting in wall-to-wall traffic on a regular basis in Beijing, I can understand the growing popularity of eBikes. They allow commuters to get around much faster, especially as half a million new vehicles are added to the streets of the Chinese capital every year. There are now over four million vehicles on the roads here.
At least, you may ask, they are not as polluting as cars? Well, the majority of electric bicycles in China aren’t as green as billed. They use lead acid batteries, which are not good for the environment. eBikes that are powered by lithium batteries, which are much cleaner, are increasingly available, but still cost a premium.
(Mong is at left, on her non-electric bike)
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