Swinging between business and public services, sharing bicycles
After finishing the night's ride, at 6 o'clock in the morning, Yang Qing dragged his tired body back to the rental house and charged the new energy truck he had rented. After squinting for less than 3 hours, he went out again to start a new day of work.
This is Yang Qing's fifth year as a shared bicycle dispatch driver, and his daily work is very fixed - transporting the excessive accumulation of shared bicycles near commercial districts and commercial buildings to open streets, ensuring a balance in the number of bicycles on each road in the area. High intensity driving and moving can lead to calluses on the palms. Before going out, he specially cut it.
Su Ming, the deputy captain of the comprehensive administrative law enforcement team in a town in Minhang District, Shanghai, is also busy working on shared bicycles. Every morning from 6:30 to 9:30, he would closely monitor the camera footage on the road, constantly alert to incoming bicycles that would "engulf" the non motorized lane, and promptly dispatch cleaning vehicles.
Yang Qing and Su Ming are both nerve endings of the entire city's shared bicycle scheduling system, striving to maintain the operation of shared bicycles throughout the city.
Recently, a netizen suggested in the leadership mailbox of the Shanghai Municipal People's Government website that "the development of shared bicycles has more drawbacks than benefits and should be completely banned", believing that the development of shared bicycles has caused a huge burden to the city so far.
Behind seemingly extreme proposals lies a pain point in the development of the shared bicycle industry in the past decade: during peak hours, bicycles pile up and occupy the road surface, squeezing the space for pedestrians and vehicles to pass through; Some bicycles at certain locations have low usage frequency and are abandoned due to lack of maintenance or intentional damage; A large number of "bicycle cemeteries" appear in cities
No one can deny the beautiful vision of shared bicycle companies when they were founded. In 2014, a startup team that started on campus told the media, "Whether from the perspective of environmental protection, low-carbon transportation, or convenience for the public and solving short distance transportation problems, shared bicycles are likely to be the optimal solution."
However, why does a solution that creates enormous value lead to another public management challenge?
Shared bicycles at crossroads, swaying between commercial activities and public services, have not yet found a true way out.
A surge of bicycles
A surge of bicycles
I transport bicycles back and forth every day, and those who don't know think it's like playing. At 9 o'clock in the morning, Yang Qing drove around in Hongqiao Town, Minhang District.
In Hongqiao Town, Minhang District, there are three bicycle companies: Meituan Bicycle, Haruo Chuxing, and Qingju Bicycle, with Yang Qing working for one of them. Although not located within the inner ring, there are commercial districts such as Korea Street and Aegean Shopping Park, as well as commercial office buildings and parks such as Caohejing Development Zone in the area, and the workload of scheduling is not inferior to that of the city center.
Yang Qing revealed that the total number of bicycles in Hongqiao Town is over 10000, and his company has about 5000. The enterprise has about 6 dispatch vehicles in Hongqiao Town, Minhang District, ensuring the daily use of shared bicycles for approximately 200000 people in an 11.08 square kilometer area.
The truck is parked near the MixC Mall in Minhang District. Within the limited white line of non motorized lanes, shared bicycles and citizens' private electric bicycles and bicycles are parked in a staggered manner. Some bicycles can only be parked on the sidewalk due to the lack of space within the white line.
The white line parking spaces on non motorized lanes are very limited. Zhu Yawen/Photo
Yang Qing got off the car, opened the back door of the cargo box, took out his phone, scanned the QR code one by one, and put the bicycles on top of each other and stacked them for placement. This 3 meter long and 1.8 meter high truck can hold 35 bicycles in one breath. This is a technical task, once not placed properly, bicycles will fall down in batches.
A bicycle weighs about 15 to 20 kilograms, and Yang Qing has many bruises on his hands and thighs. "At the beginning of doing it, he felt pain all over his body, and even flipping over while sleeping," he said.
Having worked for many years, Yang Qing has a basic judgment. Areas with small and few parking spaces and high pedestrian traffic, such as commercial districts and office buildings, are key areas for cleaning. If you don't pull a car during the day, there will be complaints from citizens. He usually temporarily stores his bike in a remote neighborhood before placing it at the entrance of a community with a high volume of cycling.
