首堵北京 迴歸自行車時代不容易

BEIJING — In the early morning haze, Sun Jian peddled his bicycle along a bustling ring road in Beijing, dodging buses and cars as he weaved his way through multiple lines of traffic.

北京——清晨薄霧繚繞，孫鍵在繁忙的北京二環路上騎着自行車，他躲避着公交車和汽車，在許多條車道的車流中穿梭。

“There are too many cars in the city — it’s like pouring a basin of water into a small bowl,” Mr. Sun, 39, said as he cut through a line of cars into a bike lane.

“北京車太多了就像一盆水倒進了碗裏，”39歲的孫鍵說。他穿過一行汽車，插進了自行車道。

On good days, Mr. Sun, a Beijing native and founder of a popular bike club, must cope with congestion and pollution on his way to work. On bad days, he faces car doors that unexpectedly open ahead of him and bitter fights with drivers parked in the bike lane.

孫鍵是北京本地人，也是一個人氣自行車俱樂部的創始人，運氣好的時候，他在上班途中只需要忍受交通擁堵和污染。運氣差的時候，他會遭遇突然打開的汽車門，還會和把車停在自行車道上的司機吵起來。

Mr. Sun’s 30-minute commute is emblematic of a battle brewing on roads across the country. As China has urbanized, families have become more prosperous and many city residents have moved to suburbs many miles from their jobs. The resulting growth in car use combined with lax law enforcement have undermined a half-century tradition of commuting on bikes.

孫鍵上下班這30分鐘的路程很有代表性，象徵着中國各地道路上正在醞釀的一場戰鬥。隨着中國城市化進程的推進，以及居民生活變得富裕，很多城市居民搬到了與工作地點相距甚遠的郊區。由此帶來的汽車使用量增加，再加上中國寬鬆的執法狀況，破壞了半個世紀以來人們騎自行車上下班的傳統。

Nowhere is that battle more obvious than in Beijing, where buses, automobiles and electric scooters vie with cyclists for space. Today, only 12 percent of commuters in Beijing pedal to work, compared with 38 percent in 2000, according to government data.

在北京，這場戰役的可見度比其他地方都高。公交車、汽車和電動車都在與自行車爭搶空間。政府數據顯示，目前北京上下班的人中只有12%騎自行車，2000年這個比例爲38%。

But now, facing concerns about pollution, Beijing worries too many people have abandoned the bicycle, and it hopes to reverse course.

但是現在由於擔心環境污染，北京對太多的人放棄自行車感到不安，希望能夠逆轉這個趨勢。

China’s capital, often choked by motorized vehicles, is eager to encourage more commuters to return to two wheels. It wants to increase the proportion of commuters who use bikes to 18 percent by 2020, according to city transportation officials.

北京經常出現機動車輛堵塞的現象，因此熱心鼓勵更多人改騎自行車上下班。該市交通官員表示，希望到2020年，能讓騎自行車上下班的人提升到18%的比例。

The move is part of Beijing’s pledge to promote “green commutes” as it combats air pollution and traffic congestion. Acrid smog routinely blankets city skyscrapers and at times becomes so bad that it leads to an increase in hospital admissions.

這是北京承諾推動的“綠色出行”計劃的組成部分，目的是改善空氣污染和交通擁堵。刺鼻的霧霾經常籠罩着北京林立的高樓，有時會變得非常嚴重，導致就醫人數增多。

Bikes became an integral part of China’s culture after the Communist revolution in 1949. Along with a sewing machine and a watch, a bicycle was once considered one of the three must-haves of every Chinese household.

1949年中國共產主義革命之後，自行車成爲了中國文化的一個組成部分。它曾經和縫紉機、手錶一起被稱爲“三大件”，即每個中國家庭應有的三件必備之物。

Only two decades ago, Beijing’s streets were ringing with tinkling bells, and bike repair shops were kept busy. In fact, there were so many bikes that Beijing transportation officials reached out in 1994 to Dan Burden, then an American consultant with the United Nations, to solicit his opinion on how to manage them all given the new surge in private cars.

就在二十年前，北京還是滿街嘀鈴鈴的車鈴聲，自行車修理鋪忙得不可開交。事實上，當時的自行車如此之多，以至於在1994年，北京的交通官員聯繫到當時給聯合國擔任顧問的美國人丹·伯登(Dan Burden)，尋求他對如何在私家車激增的情況下管理自行車的意見。

When told that the problem was too many bicycles, Mr. Burden offered the opposite view.

