- THE EARLY DAYS OFCHINESE ROAD TRANSPORT

With 5.1m cars sold in China in 2004 and the excitement that greeted last year's Formula 1 in Shanghai, you might be forgiven for thinking the Chinese have been car enthusiasts for years. Not so - the country came relatively late to the popularisation of four wheel private transport. The bicycle, too, so long the symbol of the Chinese proletariat, was largely a foreign oddity until after WW2. Our China Briefing colleague Graham Thompson delves in the archives to tell the story of the country's road transportation, two wheeled and four wheeled.

Early years

In 1866, a selected Chinese readership learned of a new "cycling device" from the travel notes of an Chinese official very shortly after Michaux's construction of the pedal-driven prototype of a bicycle, and even some months before the invention became known to the European public (this historical background on bicycles is drawn largely from a web article by Amir Moghaddass Esfehani, published in Proceedings of the 13th International Cycling History Conference). The official, Binchun, had just returned from his journey to Western Europe, and reported

"On the avenues people ride on a vehicle with only two wheels, which is held together by a pipe. They sit above this pipe and push forward with movements of their feet, thus keeping the vehicle moving....they dash along like galloping horses"

Initially, it seems Chinese officials only became aware of the bicycle as a practical means of transportation, but in the late 1890s saw its potential value for military operations. With keen interest, Chinese newspapers reported on competitions between horse and bicycle in foreign armies.

But between the 1870s and the early 1890s, European and American expatriates, living in Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin were practically the only cyclists in China. The bicycle came in the trunks of missionaries, businessmen or colonial officers, and spread rather slowly to the hinterland. As early as November 1868, Shanghai newspapers briefly reported on these cyclists.

A more detailed account is given in Hu you zaji, a forerunner of modern guidebooks to Shanghai, in 1876. The author twice mentions foreigners cycling through the streets, as a spectacular sight for the Chinese visitor to the foreign settlement. The athletic capabilities and stamina of the Westerners on their bicycles were portrayed with admiration. On the other hand, with ironic distance, the authors expressed their amusement over the fallen cyclist.

Strikingly, Chinese were absent from the scenes depicted. A rare exception is a cartoon from 1880 (maybe the first illustration of a bicycle ever published in a local journal), showing a Chinese cyclist unsuccessfully trying to ride an ordinary. It was printed in the journal Huatu Xinbao, a missionary periodical which circulated mainly in the small Chinese Christian communities. Readers learn that "Westerners ride a small vehicle with great enthusiasm...it is not pushed or pulled forward, but managed by foot-pedalling and is called bicycle, it can buzz along like the wind, faster than a horse-drawn cart . but only when you have enough practice in using it". The young Chinese cyclist, though trying to partake of the Westerners' passion, not only runs his machine into a pond, worse than that, he is losing face in front of two Chinese onlookers.

By hinting at the disgrace of the unfortunate cyclist, the text is pointing to the biggest cultural obstacle to the spread of the bicycle in 19th century China. Compared to Europe in the 19th century, for the tiny segment of Chinese society that could afford to purchase a bicycle, it was considered absolutely disgraceful to be seen pedalling through the streets, mounted on a machine, always in a delicate situation leading to a state of exhaustion. The wealthier Chinese was hardly ever seen walking in public. He was carried in a sedan chair or was pulled in a rickshaw.

Individual mobility was defined according to social lines, somewhat comparable to early 19th century Europe. The bourgeois or petty bourgeois of the cities went by rickshaw, due to cheap labour commonly available for low fees. Those who could not afford to rent or even own a rickshaw would mostly sit in specially constructed wheelbarrows with seven other passengers, quite common throughout the 19th century, and in use as late as the 1950s.

The first Chinese cyclists appeared on the scene in the early 1890s, students, journalists or businessmen who had returned from abroad and brought their bicycles back with them. Another group were the sons of wealthy families with ties to the US and Europe. They caused a qualitative turn in Chinese cycle history - in contrast to the old elites, more and more western-educated Chinese were not reluctant to display their progressive cultural orientation in public.