From 9am to 2pm, Yang Qing repeatedly collected, pulled, and put into operation for a total of 6 trips, dispatching approximately 350 bicycles.
The terminal station of a subway 10 kilometers away from Hongqiao Town is an important transportation hub from the suburbs to the city center. During the morning rush hour, thousands of shared bicycles and private electric bicycles rush in the same direction simultaneously. After people take the subway, Su Ming needs to dispatch more than a dozen clearance vehicles and transport two to three thousand bicycles.
Approaching noon, a commercial park 3 kilometers away became a key area for Su Ming's headache. This place integrates commerce and office, gathering over 4000 employees; 53 merchants, including 43 restaurants, have a high volume of traffic during lunchtime, with a large portion being shared bicycles. Bicycles cannot enter the park, and parking spaces outside the park are very limited. For a long period of time, extra bicycles were parked directly on non motorized lanes, affecting the passage of citizens.
"I have come up with many solutions. Every time I hold a meeting on the city's appearance, it is mentioned that the governance of shared bicycles has been a long-standing 'stubborn problem'," said Su Ming.
Yang Qing's friend Xu Jun is a grassroots operation and maintenance personnel of a bicycle company, responsible for cleaning and placing bicycles near the subway station. Every time just after cleaning, bicycles come rushing in. A citizen passed by and questioned, "Don't you just need to arrange the car properly? Why is it so messy after arranging it?" Xu Jun couldn't remember how many times he had been "criticized" like this, so he could only answer, "I'm just arranging the car, there's nothing I can do."
The bicycles waiting to be cleared are usually concentrated in one area and usually cleared within half an hour. Respondents provide pictures
Open the work phones of Yang Qing and Xu Jun, both of whom belong to the "smallest unit" in the grid management of the shared bicycle scheduling system. How many cars can a certain area accommodate at most? What are the peak and low peak periods for car use? These answers that are unknown to the outside world are presented in their grids.
The clearance and placement of bicycles are determined based on the user's cycling needs. The more demand there is, the more investment and scheduling volume there will be in the region. After years of operation, the company has accumulated a heat map within the urban area of Shanghai, and dynamically adjusts vehicle deployment and clearance based on comprehensive factors such as heat map, season, weather, and holidays.
But even the most intelligent system cannot accurately predict the situation in reality. "This thing is unstable and cannot accurately determine the real-time dispatch volume within the area, and manpower allocation is also a problem." Xu Jun explained using a street in Jing'an District, where he used to work, as an example. Within an area of over 5 square kilometers, his bicycle company only equipped 2 dispatch vehicles, each of which can load up to 35 bicycles at a time. Compared with tens of thousands of bicycles in the area, the dispatch ability is very limited.
At 23:00 late at night, a bicycle on Line 1 outside the Shanghai Circus City subway station. Zhu Yawen/Photo
Once, he saw a pile of bicycles piled up near a shopping mall in Baoshan District and proactively contacted the cleaning drivers of three companies in the area. He said, "Hello, three bicycles, two Meituan bicycles, and two Qingju bicycles." He cleaned up the piled up bicycles in the designated area all afternoon.
But at night, the cars began to come in piles again.
Behind the chaos
The number of bicycles has reached saturation. Suming said that in his town, one company has 5000 to 8000 vehicles, while the other has 7000 to 10000 vehicles. But in his opinion, ten thousand bicycles are enough to ensure the use of citizens in the area.
The shared bicycles in Shanghai first appeared in April 2016. In February 2017, data from the Shanghai Bicycle Industry Association showed that the number of shared bicycles in the city had exceeded 280000 at that time. In September six months later, this number became 1.78 million. In August of that year, Shanghai launched a "ban on investment". In 2021, Shanghai set a total investment volume of 892000 vehicles for three enterprises.
But Su Ming found that "there is a lot of support for work on the surface, but there will still be overtaking behavior in private."
