Secret Graveyard Serves as Symbol of Share Bike Saturation
The powers that be have heard our cry. Or maybe they saw these photos.
READ: Beijing Joins List of Cities Saying No to New Share Bikes
Authorities have finally said "enough is enough" to the share bike industry, which has continued to proliferate in the already saturated capital, after it began causing chaos and inconvenience throughout the city – something proven by the recent discovery of a massive graveyard of share bikes abandoned under a Beijing overpass.
Photos of the dumped share bikes stretching beyond the photo frame have been confusingly attributed to either a Tongzhou-area bridge in east Beijing or in Mentougou, located in the city's west-northwest (or both). The latter is described by an internet user who says he discovered them while looking for a reason why share bikes had disappeared from outside his Mentougou-area office.
Assuming these photos were in fact taken in Beijing, we think we can draw a few conclusions:
That is a lot of share bikes belonging to a lot of different bike-sharing companies
They probably shouldn't be there
Something fishy is going on
Maybe we're relying on gut instinct for that last one, but we'd have to call shenanigans when share bikes are disappearing from Beijing suburbs, but have completely overtaken downtown areas like Shuangjing:
But even as the nascent bike-sharing industry players compete among themselves for dominance, new companies continue to enter the fray. Have you ever wanted to enjoy a tandem bike ride, but on a per use basis? The new Chao Bike will allow riders to enjoy the Olympic Park on a bicycle built for two – if you really want to pay RMB 10 per hour for it.
Still not fed up with share bikes? Authorities finally took the lead against them when they forbade children under 12 from riding share bikes, a new rule that comes after this past April's road accident that claimed the life of a Tianjin girl and forced a 1.08 million yuan settlement with Ofo bikes.
And yet it may be too late for new rules. Electric fencing has been rolled out throughout the city, but without any consequences for violators, making us less optimistic about the implementation of this two-level bicycle parking at Zaoyuan Station on the Beijing Metro Line 4.
And lest we forget, any new regulations will go against the entire selling point of a share bike: the freedom of using it.
Images: Weibo.com, BTRN.cn
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