This Day, That Year

Item from Jan 8, 1989, in China Daily: A few of China's 300 million cyclists defy the winter cold in Beijing ...

The bicycle population is booming in China, the "kingdom of bikes", and the government is now looking to impose "birth control" on the vehicles. More than 40 million bicycles were made here last year but with about 300 million of them in the country, or one for every three people, the industry has been asked to reduce bicycle output by 10 million.

Just a few decades ago, the streets in many Chinese cities flowed with massive numbers of cyclists.