Are you aware
A<> how many scooters Taiwan has?
B how bad those things are for air quality?
Kymco alone sells something like 1 billion USD worth of scooters a year in Taiwan!
Going on about geography seems stupid, you have to reduce the source of pollution first.
For anybody interested these are some stats for scooter sales, a VERY BIG BUSINESS in Taiwan.
Yes see all those crappy Kymco scooters parked about.
1 BILLION USD A YEAR business just in Taiwan. One company. 300,000 crappy scooter engines every year sold with no catalytic converters spewing our noxious oxides and particles.
Just on this tiny island Taiwan . Crazy.
I work for a leading high tech scientific US corporation . This number equates to half of our annual sales derived from 140 countries. It is double our annual sales in China across all of our products and services!
China is 267 times bigger than Taiwan with 50 times the population.
This is just to show you how these local companies depends on the Taiwan market.
I never said scooters were not a problem. I am arguing that 1, they are not the only problem, and 2, there are other factors at play.
Let me go further into it…
The Taipei/Xinbei metroplex has about…5 million? Denver metro has about 3. Take a look at this…
Remember, I said scooters are not a factor there.
The same monster is at play here, among other things. Factories, older cars, buses, scooters, etc all contribute. Take away the scooters, or limiting them, will do little to combat the over all situation.
Also, getting it from Chinese Beijing as well. Check this out (pause or turn adblocker off)
http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/local-news/mountains-get-denvers-air-pollution
Same demons.
I am not saying, nor have ever said that something shouldn’t be done. but, going entirely after one demographic is a little nuts.
Why not implement better traffic flow by timing the traffic lights? Implement driving restrictions based on plate numbers and days of the week? How about limiting times to put fuel in cars? Congestion charges are fine, but who will they be aimed at? You know delivery businesses and cabs will fight it. So will Uber, I am sure. Will they be exempt? What about the elderly and the lower incomes within Taipei? Are you going to gentrify the whole area? How about shutting down all the gas and coal power plants? I would say go nuclear, but that will just start another row.
How about place heavy handed environmental rules on new and existing factories? But, isn’t that what made Morris Chang scrap plans to open a factory in Taichung, and take it to Chinese Beijing where their are no such regulations? I heard it put to me this way “You can have clean air and water, or you can have jobs.” That sucks.
what is there to argue? they are hell on wheels.
Not that I’m pro scooter. But it’s easy for me to say take public transport in the middle of taipei city with ubikes, mrt and buses right on renai rd. But people who live in places like 三重 shanchong, Jonghe, or basically more industrial areas outside of Taipei city would be the ones suffering if we make scootering more expensive. They don’t have nice bike paths and Ubikes like taipei city where the more wealthy live. Less MRT stops around them where they probably couldn’t walk to them easily. And they probably don’t have a bus stop next to me that have a bus come that I need in like every 5 min.
I am interested to see the responses to this.
Adding new lines is a years long process. Keep in mind that 101 opened in 2004 and the Xinyi line did not run for another decade. The Taoyuan airport extension was hit by delay after delay after delay.
I mean is New Taipei City willing to invest in places like Shanchong where there not much out there and build more buse stops, Ubikes, bike paths MRT lines. It’s the main way of transportation for people there as most of them can’t afford cars and they’re also farther from things. I would love a solution that would not hurt these people just so I can sit on my high horse and said I ubiked today when I’m next to a UBike, mrt and bus stop.
Thats more of a product of the ridiculous situation Taiwan has got in by heavily subsidizing petroleum than anything else. This is only done to help manufacturing as they are heavily reliant on natural sources. Although Taiwanese think gas is cheap through the artificially low price at the pump, this price point is in fact subsidized by the tax payer. With gas so low, there is no real incentive to take or build public transport options.
None of this is new though, loads of cities have weened themselves off of the mistake of being built around motor vehicles. Its not a matter of banning scooters, but slowly making scooters and cars a less convenient way to get into the city. Money raised from congestion charges can go into more public transport and infrastructure, parking fees likewise. A lot of people are also making trips that could be made with public transport, but are just addicted to convenience. A taxi driver in Banqiao was boasting to me about how he and his family never take MRT to the city(despite living by a station) because scooter is cheaper and faster.
None of this stuff is easy, there is always resistance. But the government and Mayor Ko seem at least superficially committed. I believe in Taiwan, an Island with so many engineers, the biggest cycling industry in the world, huge LED and solar industries etc can do better than being on par with a third world country.
Take a look at Amsterdam as a case study, what was once a car city in the 60’s fought for the necessary changes and the become a true clean, modern 21st century city. http://gizmodo.com/look-how-much-better-a-city-can-be-when-it-designs-for-1760859711
There are Ubikes in New Taipei City as well.
Some of these ideas are actually really cool. I do hope there’s some willingness to do stuff like that. But like you said, scootering is so cheap and convenient. Unless that stops, it would be hard. Although it seems the government is trying on a small scale like building new bike paths, ubike stations, mrt to the airport.
There is no way to convince people to use private vehicles less. You just have to slowly make them more expensive, while giving more space to bicycles and public transport and getting rid of free parking. At the same time increase public transport such as buses.