Beginnings of popularisation

Perhaps the first car in China the Benz vintage car belonging to Empress Dowager Cixi, c 1900

The first commercial bicycle ads published in 1897/98, in the newspapers of Shanghai and Tianjin, addressed this thin layer of Chinese consumers. The bicycles offered are imported high quality bicycles, often racing bikes. Also in 1897, the Imperial Maritime Customs listed "bicycles and bicycle parts" for the first time. The value recorded, about £10,000, would be the equivalent of 500- 800 bicycles.

The first step in commercialisation of the bicycle trade coincides with the wide newspaper coverage given to the arrival in China of the British cyclists, Lunn, Lowe and Fraser. The Chinese readership of various newspapers followed their journey from its start, in summer 1896, and when they arrived in Shanghai, several hundred local cyclists accompanied them on their tour through the city. During another expedition by two Americans who pedaled from Constantinople to Peking, crowds greeted them in village after village, describing the strange vehicle as a "foreign horse" and "a little mule that you drive by the ears and kick in the sides to make him go."

After the turn of the century, newspaper ads appeared more regularly, and the products offered are more diverse. British, American and German racers, standard bikes for men, women, and children, and transport bicycles, were now obtainable at lower price. In May 1902, an exhibition of British bicycle producers was held in Shanghai. But the market for bikes, which were about 40% more expensive in China than in their country of origin, was limited to the nouveau riche of major cities. Another group of potential buyers was, apparently, the numerous prostitutes in the treaty ports - these "sing-song girls" not only had a relatively high income at their disposal, but also enjoyed a life free from most social constraints.

The bike only slowly reached the hinterland. Chengdu counted exactly seven bikes in 1904, three of which were owned by foreigners, three by different governmental institutions, and only one privately owned by a Chinese. Many other Chinese cities first saw bicycles only in the 1930s and 1940s.

The first cars in China

One of the first cars in China - if not the first - can still be seen in the Summer Palace in Beijing. Yuan Shikai, a wily warlord, who knew that Empress Dowager Cixi liked nothing better than gifts, presented this Benz car in order to curry favour with the powerful woman. Escaping from Beijing in 1900 during the Boxer Rebellion, Cixi rode in a sedan chair, but after she returned, she preferred her German automobile, saying it was more comfortable than a mule carriage. It is reported that three German engineers, visiting the Summer Palace in 1976, claimed that it was a second-generation Benz made in 1898. They would trade ten brand-new Mercedes-Benz cars for this antique. However, the offer was declined.

The first cars in Shanghai were two Oldsmobiles that arrived in 1902. A later history of the city noted, "the Licensing Department of the Municipal Revenue Office was puzzled in regard to the question of registration and at first regarded the automobile as a form of carriage". The vehicles caused "much consternation and numerous runaways". By, 1928 there were 7,000 cars in the city, by 1934, 16,300.

The rickshaw - a passenger carriage pulled by a man - came to Shanghai from Japan around 1873 or 1874. These could travel at around 8km/h (one contemporary writer noted that foreigners "require the coolie to travel faster than the Chinese do:"), and the average daily distance traveled was around 30-40km. By 1896, some 210,000 rickshaws were being used in the city - this had fallen to around 70,000 by the mid 1930s. A few remain today, mostly used by elderly Chinese or tourists.

A 1934 guidebook to the city explained, "the newcomer, especially if he has never been to the Orient before, probably will chose the omnipresent rickshaw for short trips about town....the novelty of the man-drawn vehicle is an attraction....for a ride of a few blocks pay ten cents....forty to sixty cents for an hour, according to distance traveled...don't go into strange territory in a rickshaw after dark, or make careful note of the license number...many rickshaw pullers solicit brazenly for places of bad repute at late hours".

A 1908 Studebaker, draped with American flags, was used to transport the young Chinese Emperor from his palace to the Japanese Legation in Beijing at the height of the 1911 revolution, which resulted in the emperor's overthrow and the formation of the Republic of China.

