Monday News Roundup: Free Bike Rental, Turning on the Heat and Man who Stabbed Two Foriegners in Beijing Arrested

Man who Stabbed Two Foreigners in Beijing arrested in Shenzhen
A man suspected of being involved in two knife attacks on foreigners in Beijing was arrested in Shenzhen. The 34-year-old man from Heilongjiang has since admitted to the stabbings and was brought back to Beijing under police escort.

Free Bike Rental in Beijing
96156 - Beijing's Community Help Line and Service Center announced on Friday an ambitious plan to make 40,000-50,000 bikes available for free to Beijing residents by the end of 2009. The bikes will be rented out but at no cost and a GPS tracking device will be installed in the bike to make sure it's not lost or stolen. The system will no doubt rely on the already existing "Beijing Bicycle Rental" stations that exist across the city and that currently rent bikes out for about RMB 20/day. Despite high hopes for the scheme, Beijingers do not seem to have taken to the service.

New Car Regulations Switch - 5 and 0 off the road on Mondays
Today is the first "switch" of the new 5-day week traffic restrictions. The Beijing Traffic Administration Bureau announced the new rules last week and cars with plates ending in the number 5 or 0 will now not be allowed to take to the streets on Mondays, those with 1 and 6 on Tuesdays and so on. This monthly switch has added an extra layer of complexity to the new restrictions. The current rules will apply until December 7. Anyone found breaking the rule will be fined RMB 100 and, unlike last month, there will be no warnings in the first week. Last month, in Chaoyang district alone, 605 drivers were fined for disobeying the new rules. 


Restrictions on Car Registration
In other car-related news, it seems the rumors of a cap on car registrations in the capital that we mentioned last month are closer to becoming a reality. At the Fourth China High Level Transport Conference on the weekend, the director of Beijing's Transport Department, Liu Xiaoming, revealed that the government was seriously considering putting a limit on the number of vehicle registrations in the capital. The proposal is still being researched and decision has been made. in the mean time, reports of the rumored limit have led to a spike in car sales as Beijingers considering buying a car attempt to beat the introduction of the new regulations. So while the industry might be witnessing a drop in sales across the country, the Beijing market remains strong with China Daily reporting a 30% increase in sales at one of Beijing's biggest dealerships.

Turning on the Heat
Starting from last Friday the hot water began to flow through the massive central heating system that keeps millions of the capital's residents warm throughout the winter. The Beijing Heat Power Group has announced that testing and preparation began on Friday but that the room temperatures of those with central heating should be higher than 16 degrees by Nov 15. The power group will continue to supply heat to those households that still owe them money but at the same time they've taken legal action against 110 households from 3 districts for overdue heating bills that total RMB 1 million. If the temperature in your place falls below 16 degrees after Nov 15, you can call the service hotline on 6235 7575, 6236 7788, 6533 9933.

High-Level Meetings
In the wake of the Olympics every other meeting the capital hosts seems like pretty small potatoes, take for instance last month's ASEM 7 meeting - which involved leaders from over 40 countries come to town, and despite complaints about the bad traffic, no-one blinked an eye. This past weekend has also seen a couple of big meetings. A U.N.-sponsored climate change conference in which Wen Jiabao called on developed countries to take the lead and also urged them to spend more on transferring technology to help developing nations battle climate change. The meeting resulted in what Xinhua referred to as the Beijing Declaration. Academics and policy makers from around the world also convened at Beijing University over the weekend for the annual Beijing Forum.

The Pirate DVD meets its Match?
WSJ and Variety report on a new Video on Demand service that Warner Bros plan to unveil in attempt to defeat the prevalence of pirate DVDs and illegal downloads in the China market. In theory the VOD plan sounds like it could be a winner - paying RMB 4-7 for a film of guaranteed high quality and with subtitles that don't come from an automated translation program seem sure to be a better choice than paying 8 kuai for a poor quality disc that gives out half way through the film or with meaningless subtitles. Unfortunately, the choice of the first films for release in the new system display the weakness of the plan: I am Legend, www.thebeijinger.com/blog/2008/08/12/Tuesdays-Film-Roundup and Speed RacerFool's Gold all showed at the Chinese cinema earlier this year and are already gathering dust on the DVD shelves. On a related note, The Beijing Times reports that Very CD, a Chinese website allowing users to download movies, was unable to be accessed over the weekend. We're not saying the two are related, but it reminds us of the time we reported that KFC would begin selling youtiao and then days later a crackdown on street stalls was announced.

Railway Ticket Selling System Down
I went to try and buy a train ticket on Saturday only to be told that the system was down and that no tickets from Beijing could be sold. Despite China Daily reporting that the system was only down for three hours from 8am, i know that when i tried to buy a ticket at 4pm, the system was still unavailable. Large crowds accumulated at both Beijing Railway Station and Beijing West Station. The railway authority said they were investigating the cause of the system failure.

What financial Crisis?
Economic growth in Beijing remains stable. The city's GDP has witnessed a 9.1% increase over the first three quarters of this year and for the first time the annual GDP per capita is expected to pass the USD 8,000 in 2008.

Hu and Obama
Chinese President Hu Jintao and President-elect Obama had their first phone conversation on Saturday. The Chinese president will also travel to the US later this month and it's possible that the pair might meet.

First Christmas Tree of the Season Spotted
Finally, we spotted our first Christmas Tree this year out the front of Sci Tech Plaza. We'd seen that IKEA already have decorations on sale, but this is our first sighting of a tree out "in the wild." Those who like to plan ahead can take at this post from last year about where to start looking for your own Christmas decorations.

Links and Sources
The Beijinger: Beijing in Pictures: Knife Attacks, DUI and Naked Sculptures Urbane: November Feature - Car Crunch (image)
The Beijinger: Where to buy Christmas trees
The Beijnger: Beyond Odds and Evens
CNXN: Image of Beijing's former vice-mayor looking to see if dark clouds of pollution have come with the turning on of the heat in 2006