These arent ideas, moreseo what is happening all across the world and also in Taiwan. Fuel tax reform has been discussed for ages and will probably happen next year . Bike lanes are already being built. Charging for parking is already in place and planned to implemented more. Academics and think-tanks have been deliberating congestion charges for an age as well..
Also, a lot of people in the greater Taipei area could commute by public transport, they are just choosing not to as private motor vehicles are so cheap. Utilization of the public transport system is minimal (only 40%) and only 14% of commuters regularly commute by subway (compared to 40% in New York). Although you are right that for many people that it is difficult to travel by public transport, there are plenty who could but are just not choosing not to, I know many anyway.
It is about convenience. Whether it is more expensive or not, people choose their own transportation if the option is available. We can take a shuttle bus, for free, to the HSR. Yet, myself, and many of my fellow citizens opt to take our own ride and pay for parking, to boot. That is about as illogical as you can get. Its about convenience and independence. As I mentioned above, it will take a societal shift for that to happen.
I am all for putting solar panels and little wind turbines on every building here. I am all for, what someone mentioned above about heat exchangers. I am especially all for raising the price of water 1000 fold. I am all about more parks and green.
And all this talk of a peloton paradise is fine. But, bicyclists should face stiffer fines for hitting pedestrians and keep them off the MRT, or -since you mentioned Amsterdam- make them pay a higher fare.
@OrangeOrganics, I’m afraid that what you are doing here is not totally right. May be you are not like this, but in this topic you’re being a bit too arrogant.
You are calling @JB_IN_TW troll basically because what he says is different from what you would like to hear. I don’t think he’s trolling at all. the same that you see objections in other people’s ideas, yours aren’t necessarily perfect. I asked you before what else, in addition to the gym thing, was in your opinion just silly things to make me feel better. You just repeated that the one about the gym was stupid. Good.
You emphazise how important is to raise taxes so that people stop using scooters, but this is 1) not the biggest problem, probably, 2) very unlikely to achieve, or not by that means only and 3) very unfair for people who can’t afford something bigger; rich people will do the same and own’t give a shit, and scooter riders will probably keep riding, but poorer.
But the most annoying thing is that you seem to despise other people’s opinion like if they were so off… while the title of this thread is “what can I do…”.
I don’t think we can change the scooter and oil regulations. Probably we can change our attitude and spread a different mentality, which will work well with different taxes structures too.
Don’t accuse people of trolling please. Flag the post or move on.
When I worked in government, I absolutely detested Climate Action initiatives. Tried to ensure that anything that was launched would be deemed trade inconsistent and would able to be brought up in a dispute.
Me and a like-minded colleague created a team that would purposely ruin recycling bins. We called ourselves the Brown Team (as a play on PC Green Team language)
In response to your points. Nobody said to raise taxes, said to stop the subsidies. These are two different things. The subsidies are going to be stopped, the government talking about all the time. To say that it is unrealistic is silly as I already posted links showing that it will happen.
I dont despise others opinions, but you cant just say things like ‘yeah but its convenient’. Nobody is arguing that scooters are not convenient.
Why do you think this way? I gave a pile of links to show that it does work and that the Taipei government is planning to change. Fact is that people dont do stuff of their own accord, you need to hit their pockets. Look at using plastic bags, as soon as you started charging, people immediately started taking their own bags.
Im sorry if that upsets you. If you dont think that scooters are one of the major contributors to the pollution in Taiwan, come with evidence.
I am confused. Why do you have to defend scooter riding? I am a beer drinker but still can accept that its bad for you.
Making things inconvenient is the most effective way. Thats what happened in Amsterdam and Copenhagen. They made cycling the most convenient way to get around a city and motor vehicles the least effective. This is far less controversial that banning private motor vehicles. The reason New Yorkers dont own cars is that its expensive and inconvenient to own them. Thats why its the greenest city in the US.
Im sorry if you dont think this is what works, but come with some facts or studies.
taking a dump out of my window is also convenient.
You have either misread me, or overlooked it. I never said scooters were good. My argument for scooters rested only on that it is convenient and easy way to get around in places that do not have viable public transportations networks. Unless you want drench in sweat while riding to 7-11 for some water. If you also read you will see where I was, in fact, in favor of higher taxes on gas burning motors.
I remember when the yellow trams were used in Amsterdam. Hell, I remember them red.
Amsterdam has had a cycling culture for over 100 years. Amsterdam is flat and cool. Taipei is flat, but hot. Cycling in the wintertime is fine. Summer, not so much. Is the boss going to allow showers in the businesses now? And the scooter menace is taking hold in Amsterdam as well. But…Amsterdam has a rather thorough public transportation scheme. Buses, trams, subways. All over the country is rather convenient to get by damn near any transportation. Unless you go into the hinterlands like De Rijp or Zaan Schaans. Also, Amsterdam has an Albert Heijn on nearly every corner. So the Netherlands has a convenience overload. I have, for the longest time, argued that Zhubei and Hsinchu city should adopt a tram like system to cover main veins in the two cities.
I also said that Taipei, suffers from a location problem. Getting rid or, or limiting scooters would be like using a bandaid to cover a 10" gash. The thought is in the right place, but much more will need to be done.
Bedankt voor nij tijd.