Car throwing mostly occurs late at night. Yang Qing once had a dispute with the regional manager over the investment of vehicles. The company plans to directly dispatch a fleet of six to seven meter long oversized trucks, which will be forcibly deployed in units of thousands. I threw everything in a mess and didn't place it, so I'll handle it in the end. Some regional managers also negotiated with dispatchers, "If we give you a spot, can we invest an additional 200 vehicles tonight?"
Su Ming often competes with enterprises. In Shanghai, enterprises must put bicycles on record, and vehicle information needs to be synchronized to the Internet bike rental information service platform. The Shanghai Municipal Transportation Commission once developed an online tool for scanning QR codes for supervision. Su Ming took the management personnel to the street and scanned the cars one by one with his phone. "The given number of cars was 6000, and the conservative estimate was over 10000 after scanning.".
The reason given by the person in charge of the area is that "the headquarters pulled cars from other places to invest.". This is a "cross city" advertising method aimed at occupying the market - temporarily storing cars from other provinces at transfer points in the suburbs of Shanghai, and then placing them in the urban area after a period of time.
Some car company employees explain that their bicycle usage rate is higher. At present, the turnover rate of most bicycle companies is generally 2-3, but their companies can reach 5-8, so it is necessary to increase their investment share.
However, the road resources in the core urban area are scarce, and controlling the total number of bicycles is inevitable. Su Ming calls on enterprises to prioritize the public interest and reduce their business thinking. He requested that companies share the real-time scheduling of shared bicycles, and the answer he received was "commercial core, cannot be disclosed". With his efforts, companies will now "talk" at bimonthly meetings, and real-time data still cannot be monitored.
In order to monitor the number of bicycles on the street in real time, the urban management department where Su Ming is located is doing everything possible. After coordination, the relevant public security departments have opened more than 180 road cameras for urban management personnel to see the surveillance footage. "We are still installing road cameras for the urban management department to maintain street order. We plan to build 114 of them and complete them in November."
Unclear parking areas can also cause accumulation.
In Shanghai, shared bicycles, private bicycles, and electric bicycles are mostly parked within the white line of a unified non motorized lane, but the area divided by the white line is very limited. Several times, Xu Jun rode his bike to the subway station, but the staff of a third-party transportation company refused to let him park his car on the white line, saying, "There are too many cars here, look elsewhere.".
According to regulatory requirements, bicycle companies also need to delineate no parking zones. But Xu Jun believes that many delineations of no stop zones have not played a role. In a shopping mall in Baoshan District, a bicycle company has designated a no stop area on the main road in the middle of the road, but a nearby area that was originally intended for pedestrian leisure has not been designated as a no stop area. Nearly a hundred bicycles have piled up on the road, affecting pedestrian traffic. I am very helpless. He said he didn't scratch, and it can be considered as scratch, but even if he did, it was useless.
Near the subway station, the number of parking spaces is limited, and bicycles are piled up in large quantities on the other side. Zhu Yawen/Photo
However, there are also some irregularities that may be caused by information gaps. Xu Jun once handled work orders for 12345, and some citizens claimed that shared bicycles near the subway station were parked randomly, hindering passage. But when he arrived at the scene, he found that there was no bicycle and learned that the bicycle had been pulled away within ten minutes. "Many people sometimes only see a momentary situation, but in fact, staying for an extra ten minutes can make things different," Xu Jun said.
The bicycles at Exit 2 of Loushanguan Road Subway Station on Metro Line 2 were cleared in a timely manner. Zhu Yawen/Photo
In order to effectively and in real-time address the problem of disorderly parking of shared bicycles, various districts and towns in Shanghai have hired third-party service agencies for supervision and established local shared bicycle management working groups.
Third party
In order to effectively and in real-time address the problem of disorderly parking of shared bicycles, various districts and towns in Shanghai have hired third-party service agencies for supervision and established local shared bicycle management working groups.
If a street town or a third party finds that there are too many bicycles in a certain area, they will immediately notify the area manager in the group to arrange for dispatch drivers to go there. If the clearance cannot be carried out within the specified time, a third party will be responsible for the clearance.
