Shanghai's roads are notoriously dangerous. Local drivers are infamous for not paying attention to other cars, seeing pedestrians as targets instead of as people and blatantly disregarding traffic laws. Here, the rule of the road is basically "every man for himself."
No matter if you are driving a car, riding a scooter or just going for a stroll on a sidewalk, one must be on guard in Shanghai every single moment.
Buses and taxis try to one-up each other to the next red light, rich people in expensive sedans want to show off by driving as fast as possible, and delivery boys on e-bikes have taken over the sidewalks.
This has created high levels of tension and mistrust between drivers and pedestrians that often result in even more anarchy.
I used to only walk or take public transportation, but recently I bought a scooter, which in the past few years have become massively popular in Shanghai.
I must admit that, in spite of the constant chaos in car lanes, lanes dedicated for two-wheel vehicles like scooters are comparatively convenient, orderly and safe.
But even in scooter-only lanes there is still one particular type of vehicle here that I fear more than any other: taxis.
It seems there is not a single traffic law in this city that applies to Shanghai's taxis.
These guys are either the most arrogant bunch of drivers or the most maniacal. They never slow down before making right- or left-hand turns at intersections, they switch lanes without signaling and red lights just don't matter to them.
After several near-death collisions with taxis whilst riding my new scooter, I have come to believe that they not only do not care about hitting other cars or pedestrians - they are actively seeking it out.
Maybe sitting inside a car for 12+ hours per day has made them crazy, or maybe having to deal with other local drivers has put murderous visions into their heads.
As such, my new personal driving rule is that any time I see a taxi in front or behind me, I will slow down and wait for it to leave my vicinity.
Better to let some other unfortunate fool be Shanghai's latest statistic (619 deaths and 809 road accidents in the first 10 months of last year). I'm not ready to die yet, and I certainly don't ever want to die by being squashed into asphalt.
Unfortunately for me and other scooter enthusiasts, many Chinese taxi drivers are now switching from their low-paid, miserable careers with taxi companies to profitable private car services like Uber and Didi, which makes them nearly impossible for me to identify.
Nobody can deny the fact that on-demand mobility (ODM) services have revolutionized the global transportation industry by offering a competitive alternative to traditional taxis, which for the past decade in China have been on a long, steady decline of poor quality and outrageous fares.
But China's burgeoning ODM industry, which the central government granted full legal status to just last week in its first nationwide ODM policy, has also made its roads far more dangerous than they already were.
The primary problem is that ODM drivers are not professional in any sense of the definition. Traditional taxi companies were ruthless and exorbitant, but at least they provided training and experience.
The average Uber/Didi driver, however, is just some ordinary schmuck with a car looking to make some extra income. Because many are non-locals, they don't usually have much familiarity with the city's geographical layout.
The other issue is that the very nature of Uber and Didi being mobile apps requires their drivers to constantly look at their phones for new passengers instead of paying attention to their surroundings, which is a recipe for disaster in congested cities like Shanghai.
In my short time as a scooter rider I have already spotted dozens of ODM drivers nearly crushing other scooter drivers or pedestrians as they swerve from lane to lane or suddenly stop without warning.
Last week, foreign-owned Uber announced that instead of trying to compete with Didi, a Chinese firm, they would relinquish their Chinese mainland operations to Didi in exchange for a stake in their rival's profits.
Stock market investors are applauding the deal, but for pedestrians and scooter riders like myself, this monopoly means even more insanity in the streets due to a complete lack of competition. Maybe I'll switch back to walking.
