The shared electric bicycles that are "flowing everywhere" in small and medium-sized cities have exposed many problems, including irregular cycling among citizens, excessive production of manufacturers, and unlicensed cars on the road.
text | "Finance" E-Factory Editor Liu Chang | Lu Wei
One morning in mid-September, Wu Jing, a Kunming citizen on the way to work, saw a shared electric bicycle "heavy" hitting a car passing through the T-junction.
"The visibility was not high at that time, and the electric bicycle was fast and soundless, so I suddenly became 'stop' on the car." Wu Jing told the E method of "Finance".
Fortunately, both sides were not seriously injured.
After confirming that the other party was fine, the car driver complained that the electric bicycle driver "walking without looking at the road". The latter uses the unique humor of Chuncheng people to "counterattack": "If you don't drive a small car well, where can you get the money to buy a big car?"
In fact, shared electric bicycles that are basically "banned" in first-tier and even many second-tier cities are "blooming" like mushrooms after a rain in small and medium-sized cities.
"The longer-term significance of shared electric bicycles to modern urban planning and construction is that it has taken the first step in driving urban transportation with the 'energy + intelligence + network', which is a fundamental difference from shared bicycles." Suo Liming, professor at the Zhou Enlai School of Government Management of Nankai University, told the E-law of Finance.
is similar to the "prosperity" of shared bicycles back then. At present, major manufacturers are pushing for shared electric bicycles, but behind the huge demand, shared electric bicycles have exposed many problems: citizens' irregular riding, manufacturers' over-concentrated production, cars on the road without a license, etc.
(Henan mounts on the streets of Meituan electric bicycles carrying people frequently)
The outside world is generally concerned about how long will the shared electric bicycles that are currently popular in second- and third-tier cities be popular? Will shared electric bicycles repeat the mistakes of shared bicycles? Major brands rushed forward and "siege the city and abuse the land", and eventually left a "mess of mess"?
layout "last X kilometers"
According to iMedia Consulting Report, the number of shared electric bicycles in China exceeded 1 million in 2019, with a revenue scale of 3 billion yuan. It is estimated that more than 8 million vehicles will be launched in 2025, with a revenue scale of 20 billion yuan.
In 2020, 36.2% of the urban distribution of shared electric bicycle users in China were distributed in third-tier cities and 34.6% were distributed in fourth-tier cities and rural areas. More than 70% of the sinking market has become the main battlefield for the competition among giants.
An internal person from Meituan Bicycle who did not want to be named told the E method of "Finance" that because of the difficulty of riding, shared bicycles are generally defined as suitable for short-distance transportation of 1km-3km. Electric bicycles can help extend this travel distance to 5km-10km. In first- and second-tier cities, the two can meet the needs of different groups of people and different scenarios, forming a complementary relationship.
"However, in third-, fourth-tier cities and even smaller cities, electric bicycles have to face more of a competitive relationship - especially competition with cars (i.e. taxis). This is determined by the different travel ecology of cities of different sizes." The insider said.
Shanghai Jiaotong University Assistant researcher in the Department of Transportation Engineering Wang Tao told the E-law of "Finance" that most residents in cities below third-tier cities are within 10 kilometers, and all kinds of transportation modes have their service scope. "If both methods serve the same travel distance, competition will inevitably arise."
But the huge advantages of shared electric bicycles still help it quickly "siege the city and grab the ground."
Some industry insiders revealed that the three giants Hello, Qingju and Meituan planned to invest more than 5 million vehicles this year, which almost tied the industry's development in the previous three years.
"In a relatively complex core hotspot environment in big cities, it is necessary to focus on specific tide hotspots for commuting and getting off work, and at the same time, it is necessary to cooperate with the governance of urban management. The peak of small cities is not exactly the same as that of big cities. Large cities are typically concentrated in peak hours of commuting, and small cities are flattering curves. They will have travel needs in different time periods, and the places they go to will be significantly different from those of big cities." Chu Yiqun, general manager of Hello Travel Bicycle Division, once said.
"If there is no shared electric bicycle, it will be difficult for me to get to and from get off work." Li Kehan, an employee of Hubei Xianning company, told the "Finance" E Law, "Our unit is about six kilometers away from my house. It is not cost-effective to drive, and it is difficult to find a parking space; if you ride a bicycle back, it will be too far; as for the bus, there is only one bus from my house to the company, which is crowded every morning, and the experience is too poor." She said that since Xianning has shared electric bicycles, she has "basically no longer considers other methods of traveling in the city."