在被告知問題在於自行車太多時，伯登提出了截然相反的看法。

Mr. Burden told officials in 1994 that bikes were a “victim of unplanned car growth and should not be shoved out of the way,” as they take up far less space than cars, he said in an email interview.

伯登在接受電子郵件採訪時說，自己當年告訴相關官員，自行車是“無規劃的汽車增加的受害者，不應該把自行車趕走”，因爲它們佔的空間比汽車少。

But Mr. Burden’s advice was ignored.

但伯登的建議被忽略了。

“We believed the bicycle was the solution, but our message and solutions weren’t fully heard,” he said.

“我們認爲自行車是解決問題的辦法，但我們的話和提出的方案，沒有被完全聽進去，”他說。

In the decades since, China has claimed the title of world’s biggest automobile market.

在自那之後的幾十年裏，中國成爲了世界最大汽車市場。

Persuading Beijing drivers to use their cars less is unlikely to be easy. To encourage more commuters to use bikes, city planners have proposed a ban on car parking on side roads less than 20 feet wide, more colored bike lanes and barricades to separate motor vehicles from nonmotorized ones.

勸北京的司機少開車可能不那麼容易。爲了鼓勵更多的上班族使用自行車，城市規劃人員提議，禁止在不足20英尺（約合6米）寬的輔路上停車，並建議設立更多塗色的自行車道和分隔機動車與非機動車的護欄。

But many cyclists here are skeptical that the changes will make Beijing’s roads more hospitable anytime soon.

但這裏的很多騎車人都懷疑，這些改變無法很快就讓北京的道路變得更適於騎車。

“What I can’t stand is that there are practically no bike lanes, and these are often occupied by cars,” said Fang Yongbin, who moved to Beijing last summer. He said he tried biking to work but quit after a month because of a variety of frustrations, including the smog and aggressive motorists.

“我無法忍受的是幾乎沒有自行車道，車道常常被汽車佔了，”去年夏天來到北京的方永斌（音）說。他稱自己試過騎車上班，但一個月後就放棄了，原因包括霧霾、機動車司機咄咄逼人，還有其他很多令其受挫的因素。

Mr. Fang, who now drives to work, said that the measures being considered by officials gave him no assurance.

現在開車上班的方永斌說，官員目前考慮的措施無法讓他信服。

A study released this year by researchers at Peking University in Beijing found that air pollution, safety concerns and a lack of road space were the main reasons people avoided biking to work in the capital.

今年發表的一項研究發現，空氣污染、安全問題和道路空間不足是首都民衆避免騎自行車上班的主要原因。該研究是由北京大學的研究人員開展的。

The sheer number of vehicles and the lack of parking spaces remain major issues, said Li Wei, an engineer at the Beijing Municipal Institute of City Planning and Design, who is helping draft regulations intended to improve bicycling and pedestrian infrastructure in Beijing. The city has designed parking capacities that can accommodate only half of the five million cars in Beijing, he said.

北京市城市規劃設計研究院主任工程師李偉稱，缺少停車位仍是主要問題。他正在參與起草意在改善北京的騎車和行人基礎設施的規章。他說，北京市設計的停車能力只能容納250萬輛車。

“Many cars are parked not in real parking spaces, but on the roads,” Mr. Li said, adding that the city’s transportation policies have long favored cars. “Beijing has really reached a limit.”

李偉說，“很多車沒有停在真正用來停車的地方，而是停在了馬路上。”李偉還說，長期以來，北京市的交通政策一直是對汽車有利的。“北京真的到達極限了。”

Lax enforcement of traffic laws also contributes to the poor conditions for cyclists, Mr. Li said.

李偉說，交通執法不嚴也是騎車人面臨惡劣條件的原因之一。

“Private cars in Beijing are the most capricious and free,” he said. “Whenever there’s a traffic jam, the cars drive onto the side lanes, which used to be the nonmotor vehicle lanes. There is no other country in the world where cars can drive wherever they want.”

“北京的私家車是最任性、最自由的，”他說。“不管什麼時候，只要遇到堵車，機動車就會開到旁邊的非機動車道上。世界上沒有其他哪個國家的車，能想往哪兒開就往哪兒開。”