LIFE CYCLE IMPORTED FRAMES
The Asian manufacturing colossus Taiwan’s recent cycling initiatives can inspire us, reckons Rob Ainsley
Taiwan’s towns are nothing to write home about. No wonder I couldn’t find many postcards as I cycled there last month. The west coast – where all those bike factories and frame producers are – is one long dreary concrete sprawl. My mountain bike’s older than most of its buildings. Less corroded, too.
But the country proved to be a great place to tour. We were doing its End to End. (I’m collecting them: Britain, Ireland, Sri Lanka, Cuba in four memorable weeks, Isle of Man in one forgettable day…) Its east coast was fabulous: lush dramatic cliff scenery, dramatic winding roads.
The Suhua Highway was tricky though. Not because of the sheer drop to the ocean – it was fenced – but the one down the deep drainage channel inches from my wheels. One moment of inattention as a lorry passed and my journey would be over. The one that began in Woodgates Maternity Home, that is.
We hired carbon road bikes from Giant: two weeks for a hundred quid, which would just buy a round of real ale in a hip Taipei bar. Super bikes, but the tiny panniers’ clips were as robust as a potato crisp. I didn’t fall off, but the panniers did. Often.
Mostly, though, it was a delight. Like fast continental-style road cycling? You’ll like Taiwan. Main roads usually include wide bike lanes, surfaces are smooth, mountain climbs and descents are evenly graded, and there are plenty of roadside shops. Locals are friendly, polite and happy to help with menus or directions. There are even regular ‘Cycling Rest Stops’, typically at police stations. Some countries’ coppers you fear, here they give you water, pump your tyres and lend you lube, and in return only want a selfie.
Taiwan may make the world’s bike frames, but cycling levels are low. Its 23 million people own six million cars, 14 million motorbikes, and it seems two billion smartphones and tablets – but only one million bicycles. The roads are jammed and pollution is awful.
The west coast is one long dreary concrete sprawl. But Taiwan proved to be a great place to tour
So, Taiwan’s trying hard to encourage bikes – in Taipei, legalised pavement cycling has recently been introduced, along with lots of painted-on-road bike lanes. It’s makeshift, but it makes breezing round the city easy, and results in no apparent conflict. Taipei’s network of riverside cycle paths, often wide as a road but always carfree, stretches for dozens of kilometres. And if your path crosses a motorway or railway, there’ll be a big, smoothly graded and rideable new ped-bike bridge.
It’s working. Modal share in Taipei is up from negligible to five per cent. The political will is there, and it isn’t afraid to spend money on infrastructure. That should inspire us as we lobby councils and MPs. Taiwan is making great strides (most of them sideways on footpaths to let scooters past).
The big boost to leisure cycling though came from a 2007 film, Island Etude, in which a student spends a couple of weeks riding round the island toting a rucksack and guitar. He encountered Taiwan’s many aboriginal groups, whose languages, clothes and customs are Austronesian, not Chinese. The movie inspired young Taiwanese who saw their country more inclusively than older generations. The huándao (‘island ring’), as they call it, is their way of embracing it all, their nation, its landscapes and people.
We saw hundreds of huándao- ers, all on good road bikes, wearing sunglasses, faces scarfed up against the sun like the Invisible Man, sporting rucksacks like the film guy, or maybe they don’t trust rental panniers.
In Britain, circular routes are usually day rides back to the car. Multi-day journeys are point-to-points, End-to-Ends, coastto-coasts. Maybe that’s western linearity and logic versus eastern spiritual ebb and flow. Or maybe our island’s simply best suited to cross-sectional touring. Now Sustrans has issued its own End-to-End route, it might be time to create a big roundBritain huándao of our own. A frame imported from Taiwan, as it were; a ride to embrace not just the picture-postcard stuff, but our multicultural heritage, from Lakes sheep farmers to Southall’s sari shops. It’s food for thought. Which reminds me: Taiwan’s Night Markets, with their cheap tasty dinners, would be welcome here too. That would be worth writing home about.