An industry insider who wanted to be named told the E-law of Finance that even in first-tier cities, citizens still have a huge demand for shared electric bicycles. "We have conducted a survey. There are many people living in suburban areas such as Beijing and Shanghai, but public transportation is still difficult to be developed and it is difficult to match the huge demand every day."
The industry insider further stated that if the travel needs of such residents cannot be met, they generally choose to purchase electric bicycles by themselves. The total number of ownership will not only not decrease, but will also increase, "instead, further increase the burden on cities."
Suo Liming told the E method of "Finance" that from a technical perspective, shared bicycles require human power and are only suitable for the activity radius of about 1km-3km. Shared electric bicycles can improve travel speed, expand residents' travel range, further expand the space of the "living circle" and further shorten the time, and optimize the city's spatial structure in the time dimension.
"Like shared bicycles, shared electric bicycles are uniformly purchased, charged and maintained by relevant companies, which has a significant scale effect." Suo Liming said, "This can not only alleviate the environmental pollution and parking problems caused by the large number of decentralized purchases and use of motorcycles, but also alleviate the disorderly parking caused by residents' scattered purchases of electric vehicles and the fire hazards caused by decentralized charging."
"The emergence of shared electric bicycles is undoubtedly an objective demand of the market." Yin Chengzhi, deputy director of the Center for Urban Renewal and Governance Research of the School of Public Administration of Tsinghua University, told the E-law of Finance that in the past few decades, the number of motor vehicles in major cities in China has grown rapidly, and the construction of municipal roads cannot expand infinitely, which has caused congestion in motor vehicles. Shared electric bicycles are light and flexible, have sufficient power, smooth traffic, and can carry people and things. They are particularly convenient in crowded urban traffic and are widely favored by citizens. The transportation needs of citizens have formed an objective demand for shared electric bicycles.
"Based on the above advantages, shared electric bicycles have the convenience characteristics of the sharing economy, and naturally have certain market demand." Yin Chengzhi said.
problems occur frequently, and supervision is becoming stricter. Although the demand for
is large, the many chaos that are growing rapidly by shared electric bicycles are still the "difficult" problem that plagues urban governance departments and businesses.
is the first to be disarrayed, which far exceeds the demand. "Finance" E-Law review found that since this year alone, shared electric bicycles in Kunming, Nanning, Nanchong, Xianning, Baotou, Changsha and other places have been exposed to over-distribution. There have been a large number of citizens’ messages on government websites in many places, saying that the proliferation of shared electric bicycles has affected daily life and travel.
"We are a county-level city and do not need so many brands of electric bicycles . At most two are enough." Nanchong City . A staff member of a company in Nanbu County, Ma Zi'ang told the "Finance" E Law, "Now when you go out every day, there are shared bicycles on the blind path, which seriously affects citizens' travel. We just hope to clean up quickly."
At present, a total of nearly 20,000 shared electric bicycles are deployed in the urban area of Xianning, Hubei, and the local urban management law enforcement committee introduced that the saturation status of shared electric bicycles in Xianning urban area is about 10,000, which is currently in a super saturation status. Local media reported that a large number of shared electric bicycles with low usage rates were piled up in various areas of the urban area, which was a huge waste. The excessive market placement has also put great pressure on the maintenance personnel of the company. Some vehicles that have failed or have no power cannot be repaired and charged in time, and electric bicycles that are dirty with mud and water and dust are also unscrupulous.
In Nanning, Guangxi, in order to better solve the random parking of Internet rental bicycles, the local transportation bureau divided each urban area into 50 responsibility grid areas and allocated 700 enterprise operation and maintenance personnel. Operation and maintenance personnel are required to protect the "responsible field", increase inspection efforts, and strictly rectify the chaos of illegal parking in grid areas, cross-regional deployment, and the release of shared moped cars without license plates.
In addition, the issue of registration has also become the "lifeline" of shared electric bicycles.
The Road Traffic Safety Law of the People's Republic of China stipulates that driving registered non-motor vehicles on the road should hang license plates in accordance with regulations and keep the license plates clear and complete. With the official implementation of the national mandatory standard " Electric Bicycle Safety Technical Specification " on April 15, 2019, many places have also issued relevant non-motor vehicle management standards, requiring that all electric bicycles, including shared electric bicycles, should be hanged license plates or temporary signs in accordance with the law, otherwise they will not be allowed to be on the road.
However, at present, the phenomenon of shared electric bicycles without license plates is still very common.