"The main purpose of hiring a third party in the past was to ensure urban appearance and sanitation, but now 40% of the workload is on bike sharing management, which puts a lot of pressure," said Su Ming.
Contradictions arise as a result. In the tug of war between the government and enterprises, third parties become beneficiaries. The high cost of picking up cars caused by the crazy collection of cars has forced companies to transport more cars from other provinces to ensure market share, leading to a continuous increase in the total number of bicycles and forming a vicious cycle.
Yang Qing once worked for a third party for a period of time. He recalled the working mode at that time: if someone was watching, he would first load the cars outside the white line, arrange and organize the cars inside the line, and if there was no one around, he would directly load all the cars inside and outside the white line.
That's how this job is done. A third-party earns tens of thousands of bicycles every day, and sometimes the two third-party companies even have a big fight over it.
Enterprises are also helpless about this. "Previously, third-party car collection in Shanghai was rampant, and regardless of whether it was within or outside the parking white line, it would be indiscriminately collected, causing huge asset and economic losses to enterprises and industries. However, after a period of government attention and rectification, this phenomenon has been well curbed in Shanghai," said the relevant person in charge of a certain bicycle company.
Yang Qing pointed to a truck ahead and said it was specifically used by a third-party urban management company to transport bicycles. Zhu Yawen/Photo
"The situation is much better, but it still exists," Yang Qing occasionally encounters situations where the front foot has just set up the car, but the back foot car is taken away. "There is no riding volume at all, who will give me money?" Yang Qing explained that scheduling drivers is based on riding volume rather than advertising volume to receive commissions and performance. If the cycling volume is zero, the unit price is around 2 yuan, and if there is cycling volume, it is even higher.
The relationship between enterprises and third parties has become ambiguous as a result. Yang Qing has received multiple "red envelopes" from companies when working as a third-party. After the relationship is established, the company will propose requirements such as "collect the bicycles of other companies, and if there are no bicycles, I will send them".
"A type of business war, an open secret," said Yang Qing.
"Previously, a third party approached us in the hope of obtaining the right to clear bicycles in our town and settling fees with the company after the clearance. However, we did not agree, as there were too many conflicts of interest that caused chaos." Su Ming said that currently, his town has placed the cleared bicycles at a centralized point, and the company will pick them up without taking any money. "I would rather the company in the urban area work harder and persist for several years.". If there are difficulties in picking up the car, the urban management department will also come forward to coordinate.
The town where Su Ming lives is promoting the Work Plan for Selecting Third Party Recycling and Cleaning Teams for Internet Rental Bicycles, which is expected to be implemented in November this year. "The government takes the lead in matchmaking, and third parties and bicycle companies sign contracts to regulate the behavior of third parties." Su Ming introduced that companies in the urban appearance sector of each street and town will participate in bidding, and the government will put forward certain requirements and restrictions to the third party. Firstly, they need to be familiar with the area, and secondly, they need to have a dedicated parking space for bicycles. Bicycle companies also have the right to vote on this.
At the same time, Su Ming also mentioned that the punishment for disorderly parking of bicycles by enterprises is not strict enough. "When users call customer service or watch teaching videos, the scheduling fee can be refunded." Su Ming understands that companies are user oriented, but "one person can receive education once or twice, but as the number of people increases, the pressure becomes greater.".
"If each party only manages bicycles for their own interests, it will only become increasingly chaotic," said Xu Jun.
Business or public service?
It is undeniable that shared bicycles are still a business dominated by enterprises, rather than government led public services.
At the time of its rise in 2016, more than 20 companies fought fiercely and underwent multiple rounds of industry reshuffle. Now, Meituan Bicycle, Haruo Bicycle, and Didi Qingju stand on three legs, occupying 95% of the domestic market.
Competition always exists. Bicycle companies have avoided questions from reporters about why they need to exceed investment, but in the eyes of Su Ming and Yang Qing, the answer is obvious - "The data for exceeding investment looks better, and shareholders can handle it." This is also what an employee of a certain bicycle company privately told him.