General Motors - still a major investor in Shanghai - opened an office in the city in 1922, and sold a Buick four-door sedan and a four-door limousine to Emperor Pu Yi, the first (and last) to own such vehicles. By 1930, one in six cars in China were Buicks - cars bearing the name still produced in Shanghai.

Bicycle production

Democratisation of cycling thus did not set in until the 1920s. Cultural and social changes in the preceding decade, after the overthrow of the dynastic government in 1911, had markedly altered the urban setting and produced new public spheres. At first, the growing urban middle class discovered the bicycle as a toy for their leisure time activities. In Shanghai, with 2m inhabitants, there were over 20,000 bikes in 1930.

The bicycle entered into many aspects of life, not only privately but also due to its use by public institutions. Many Chinese may first have been equipped with bicycles as postmen, soldiers, or as members of mobile police squadrons. Emperor boy Pu Yi ordered gaps cut into the high thresholds of the Forbidden City so he could ride his bicycle unimpeded through the palace grounds.

In the 1930s, the Chinese cycle industry emerged, as the three largest importers - Tongchang Chehang (Shanghai), Changcheng (Tianjin), and Daxing (Shenyang) - established production lines. The combined output of the Chinese bicycle industry reached 10,000 units annually between 1937 and 1945. By the mid-1930s, Chinese cycle history reached a stage comparable to that of Western Europe around the turn of the last century.

Socialist transport

The number of bikes in Shanghai increased to 230,000 in the late 1940s, and China-wide, there may have been half a million bicycles in 1949. The year 1949 marks a pivotal year, not only for Chinese national history, but also for cycle history. After 1949, when the People's Republic of China was founded, the bicycle soon found a strong advocate in the communist government.

Maybe it was because of problems building a public transport system, or maybe there were ideological reasons. But the bike certainly the bicycle received strong support from the Chinese government in different ways. The cycle industry was given preferential allowances of rationed materials, and achieved growth rates of 58.7% annually. The level of one million bicycles was reached in 1958. Bicycle lanes became part of urban street planning and commuting workers received financial subsidies when purchasing a bicycle. Families considered the bicycle a prized possession ; women sometimes refused to marry men who did not own one.

The Chang Jiang - really rather refined

One of the distinctive sights on the streets of Shanghai and Beijing are beautifully crafted motorcycle sidecar combinations - the Chang Jiang 750. These bikes are hugely popular with expats. Readers who watched the war films of the 1970s may find these bikes vaguely familiar - this is not surprising, as the Chang Jiang 750 is basically a copy of the BMW R71 model used widely by the German Army during WW2. But the bikes you see here now are not the rugged dusty machines that followed Hitler's panzers.

The Chang Jiang reached China by a slightly roundabout route. Some accounts say the Soviet Union acquired the design before the German invasion in 1941 and began manufacture of their version, called the M72, during the war. Others say they took the BMW factory back to Russia after conquering Germany in 1945. Either way, the bikes ended up in production in the Ural mountains.

The next step came in the early 1950s, when with technical support from Russia, China also manufactured a version of the R71 - it was traded for textiles, apparently. On 30 November 1957, the first Chang Jiang 750 rolled off the production line and the bike became the standard motorcycle of the PLA and law enforcement agencies throughout China (the 750 in the name refers to its 750cc engine). It is believed they are still made, albeit in fairly small numbers, maybe a few hundred a year. Large numbers lie unused in Chinese military warehouses, and there are various companies around the country who do renovations.

But for the crème de la crème of Chang Jiang restorations, you must come to Shanghai, and meet Danny Woody of V Sidecars (www.vsidecars.com). He and his talented local crew have over 20 years collective experience and can customize each bike to suit your individual taste and lifestyle. From various design options to a choice of colours using BASF premium paint, trim or engines, each motorcycle is a coveted piece of machinery. Indeed, they are works of motorbike art.

Danny's shop is the only one that takes the bikes apart and completely rebuilds them. For example, the frames are grinded smooth, undercoated, sanded until smooth for days, undercoated again....and this process is repeated until a perfect finish is produced. Only then is the top coat of paint applied. All aluminum is polished to a brilliant finish, including the engine. Nobody does this in China, so Danny created it himself.

