3 ms·

Have you seen piles of them on the street yourself? I never have, in Beijing, Shanghai, or Xiamen. People are 99% considerate; the 1% who aren’t make for bett

by mike_h 9y ago

Have you seen piles of them on the street yourself? I never have, in Beijing, Shanghai, or Xiamen. People are 99% considerate; the 1% who aren’t make for better photos. The frictionless utility of dockless has brought so much ease and joy to these cities that any marginal, occasional mess appears far outweighed to me, and anyone I’ve ever talked to.

nrser 9y ago
I live in Beijing, and the bike and scooter shares are everywhere, including blocking sidewalks and in huge piles and it’s absoultly great. They’ve been a terrific improvement. It’s great to use them, and it’s great to see so many other people using them. Yeah, they’re kind of a pain to deal with them sometimes, but it turns out you can just move the bikes, and walk or ride around the piles. I have yet to see anyone get stuck in a pile. And somehow even people that don’t use the bikes seem to be able to lend some value to the idea that other people do (this was very strange to me at first, having grown up in the Bay Area). Beijing is pretty much the perfect city for them though... completely flat and ridiculous spacious and open (except parts of the old city). I can see it being more painful in tighter cities. But they’ll figure the piles problem out; it’s already gotten better, and the net benefit has been pretty large.
URSpider94 9y ago
Yes, I have, in Shenzhen, as recently as last month. Not the crazy mountains that have made the news, but certainly dozens of them at every corner of the central business district. Fortunately, Shenzhen is a new city, more like San Jose than SF, with extremely wide sidewalks, so there’s enough room. That same density of parked bikes in SF would make the sidewalks unpassable for pedestrians, much less people in wheelchairs.

3 ms·

Have you seen piles of them on the street yourself? I never have, in Beijing, Shanghai, or Xiamen. People are 99% considerate; the 1% who aren’t make for bett

by mike_h 9y ago

nrser 9y ago
I live in Beijing, and the bike and scooter shares are everywhere, including blocking sidewalks and in huge piles and it’s absoultly great. They’ve been a terrific improvement. It’s great to use them, and it’s great to see so many other people using them. Yeah, they’re kind of a pain to deal with them sometimes, but it turns out you can just move the bikes, and walk or ride around the piles. I have yet to see anyone get stuck in a pile. And somehow even people that don’t use the bikes seem to be able to lend some value to the idea that other people do (this was very strange to me at first, having grown up in the Bay Area). Beijing is pretty much the perfect city for them though... completely flat and ridiculous spacious and open (except parts of the old city). I can see it being more painful in tighter cities. But they’ll figure the piles problem out; it’s already gotten better, and the net benefit has been pretty large.
URSpider94 9y ago
Yes, I have, in Shenzhen, as recently as last month. Not the crazy mountains that have made the news, but certainly dozens of them at every corner of the central business district. Fortunately, Shenzhen is a new city, more like San Jose than SF, with extremely wide sidewalks, so there’s enough room. That same density of parked bikes in SF would make the sidewalks unpassable for pedestrians, much less people in wheelchairs.