Some companies are still striving for franchise rights in some cities. The auction price for the 5-year franchise rights of shared electric bicycles in the urban area of Zhangjiajie City, Hunan Province exceeded 45 million yuan, while the auction price for the 5-year franchise rights of 2500 shared electric bicycles in the urban areas of Ruili City and Jiegao City in Yunnan Province reached as high as 65 million yuan.
But these practices have been included in the fourth batch of typical cases of violating the negative list of market access by the National Development and Reform Commission last year, involving local governments or relevant departments restricting competition in the shared bicycle and moped market through public auctions, bidding, or signing exclusive agreements.
Associate Professor Yao Huasong of the Department of Sociology at Guangzhou University called in his signed article that relevant departments should not only calculate the financial revenue of the "higher priced one" for the franchise rights of shared bicycles, but also consider the "quasi public nature" of shared bicycles.
Before the emergence of shared bicycles, the government often relied on the establishment of shuttle buses or the construction of urban public bicycles with fixed stakes to meet the "last mile" travel needs of citizens. Afterwards, the service gradually took over from shared bicycles that were borrowed and returned on demand.
"The ultimate goal of the development of shared bicycles is to become a component of urban public transportation. Existing public transportation, such as buses and subways, enjoy corresponding financial subsidies, while shared bicycles are the responsibility of enterprises for their own profits and losses. We are striving to achieve a balance of income and expenditure through refined operations and other means," said the relevant person in charge of a bicycle company.
The person in charge stated that vehicle manufacturing, operation, maintenance and depreciation, and urban management expenses are the three sectors with the highest industry costs.
At present, the shared bicycles on the market mostly use higher configurations such as solid tires and chain transmission devices. After deployment, the storage, maintenance, and scheduling of bicycles, as well as the annual depreciation cost, are all expenses.
Hello CEO Yang Lei once stated that the daily operation and maintenance cost of a single vehicle is 0.3 yuan, and the depreciation cost of each vehicle is 0.6 yuan per day. On an annual basis, the maintenance and depreciation cost of a shared bicycle is approximately 365 yuan.
Yang Qing's truck was already rusty, with too many bicycles stuck in it, and the bolts couldn't be fastened. Zhu Yawen/Photo
The current shared bicycle industry has left the era of burning money subsidies. The most direct way for bicycle companies to continuously reduce costs is to control the workload of grassroots scheduling and operation, which is reflected in Yang Qing and Xu Jun, becoming the most realistic survival pressure.
After five years in the industry, Yang Qing has worked as a dispatch driver in three bicycle companies in Shanghai. The first company had a low basic salary, and the company deducted nearly half of the salary under various pretexts, which was equivalent to two or three days of work in vain per week. The second company developed shared bicycles in Shanghai the latest, and at first the salary was decent. As the business model gradually improved, Yang Qing clearly felt that the effort and income were not proportional, so he had no choice but to jump to the third company. At present, Yang Qing's monthly salary can only sustain expenses. He calculated that the monthly rent for the truck is 4500 yuan, the charging cost is 1000 yuan, and with the rent added, "if you don't eat or drink, it will cost nearly 9000 yuan per month.".
Yang Qing and Xu Jun have both encountered situations of restricting work orders and scheduling vehicles. In a certain bicycle company, there is a work order type of "low battery", which means finding a bicycle that is about to run out of electricity in advance to prevent asset loss caused by later disconnection.
In Shanghai, the amount of cycling in winter is not high. In order to control costs, companies will limit the number of such work orders and release them when the cycling volume is high in summer.
The continuous cost compression has led to grassroots operation and maintenance personnel competing for orders, causing internal friction in the enterprise. For a period of time, Xu Jun was responsible for collecting faulty bicycle labels in Yangpu District. During the peak hours, there were over 100 faulty bicycles per day, and Xu Jun only produced less than 50 orders, with a price range of 3 to 4 yuan per order. When he finishes work every day, there are still many faulty cars on the road that have not been cleaned up.
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