Today's weather: High = 13 Low = 3
Partly cloudy
What follows is a rather sad trend for those who enjoy driving scooters and motorbikes to get around the city. After having finished an extended bicycle trip, I'm now back to using a motorcycle to get around Shanghai as my primary mode of transport. Basically I ride around a Yamaha 125cc motorcycle and have been doing this kind of 'career' for the past 2.5 years.
The benefits of using a motorbike in Shanghai are enormous:
1. Freedom to go at your own schedule
2. Punctuality in a city where late arrivals and delays are commonplace
3. Save money
4. No need to put up with crowded buses, subways, or scarce taxis in rush hour
5. Good mental stimulation to focus during traffic.
6. Speeds are low, so it is safe.
On the surface, the traffic in Shanghai looks chaotic with everyone breaking rules. To some extent that is true, but the key to safety lies within the low speeds. Basically every road user distrusts the other one, and every road user wants to avoid an accident at all costs. It only makes sense, as an accident is the worst possible thing that could happen. So the key stategy is to keep the speed low, always watch the other person driving, and be prepared to react. It makes for a safer traffic environment for everyone.
Contrast this to a western country where the traffic speeds are too high, the acceleration and braking is rapid, and people trust that the others will follow the rules. In terms of motorcycle riding, that is far more dangerous than China.
However, the unfortunate reality is that the vast majority of scooter and motorbike riders in Shanghai are doing so illegally. You can refer to the 'MyChinaMoto' forums as to why this is the case, and what exactly it means to be street-legal. Be prepared to sift through a lot of conflicting information.
The city outrightly banned gas scooters in 2007, stopped issuing new license plates, and launched a series of crackdowns, but they never successfully got rid of the bikes. As a crackdown petered out, the bikes would come back in full force, like they are now. Local people saw the obvious advantages as mentioned above, and found a myriad of ways to keep riding despite it now being illegal. For example, they used LPG powered bikes and modified them to run on gasoline. Or the factory that produced license plates now made fakes copies, etc. etc.
The most recent trend has been for the police in individual districts (mainly downtown ones) ordering that gas stations refuse to sell fuel to these vehicles. The sign above states that no gas is allowed for 'power assisted vehicles' which is a grey enough term to refuse unclicsend scooters, those with out-of-town plates, modifed bikes, and anything else they deem fit. Suburban districts are still OK for a fill-up, as I recently discovered. These districts fringe the outside of Shanghai 'province' and this is where you'll find most of the farmers and common people who depend on fuel to their power-assisted vehicles in order to make a living.
Getting fuel for the bikes is becoming quite a headache now. But all this has done is generate a black market for petrol downtown and for people to go further from the city to fuel up. Word on the street from my Chinese friends is that the police want all illegal scooters off the road by the end of this year. The 'seige tactics' may be the beginning, and a new crackdown could be in the works.
Meanwhile, I still want to get somewhere on time, so I'm still riding.
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