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Home to some of the world’s worst traffic and highest levels of pollution, Bangkok, Thailand, is attempting to start a cycling movement that will help the city battle its smog and congestion. Last year, the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) began the Bangkok Green Bike program, which provided residents and tourists with some 300 bicycles—at no cost—available at eight different pick-up points around the city.

The program also provides maps of the city’s bike paths. While the program isn’t yet terribly popular, its gradual growth has spawned the construction of additional bike paths and gotten attention from tourists looking for cheaper ways to quickly move about the city.

Currently, most people drive motorbikes or hail a tuk tuk (a three-wheeled motorized cart that may be one of the most polluting contraptions in existence) by flagging down one of the drivers found on nearly every street corner shouting, “Hello, hello! Tuk tuk?” to potential fares. Others use taxis, the bus, the Skytrain, the subway or the river taxi.

Yet with all these modes of public transportation, the city remains difficult to navigate. The public transportation routes are short and their hours limited. The confusing streets of Bangkok, some of them running in diagonals, others with changing names, also frustrate drivers and aggravate traffic. According to the Bangkok Post, 217 people are injured daily on Thai roads, 34 of them fatally. The city’s humidity (exacerbated by the smog), the absence of bike paths and sidewalks, the many construction sites, and the overpasses make getting around feel like running an obstacle course.

This may explain why the bike program has been slow to catch on with visitors to the city. Under these conditions, not many tourists are motivated to leave the comfort of a tuk tuk—piloted by someone familiar with the city—in order to try to maneuver the city themselves by bike.

Even in the face of challenges like this, the city continues to encourage the cycling movement.  Last August, it built a 6.8 km bike path beginning at City Hall and passing most of the tourist sites. The bikes will be improved upon, too; as ThaiAsiaToday.com reports, “a BMA official said that eventually all bicycles will be fitted with a Global Positioning System so the city administration will be able to keep track of their whereabouts at any time.” Visitors using the bicycles will also, no doubt, appreciate this feature as they wander the city.

Though Bangkok’s labyrinthine streets sometimes appear to be the last place you’d want to be on a bicycle, it may be only a matter of time before the cry of “Hello, hello! Tuk tuk?” is replaced by the cry of “Hello, hello! Bike, bike?,” a sound sweet to the ears of the Earth.

Updated 3/25/11; originally posted 8/27/09.

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