Facing south from the Park Hyatt’s 65th floor China Bar in Beijing. Photo by James Fallows.
James Fallows of the Atlantic recently blogged about “today’s enormous, expanding Chinese cities,” comparing the more intimate architecture of Shanghai to the sprawling concrete slabs in Beijing.
“This is not a ‘which do you like better?’ discussion,” he emphasizes.
Rather the question is why the look and feel of Beijing seem so clearly to represent the direction Chinese cities are heading. To oversimplify what this means: although Shanghai probably contains more people than Beijing, it feels smaller. The roads are narrower, they’re more likely to bend or twist, the city unfolds on a smaller scale of neighborhoods and courtyards and little houses. Beijing is bigger and squarer and broader and more grandly imposing.
A gloomy sunset on Beijing’s 5th Ring Road. Photo by Lim CK.
Beijing is prepared to pay up to 1 billion yuan (about $146 million) in subsidies to get citizens to ditch their dirty cars and purchase cleaner ones. (Read Laura Root’s recent post about the pros and cons of these types of “cash for clunkers” programs.)
The goal is to remove more than 350,000 huangbiaoche, or “yellow-label cars” that fail to meet emission standards, by the end of this year. These cars represent only 10 percent of the total number of cars in the city but contribute to 50% of emissions, according to Du Shaozhong, deputy director of the environmental protection bureau.
Previously, the Beijing skyline took the international spotlight during the Olympics as air pollution threatened athletes and cast a gray haze over the city. Now the Beijing government is designing a policy that would reward driver’s for purchasing cleaner cars. The “cash for clunkers” plan is part of a multi-pronged strategy to reduce over a quarter of a million high polluting cars from Beijing roads in 2009 and support China’s other efforts to reduce air pollution from transport.
This new initiative would address about 10% of the city’s cars which are thought to account for up to 50% of the air pollution for cars. Drivers of the targeted vehicles could be given up to $3600 to trade in their old polluters for cleaner cars in addition to low- rate loans to finance newer, cleaner vehicles.
In 2008, auto sales rose 7.4%, meaning that close to 6.5 million passenger cars came onto Chinese roads last year. “Cash for clunkers” programs have been implemented in many countries to help reduce air pollution through helping private users upgrade to cleaner solutions and they often inspire auto-makers to manufacturer cleaner. However, no matter how clean cars are; only so many will fit onto limited highway space. Thus such programs don’t address the broad spectrum of sustainable transport issues but they do serve to get committed car users into cleaner vehicles.For more information about the mixed reviews of “cash for clunkers” programs please consult:
Listening to NPR last night, I was caught by surprise by a story describing the unexpected popularity of the temporary traffic restrictions Beijing implemented during the Olympics. Conventional wisdom holds that citizens usually view such regulations (which in Beijing’s case prohibit motorists from driving more than every other day) as onerous. But as yesterday’s piece by Mary Kay Magistad of “The World” notes, “many Beijingers like the [resultant] improvements in air quality and traffic, and they’d like the restrictions to become permanent.”
This somewhat surprising response is probably a direct result of the fact that 80% of Beijing residents still do not own a car. This often silent majority is thus forced to suffer the negative aspects of the city’s increasing motorization (such as traffic congestion and air pollution), while missing out on the benefits of private cars.
Despite their popularity, however, these new traffic regulations are expected to be rescinded after the Olympic hype subsides. Now the question is whether or not policymakers will take this broad support into account and make the traffic restrictions permanent. Let’s hope they do, because without these and other interventions, Beijing’s environment, public health, and general quality of life will continue to take a back seat to cars and car infrastructure.
In anticipation of the impending Olympics, Beijing’s subway has undergone a series of major changes, documented in this series of photographs. With a total of five lines totaling 140 kilometers of track, Beijing plans to add three more lines this year to extend coverage to 200 km.
Once known as the world’s ‘bicycle kingdom,’ China has experienced rapid urbanization leading some to declare the beginning of the end for China’s bikes. While it’s true that from 1995 to 2005, China’s bike fleet declined by 35 percent and private car ownership more than doubled, there is no evidence today that bicycles are a thing of the past on Beijing’s streets.
Increased urbanization and growing diversification of transport has only meant cycling Beijing streets is becoming a greater challenge, particularly in areas where designated bike lanes have been removed. Cycling in Beijing – let alone mastering the art of walking Beijing’s overcrowded streets brimming with buses, cars, bicycles, motorcycles, and some 18 million people – is (in a word) terrifying, yet somehow millions of Beijingers seem to cope just fine.
Helmets are nonexistent, and the agile Chinese have mastered the art of multi-tasking while cycling. Not only do people seem to cart their livelihoods on bikes, but I’ve witnessed whole families perched atop a single tandem, ladies cycling one-handed with umbrella in tow to prevent any sun exposure that would risk their pale complexions; I even saw a man with three 15” computer monitors strapped above his back wheel (and they were not flat screen). And you’ll never see a hint of the abashed – anything goes in the Beijing bike lane. Read the rest of this entry »
Photo by padawan.
China: China’s Olympic anti-pollution plan to start in July[AFP]
China: Beijing Stops Construction for Olympics[New York Times]
United States: Push for Urban Parkland Takes Root[USA Today]
New York: ‘Biking Is the New Golf!’[New York Observer]
Washington DC: Metro Accessible Ball Park Anchors An Areas Revival[New York Times]
China’s Green Beat, is a neat bilingual blog I stumbled upon the other day, written by John Romankiewicz, an American Fulbright scholar currently living in Beijing, and Zhao Xiangyu, a Chinese citizen from Heilongjiang, a province in the northern part of the country. Check out the above video for a comical take on serious challenge: motorization in the Chinese capital.
A miasma of soot and smog sits over Beijing. Photo by +212.
“Should I run behind a bus and breathe in the exhaust? Should I train on the highway during rush hour? Is there any way to acclimate myself to pollution?” These are just a sampling of the strange questions that exercise physiologist for the United States Olympic Committee Randy Wilber has fielded from American athletes anxious to turn out a top-notch performance in Beijing this August, according to a recent New York Times article.
According to Chinese officials, such worries are unfounded. They believe that Beijing will boast blue skies during this summer’s Olympics, when China will openly flex its superpower muscles for the entire world to admire. Unfortunately, Beijing’s plans for creating blue skies rely on a tremendous, temporary green washing of the city – drastic limits on vehicle use and factory closings.
The New York Times article points out that pollution levels in Beijing typically reach five times the World Health Organization standards for safety. Athletes competing in Olympic test events last summer reported contracting respiratory infections and coughing up black mucus. If China’s temporary fixes don’t produce blue skies in Beijing, athletes’ bodies’ may react to extreme air pollution levels by reducing air intake, leading to oxygen debt and cramps. Athletes may also experience allergic reactions. In the worst-case scenario, extreme pollution may lead to heart attacks in even the fittest of athletes. Read the rest of this entry »
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A miasma of soot and smog sits over Beijing. Photo by 
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