On the afternoon of May 5, 2023, the Consulate General of Denmark in Guangzhou and Guangdong People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries jointly launched a riding activity in Guangzhou.
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In this Riding for a Green Guangzhou event, people from different countries enjoyed a 5-kilometer ride by shared bikes on the greenway of Ersha Island.
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Søren Bindesbøll, the Consul General of Denmark in Guangzhou, is a bike user not only for leisure but for daily commute.
“Every day I take my kids to school by bike. My younger daughter would sit on the backseat and my elder daughter would bike by herself. We feel safer biking here. I hope today's event will enhance more awareness about biking in Guangzhou and more Cantonese people will join me and my colleagues on the bike tracks in Guangzhou,” said Søren Bindesbøll.
He also noted that Guangzhou is in a positive track in improving riding environment. There are more and more bike lanes that are marked clearly and it's becoming much safer to across the traffic lights with these changes happening in the city.
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According to Liu Chenzi, President of Guangdong People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, bicycles have been more frequently used as one of the main forms of transportation as citizens in Guangzhou are embracing the idea of low-carbon emission.
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“Major cities in China, including Guangzhou, have opened up more bicycle lanes to provide better infrastructure for green travel and low carbon life. We sincerely hope to call on everyone to be part of low-carbon lifestyle and to make our due contributions to the achievement of the UN 2030 Sustainable Development Goals,” she appealed.
Li Wei, Cycling Program Director at Institute for Transportation & Development Policy, introduced that Guangzhou is attaching increasing importance to riding and has been working on building more riding-friendly roads.
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“Guangzhou has improved 118 kilometers of lanes for bicycles in 2021, 350 kilometers in 2022, and plans to improve 500 kilometers of that in 2023. According to the statistics, as of the end of 2022, 212 crossing roads have been upgraded for riding. Guangzhou has been a pioneer among all Chinese cities in building greenways since 2010. As to now, Guangzhou has built a greenway network covering 4500 kilometers. And it plans to expand the network to 6000 kilometers by 2025,” she added.
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According to Jerry Grey, a U.K.-born Australian who has lived in China for almost 20 years, he and his wife met a long greenway extending over 100 kilometers starting from Huadu of Guangzhou in their bike trip from Urumchi of Xinjiang Province to Zhongshan of Guangdong Province in 2014.
“Guangzhou has incredible greenways. And we can even see the high rise buildings of downtown Guangzhou when we were in the greenway in Huadu,” said Jerry.
(Photo Provided to GDToday)
(Photo Provided to GDToday)
Reporter: Rofel
Editor: Wing, Nan, Steven, Jerry