"Finance" E method found that there are still a large number of shared electric bicycles in many places that have not been registered and put on the road. A law enforcement staff member in Hangzhou, Zhejiang who did not want to be named told the E Law of Finance that since enterprises, users and law enforcement departments need to work together, the communication channels between the three parties, especially enterprises, and law enforcement departments are not smooth, and the management of shared electric bicycle license plates is "hard to standardize".
"When consumers encounter the problem of being fined for not applying license plates, the law enforcement department needs to enforce the fine in accordance with the law, but consumers will feel wronged. Generally, our solution is to ask consumers to contact the head of a shared electric bicycle company to get a vehicle driving license, or an invoice and a vehicle certificate, but most consumers report that the company has no reply. Only a few firm consumers can get the corresponding reply after repeated attempts." The staff member said.
Wu Jing was also punished for similar issues. She said that ordinary consumers "seldom waste a lot of time, energy, or even money to deal with this kind of thing."
In April 2020, the Traffic Management Bureau of the Ministry of Public Security issued a notice stating that it will carry out the "one helmet and one belt" safety protection operation nationwide starting from June 1. Among them, the "one helmet" for electric bicycles refers to a safety helmet. Many places immediately followed up and issued relevant regulations requiring electric bicycle users to wear helmets to ride.
The industry generally believes that this is a major challenge to shared electric bicycles.
"Who would take a helmet to ride a shared electric bicycle!" Ma Zi'ang said with a smile.
At present, leading companies in the industry such as Meituan, Hello, Qingju, etc. have expressed that they will actively respond to the Ministry of Public Security’s “One Helmet and One Belt” security protection action. Meituan and Hello have also begun to equip their electric bicycles with helmets.
《Finance》E method found that the safety helmets and handlebars of the two brands of shared electric bicycles are equipped with anti-theft telescopic ropes, which can be retracted and stretched freely. To avoid affecting safety, the telescopic rope is installed on the left handle and the right handle controls the vehicle speed.
Yin Chengzhi believes that in actual operation, it is indeed difficult to achieve "one car, one helmet", so we can start with speed control and control the speed of shared electric bicycles to the level of general bicycles, thereby achieving the goal of safety. As a transportation tool, shared electric bicycles should be a labor-saving vehicle, not a "motorcycle" for racing.
The irregular riding of consumers themselves also seriously affects the living environment of shared electric bicycles.
At present, there are unsafe phenomena in many places that people even ride shared electric bicycles. A traffic assistant manager in Jining, Shandong told Caijing E method: "I have basically never seen people riding a blue shared car (i.e. Hello moped) rides more people, and I can see them seven or eight times a day." The assistant manager also gave his own explanation: "The cushion of green cars is wide, and it can accommodate two people by squeeze."
In fact, various shared electric bicycles involving multiple brands on the market are generally considered to be able to carry people because of their wide design cushions and foot pedals.
"Electric vehicles are generally faster. When riding a manned ride, it will affect the cyclist's control of direction and speed. Once an emergency occurs, it will be too dangerous." Ma Zi'ang said, "But the seats of many brands of shared electric bicycles on the street are very wide, and most people think that this can be carried by people."
"Finance" E-law investigation found that the body of Meituan moped car has a slogan "One person is allowed to ride" and is located directly below the seat.
"Often people only pay attention to the place where they scan the code when they are riding. At most, they will look at the big slogans on the side of the car. Few people will look down specifically." Wu Jing said.
"Finance" E law wrote to Meituan and Hellobike on this issue. As of press time, neither party responded to this.
Multiple-party co-governance is the way out
At present, shared electric bicycles have been approved for listing in many places in China (Zhejiang, Anhui, Sichuan, Jiangxi, Inner Mongolia, Liaoning, Henan, Guangxi, etc.).
On September 3, 2019, the "Jiangsu Province Electric Bicycle Management Regulations (Draft for Comments)" was released, and Article 6 clearly states that "strictly standardize the development of Internet rental electric bicycles, formulate special plans for the development of Internet rental electric bicycles, strengthen supervision and inspection of operating enterprises, and scientifically and reasonably determine the pace of delivery and total volume."
On October 31, 2019, Kunming Municipal Urban Management Bureau officially issued the "Kunming Shared Bicycle Operation Service Management Implementation Rules", which clearly stated that shared electric vehicles will officially enter the Kunming market and be subject to unified management. Among them, the core indicators such as shared electric bike riding mode, speed, weight, charging warehouse standards, etc. are all set in accordance with the enterprise vehicle standards. In cities such as Hangzhou, Hefei, and Changsha, regulatory agencies accept shared electric bicycle access filing documents and implement shared electric bicycle filing and registration operations.