All engines, transmissions, and rear ends are reworked to V-Sidecar specifications - the bikes get all new gaskets and sealers, port and polished heads, bigger geared rear ends, custom pipes for better exhaust and a true motorcycle sound, a completely rebuilt reverse transmission and higher geared transmissions. The wiring is completely new, too. Small wonder that customers need to wait several months for their bike - this is not something you buy off the shelf.

Customisation options include handle bars, exhaust pipes, a larger oil sump, a stronger oil pump, an extra gear with non-reverse transmissions, polished aluminum racing rims or anodised black, stronger stainless-steel spokes, chromed brake hubs, full leather seats, full leather with rebuilt sidecar seats, canvass sidecar covers, vintage accessories, halogen headlamps and fog lamps, custom carpets, radial tires and fold-down sidecar windscreen. About the only thing not on offer is the machine gun mounted on the sidecar, although that might deter some of Shanghai's more manic drivers...however, Danny did find some hooded headlights of the kind used by the German Army to prevent the bikes' lights been seen by enemy aircraft !

He explains that most parts can be sourced in China, albeit sometimes with considerable difficulty. A few parts do have to come from overseas, such as engine bearings. But his story parallels that of many larger foreign-invested engineering businesses - his greatest challenge has been educating his team on the importance of quality, attention to detail, consistency, and the long-term maintainability of the bikes. "Other shops cut corners to save a few RMB", he says, "we do not".

Danny operates his business in association with The Portman Ritz-Carlton (www.ritzcarlton.com.cn), a well-known landmark on Shanghai's Nanjing Xi Lu, not least because the GM and Regional Vice President, Asia Pacific Mark De Cocinis is another motorbike enthusiast, owning two Chang Jiangs. Another Chang Jiang has pride of place in the hotel's gift shop. It has attracted attention from many guests over the years, including VIPs like Russian President Vladimir Putin, who recognised its distinctive lines when he was in Shanghai for the 2001 APEC Conference.

There are several reasons for the popularity of the Chang Jiang, Mark believes. "It is a simple design, easy to understand, and easy to maintain", he explains. And - unlike solo motorcycles - a motorcycle sidecar combination is a safe form of transport for children and partners. He regularly takes his family shopping on his bike, much to the amusement of the locals - "it's quite a production when we stop at a supermarket", he laughs. And the Chang Jiang is also a good way to tour the city and countryside around.

Domestic car production begins

China's oldest car maker is Nanjing Auto, founded in 1947. But the industry did not really get going until the mid 1950s, in contrast to Russia and most of the old Communist Bloc countries, where the motor industry was well established before the Second World War. The years between 1956 and 1965 were the real founding period of the industry in China, and by the end of this era the sector had a capacity to produce 60,000 vehicles a year, ranged across ten basic models.

First Auto Works (FAW) was founded at Changchun in Jilin province on 15 July 1953 with plans to produce cars and trucks for domestic use. Production was not started until the completion of construction some three years later. During construction of the new truck plant in Changchun, the Soviet government provided technical support, tooling, and more than 80% of the production machinery. A large number of Soviet advisors were stationed in Changchun during the ramp-up period to help orchestrate factory construction, production preparation, and train FAW employees. On 13 July 1956 the first middle-weight truck the CA1-, also called the "Jiefang", or Liberation, truck (based on a USSR ZIL vehicle and indeed on the US International Harvestor K series), rolled off the production lines and into the history of Chinese manufactured motor vehicles.

But up until the late 1980s, production was exclusively limited to very large cars for government officials. By contrast, even in the USSR, there has always been production of a range of cars from the enormous limousines (the ZIL, ZIM & ZIS), to smaller, cheaper (and much nastier) offerings which ordinary people could in theory buy, like the Pobeda and Moskvich. In East Germany there was the ghastly Trabant. But in China this segment of the market did not exist.

