Tens of thousands of night-time cyclists annoy authorities

Tens of thousands of night-time cyclists annoy authorities Article by RP ONLINE • 7 hours • 2 minutes reading time Kaifeng/Beijing. China's students always manage to peacefully make the authorities blush with anger in a subversive way. The latest trend is night-time bike tours. What's behind it? People with face masks on rental bikes in Beijing It started as a small excursion, now China's authorities are alarmed: In the central Chinese province of Henan, tens of thousands of students have forced the police to take unusual measures with night-time bike tours. For some time now, according to state media reports, young people from the city of Zhenzhou have been regularly cycling about 50 kilometers to neighboring Kaifeng, mostly on rental bikes. But because more and more people are joining the trend, the police said they temporarily set up checks and closed the bike paths on the route last weekend. It all started in mid-June this year, when, according to state media reports, four female students rode their rental bikes from Zhengzhou, the provincial capital with 13 million inhabitants, to Kaifeng in the evening to try a culinary specialty. The city on the Yellow River, which was the capital for a time centuries ago, is a popular place for tourists and is also known for a dumpling dish. The women documented their trip to the city with around 4.7 million inhabitants on social media. No way through on the streets This is how the trend started, which more and more people have since joined in. Videos are circulating online of six-lane roads on which cars could no longer get through because of the masses of cyclists. Other photos show streets and sidewalks that were lined with parked rental bikes and thus completely blocked. In Kaifeng in particular, some residents are now less than enthusiastic about the trend, after an estimated tens of thousands of people have already cycled into the city. On Weibo, China's own state-censored version of the online platform X, complaints about noise and traffic jams increased. The young people should collect garbage and clean rivers, wrote one user. They should do something good for everyone instead of rebelling. Authorities warn students Restaurants and authorities were also increasingly overwhelmed by the masses of hungry students and bicycles. Kaifeng's police warned of safety risks. The city government appealed to the young people to act responsibly. Because of the masses of bicycles, which often had to be transported back to Zhengzhou, the bicycle rental companies threatened to block the bicycles if they crossed the city zone of Zhengzhou. They also pointed to the high level of wear and tear and the negative physical effects when people travel too long distances on the rental bikes.