Beijing's green and pleasant bike ways

In the springtime, a young (or old) man's heart turns to ... bikes. Wandering around Beijing on my bike restores me mentally and spiritually. My wife says it's my religion.

Visitors to Beijing often see it as a city of traffic. It certainly has too many cars for my liking, but it has large green spaces. And, it's getting greener.

To my surprise, I've found Beijing to be a great biking city. About 19 percent of the population of Beijing commutes by bike. Despite 15 years of biking infrastructure investment, my hometown of Washington has still only reached about 2 percent. Most Beijing streets already have protected side roads for slow-moving vehicles and the presence of many riders provides safety in numbers.

A few changes could help Beijing become even better. Give tickets and fines to cars parked in the clearly-marked bike lanes. The resulting local government revenue could be used for health, education and other social needs. And control left and right turning cars so pedestrians and cyclists can safely cross the streets.

Besides bikes, there are many other ways to get about the city. The government has invested in building one of the world's best subway systems, and I love the tuk-tuks, the small three-wheeled vehicles that would fulfill the needs and appeal to more residents if cars were not a threat.

A dream, for the whole world, would be to finish a 60-kilometer bike-and-walking path along the Grand Canal from Beijing to Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. And, the mountains north of the city, where the Great Wall runs, are stunningly beautiful and could be made into a world-class area for bicyclists by adding a few road shoulders and bike paths.

The Chinese capital also has many great parks. The Olympic Forest Park rivals New York's Central Park, and there is a 13-km walkway and canal near the China Daily offices running across the north side of the city beside the ruins of the old Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) walls. You can discover just by looking for green on a map many such lesser known parks where tourists never go, but which the locals cherish. Many of them are open to bikes.

People need these parks. It's a joy to see grandparents walking with toddlers, young couples strolling hand-in-hand, parents teaching kids to ride bikes, families barbecuing, old men flying kites and old women dancing. The smiles are much bigger than you ever see on the street.

Like all cities, Beijing planners in the past made the mistake of becoming too car-centric. The 1950s destruction of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) city walls was a historic loss. Imagine a beautiful wall and park where the Second Ring Road now roars. That won't happen soon, if ever, but the city is moving ahead quickly to provide more great green spaces.

I recently stumbled across a truly magnificent new park - the Beijing Greenway. It's a car-free path running along the Wenyu river from Tongzhou in the east of the city, past the airport, into the north section of the city for, as of now, 54 km.

That's just the start. In March, the city announced that, by the end of next year, it will finish building four new greenways, running more than 500 km, mostly alongside rivers. In US cities, this would be considered a fantastic accomplishment - front page news. It has hardly been publicized here, but it should be celebrated as a great asset for the city's people.

This weekend, I'm going to enjoy the greenway.