In terms of cars, initially production was organised politically - senior cadres got the "Hong Qi" manufactured in Changchun, middle ranking cadres the "Fengchuang" SH760 made in Shanghai, and low rank cadres and the army got the "Beijing Jeep", the BJ211/212. There very few models available for private use.

Officially, the first Chinese car, which appeared on 12 May 1958, was the "Dong Feng" (East Wind) manufactured at FAW. It was often known as the Golden Dragon because of its large bonnet mascot. Very few were produced.

The "Red Flag"

Perhaps the most famous early Chinese car was the "Hong Qi", or "Red Flag", used by Mao, Deng Xiao Ping and other senior leaders and seen on many a newsreel of parades and other major events. The first Hong Qi, model CA72, was produced in 1958 by FAW in Changchun in Northeast China for late Chairman Mao Zedong.

 The second car manufactured in China was the Shanghai SH 760. The flagship model, called Fenghuang (a mythological bird similar to the Phoenix), was produced in Shanghai on 28 September 1958. The inspiration is believed to have been a mixture of the Mercedes Benz 220 S of 1957 and Soviet models of the same era, but with an American flavour, looking a little like the Plymouth.

According to a Western report on the factory in the 1970s :

"the Shanghai factory had only a very few mechanical processes and an elementary set of machine tools which on the whole were devoid of any safety features. These machine tools, among which there were piles of materials of all types in complete disorder, were operated by workers who were extremely skilled, conscientious and patient. ...naturally the small number of automobiles and trucks that were turned out by the factory each day were antiquated and haphazard as regards design...much of the factory's production could be described as craftsmen working in a factory setting...."

In 1964 the model was renamed SH760, and with various cosmetic coachwork changes, survived right up until 1991. With a 2.2 litre straight six engine, a copy of a Russian model, developing 90bhp, and a manual four-speed gearbox, the SH760 was good for 130km/h. A British journalist reported in 1973, "it performed ruggedly enough...[but] it felt like a very unsophisticated kind of motor car". They were turned out from the Shanghai works at the rate of up to 6,000 in the peak year of production, 1984, with 78.547 cars being made in all up to November 1991.

Another significant vehicle from the Soviet inspired days is the Beijing BJ212, a direct copy initially of the Russian UAZ 469 jeep, for the military and low level cadres. The first jeeps made in China were the classic US military version, made in Tianjin in 1951 from vehicles left by the Americans for the Nationalist Chinese. But it was not until 1961 that China made its first vehicle of this kind, the BJ210, very similar in appearance to the US jeeps. The BJ212 appeared five years later, produced in Tianjin. Together with the Jiefang and Dongfeng trucks, these dominated the street scene in China during the 1970s and 1980s. The earliest known photos of the BJ212 shows Mao inspecting Red Guards in Tiananmen Square in November 1966. With a 2.5litre 4-cylinder engine delivering 71 bhp, this rugged vehicle has evolved over nearly 40 years and is still produced as the BJ2020.

The CA72 sported a red pennant-shaped hood ornament and -- on the front bumper -- a sign with the Chinese characters hong qi, apparently handwritten by Mao himself. The car was driven in the parade that marked China's 10th anniversary in 1959, and it became a national star.

Beginning in the 1960s, the car was designated for the use of Chinese officials with ranks higher than vice-minister and visiting foreign heads of state. A total of 1,540 were manufactured over 20 years. Special versions included a special sunroof version for Deng Xiaoping and an armoured version originally built for Mao Zedong but also used by other leaders since. Production of the Chinese limos stopped in the 1980s, but you can still ride in one - the Red Flag Club in Beijing offers city tours !

But now, of course, after two decades of very significant foreign investment in the Chinese car industry, its companies and products are reaching standards that can be exported. Nanjing Auto's purchase of the ailing MG Rover is a sign of the times - the Chinese have confirmed they will retain some production at the British company's Longbridge plant. And Geely, a major domestic manufacturer, expects to make 2m cars by 2015, 1.4m for export. It is early days yet, but the Geelys, Brillances and Jianglings at this summer's Frankfurt Motor Show did cause established Western carmakers to begin looking anxiously in their rear view mirrors.