The policies on sharing electric bicycles in various places are being loosened one after another.
In addition, industry standardization work has also been started. For example, the China Electronics Technology Standardization Research Institute, the Standardization Committee of the China Urban Public Transport Association and other departments have recently launched the preparation of group standards for shared electric bicycles.
also has positive views on the definition of shared electric vehicles in future urban construction.
Suo Liming pointed out that unlike shared bicycles, shared electric bicycles have two characteristics: energy and fast connection, and advocate the characteristics of sharing, wisdom, public and network. This may be the future development direction of urban transportation and the prelude and transition of unmanned driving. This requires the city to pay enough attention to planning and construction and make corresponding deployment. "With the iterative upgrade of new infrastructure and Internet technology, we can try to interconnect the sensor data of shared electric bicycles with smart cities, so that shared electric bicycles can automatically limit speeds and voice reminders based on road information, real-time traffic information such as road conditions, and use intelligence to improve the safety of shared electric bicycles. This can to some extent be regarded as a preview of unmanned driving in scenarios and systems."
Yin Chengzhi believes that China was once a bicycle power, and correspondingly, China's original urban street space design also fully considers the comfort, safety and orderly parking of bicycles, and accommodates a large number of traffic flows in the limited urban traffic space, which fully reflects the idea of sustainable development.
"The widespread use of shared electric bicycles can promote my country to return to the green transportation model in the new era, and this return is a spiral increase in the use of new technologies and new management methods, which is also of far-reaching significance for China to achieve the goal of energy conservation and emission reduction in climate change response." Yin Chengzhi emphasized.
On the other hand, the problems encountered by shared electric bicycles in the implementation also need to be solved.
Yang Xinmiao, deputy director of the Institute of Transportation of Tsinghua University, pointed out to the E-Law of Finance that "one car, one person" is the basic requirement for ensuring traffic safety. Taking multiple people on two-wheeled vehicles will increase the weight of the vehicle, reduce stability, and increase the risk factor. Enterprises and governments should work together to ensure that each vehicle, one person through vehicle design, strict law enforcement, etc.
Yin Chengzhi emphasized that the government’s successful management experience in Internet bicycle rental can be learned from and developed and applied to the management of shared electric bicycles.As a production enterprise, it must obey government regulations and industry standards, produce safe products, and establish and improve the recycling system for complete vehicles and consumables; as an operating enterprise, it must formulate and implement standardized shared electric bicycle management processes under the guidance of the government, and do a good job in its placement, monitoring, maintenance, and scrapping, and achieve its own profit while serving the national emission reduction goals and meeting citizens' travel needs, and win-win situations for all parties.
Industry insiders generally believe that the demand for shared electric bicycles of all types of urban residents must be solved, but issues such as urban construction planning and layout must also be considered in a comprehensive way, and ultimately form a comprehensive plan that integrates the opinions of the government, enterprises and users. Simply holding one party responsible may fall into the trap of "treating symptoms but not the root cause", which will lead to worsening of the original problems.
At the same time, the "one-size-fits-all" management model has also been criticized. Some experts stressed that managers should try their best to avoid the extreme governance model of "what they looked good yesterday, but what they looked bad today." We must make full use of the role of the market, fulfill the role of supervisory and managers, establish a complete management system, and introduce management standards in time in terms of industry standards, service standards, etc. to promote the formation of a good market ecology.
Wang Tao believes that shared electric bicycles can have a place in the future urban travel system, but he also pointed out that the governance of shared electric bicycles is a process of multi-party game, and it is difficult to obtain the optimal solution that satisfies all parties. All parties need to find a balance point in the contradiction between individual optimality and system optimality. "The big policy is to be cautious."
Wang Tao put forward three opinions: First, different cities need different regulatory policies. "For the suburbs of third- and fourth-tier cities and first- and second-tier cities, their public transportation may not be very complete, and the existence of shared electric bicycles has its needs and necessities." This requires planning to be set according to local conditions; second, each city needs to formulate relevant entry thresholds and make good approval for the delivery of shared bicycles by merchants; third, it is necessary to make overall arrangements for the right to roads for electric bicycles. "The current trend is to classify electric bicycles into the concept of non-motor vehicles. This requires lowering the speed. The gap with human bicycles should not be too large. In addition, other auxiliary facilities must be equipped."
Source: Finance Network
