Parking in Beijing

[4walls]

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/179/383899299_bebca32f40_o.jpg

[superdiver]

WOW...thats alot of bikes...

Is bike theft much of a problem there?

[4walls]

WOW...thats a lot of bikes...

Is bike theft much of a problem there?

I don't know... The bikes all have locks on them and almost all of them are of the same vintage and style. Some estimates put the number of bikes in Beijing at around 10 million.

Here are some recent bike photos... (http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showpost.php?p=2676734&postcount=1)

[squashed]

I dont know about theft , I would hope I could remember what my bike actually looked like :)

[Dan_S]

Whao that is alot of bikes.

[coolmonk]

Glad to see other parts of the world are helping with the prevention of global warming. The photo is definitely catchy.

[eym2]

wow it will be hard to take ur date in your bike

[4walls]

Glad to see other parts of the world are helping with the prevention of global warming. The photo is definitely catchy.Actually, the bikes seem to be thinning out as the automobile becomes more and more popular in China. The smog there can be unbelievable. One day in Beijing, there were no clouds, but one could hardly see the sun due to the thick layer of smog in the city.

China is talking about reducing coal burning (one of their major power sources) which should go a long way towards reducing the polution there.

wow it will be hard to take ur date in your bikeNa, the bike doesn't prevent them from traveling together. Sometimes you see up to three people on one bike. Don't have a picture, but will try to get one like that next trip.

[BottomBracket]

Very interesting capture, thanks for sharing your city with us. I love bikes and their use as alternative transport.

[SuzyView]

Bikes are great. I wish we had more of that in the US. We do love out cars. And the roads here are unfriendly to bikers. Even with side lanes for bikes, people don't take advantage of them.

[up4tea]

I think your framing could have been a little more effective if it showed the bikes angled off across the shot left to righ, top to bottom... but that's just my sense of composition

good pic

[4walls]

Very interesting capture, thanks for sharing your city with us. I love bikes and their use as alternative transport.Thanks for the comments. BTW, it's not MY city, I was just visiting :)

Bikes are great. I wish we had more of that in the US. We do love out cars. And the roads here are unfriendly to bikers. Even with side lanes for bikes, people don't take advantage of them.Even with the huge number of cars in Beijing now, I am surprised how the bike lane has remained "sacred". Drivers seem to go anywhere they please (at least it seems that way from the back of the taxi), but the bikes just press on, undaunted. There seems to be strength in numbers... and that's what rules the flow of traffic.

Here on the west coast of Canada, the popular thinking is that cars are the great evil... so we don't even build proper roads for them. Be glad that in the US you have a road system that works, even if the traffic grows faster than the road system. Vancouver has the same 4 lane freeway (2 in each direction) that was here more than 20 years ago. But they are talking about building a new bridge. You should see the Koreans... man those people build bridges! :D
I think your framing could have been a little more effective if it showed the bikes angled off across the shot left to righ, top to bottom... but that's just my sense of composition

good picThanks for the comment. I will look for that shot again and see if I can reframe it. No shortage of bikes to shoot in China. :)

[GPR1]

Last year I lived in Chengdu (another major city in China). My family of 4 had three bicycles stolen in 10 months. Our Chinese friends just shrugged....

Greg

[ZekaG]

Interesting shot indeed... Thanks for sharing.

[Transportithere]

Do you think any of those bike are made in America?

[4walls]

Do you think any of those bike are made in America?
I doubt that there are any US made bikes. There are some US designs (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/05/21/wbike21.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/05/21/ixnews.html), but I would guess that most or all of those are built locally.

At the forefront of the whole bicycle phenomenon in the PRC is the trusty Flying Pigeon. Of all the bicycle logos in China today, the silhouette of a pigeon resting on the two letters FP is probably the best-known. Other brands take a close second, such as the Phoenix (Fenghuang), Forever (Yongjiu), and Giant. Flying Pigeons are hatched at the Tianjin Bicycle Company, which was originally an artillery factory created by Japanese occupying forces in 1936. After the Communists came to power in 1949, the bicycle industry was revived. In the early 1950s, Chairman Mao's heir apparent Liu Shaoqi paid a visit to the factory and commanded that it become the first bicycle manufacturer in New China. www.beijingscene.com/v07i002/ayi.html (http://www.beijingscene.com/v07i002/ayi.html)

[fritz1]

wow it will be hard to take ur date in your bike

Sure you can you can take the whole family

[fritz1]

And some of the farm

[fritz1]

Sorry I am not hijacking just thought they were interesting

[rider10099]

Having been in both bejiing and chungdu last year I can attest to the number of bike. They all look the same to me. I have no Idea how they know who's is who's. Oh and they don't have lights - a real joy when you are in a car. BTW burning coal in the cook stoves really adds to the pollution.