This all came to a head in 2022 when CNN published this article calling Taiwan a living hell because of its abysmal road safety record. At the time, road deaths in

2022 年，美國有線電視新聞網（CNN）發表了一篇文章，稱臺灣因其糟糕的道路安全記錄而成為人間地獄。當時，臺灣道路死亡人數

Taiwan were the highest they had been since 2013. Every single day five pedestrians were injured or killed in Taipei City alone and about half of those deaths were of people over the age of 65. The CNN article became headline news for weeks as Taiwanese people and foreigners alike would share their stories about the dangerous streets.

臺灣是自 2013 年以來的最高值。僅在臺北市，每天就有五名行人受傷或死亡，其中約一半是 65 歲以上的老人。美國有線電視新聞網（CNN）的這篇文章連續幾周成為頭條新聞，因為臺灣人和外國人都在分享他們關於危險街道的故事。

Or like when they're turning. Like that. Like that. Just like that. Exactly. Like that's so reckless.

或者像他們轉身的時候。就像那樣就像那樣就像那樣沒錯像這樣太魯莽了

And I was told by my friends in Taiwan that this resulted in the acceleration of many safe streets initiatives especially in Taipei. So while I was in Asia recently I decided to go to Taiwan for a few days to see some old friends to eat some great food and to see if the streets of Taipei were still a living hell. And I'm happy to say that some things have gotten a lot better. But it's not there yet.

我在臺灣的朋友告訴我，這導致了許多安全街道倡議的加速，尤其是在臺北。是以，當我最近在亞洲的時候，我決定去臺灣玩幾天，看看老朋友，吃點美食，順便看看臺北的街道是否仍然是人間地獄。我很高興地說，有些事情已經好多了。但還沒到那一步。

The last time I was in Taiwan was in 2012 for Computex of course. So it's been a while but the one thing I noticed immediately the first time I stepped outside was that cars would actually stop when I was crossing the street. Even moped riders and taxi drivers were waiting for people to cross. This would never ever happen in the past. Not even close. Drivers used to aggressively push through the intersection while people were trying to cross. I was told that this was due to a new law that was introduced recently where all motor vehicles have to stay at least three meters away from anybody in a pedestrian crossing. Steep fines were introduced for any drivers failing to yield and most importantly those laws were actually being enforced. Oh and I also noticed that the garbage trucks play different music than they did before. One of the other things that Taipei has been trying to fix is a lack of sidewalks. Many sidewalks in Taipei were either too narrow or there was no sidewalk at all. I saw a few roads like this one where the sidewalk had been widened and even bike lanes installed which was nice to see. I also never once saw a moped driver driving down the sidewalk, never mind a taxi, which used to be a common occurrence. I went to this street near our old apartment that I specifically remember having terrible sidewalks but unfortunately it was still the same and the sidewalks were still too narrow. But just like in Japan the nicest places to walk in Taipei are often on the really narrow streets which are usually referred to as lanes here. Each lane is labeled with the closest street number and the name of the road it connects to. In Taipei the lanes and narrow streets are where some of the best stuff can be found too. You will find lots of small businesses, food stalls, convenience stores and other interesting urban amenities like this local park and playground. But sadly the dumpling place that I used to go to on my way home from work was closed when I walked by. I noticed that many of the streets were now painted with a green stripe and labeled as a sidewalk in an attempt to make them safer. These predated the CNN article but they weren't here when I lived in Taipei and I'm not totally convinced that these are an improvement. On wider streets it makes sense to designate some of the space as a sidewalk but these painted areas were supposed to be only temporary until they were replaced with physical sidewalks but as they say there's nothing more permanent than a temporary solution.

我上一次來臺灣當然是在 2012 年的電腦展上。雖然時隔已久，但我第一次走出家門就立即注意到了一件事，那就是過馬路時車輛真的會停下來。就連騎輕便摩托車的人和計程車司機也在等人過馬路。這在過去是絕對不會發生的。根本不可能。以前，當人們正試圖過馬路時，司機們會咄咄逼人地穿過十字路口。有人告訴我，這是因為最近出臺了一項新法律，規定所有機動車輛都必須與行人過馬路的人保持至少三米的距離。對不禮讓行人的司機處以高額罰款，最重要的是，這些法律確實得到了執行。哦，我還注意到垃圾車播放的音樂與以前不同了。臺北一直在努力解決

A street this wide should definitely have a real sidewalk and those sidewalks should be a lot bigger than this little green stripe. But on narrower streets I don't think these painted areas are that helpful. I recently made a video about why the narrow streets in Japan are so great and one of the things I mentioned is that because there's so little car traffic people can just walk down the middle of the street. Japan does sometimes have white lines like these to indicate where cars should drive but people are still encouraged to walk wherever they want. But if you paint a very clear area and label it as sidewalk as is done here then it implies that drivers get the rest of the space and will get upset with you if you are walking in their space. I think on narrow streets the real solution for road safety isn't painted sidewalks but rather to do what Japan has done which is to significantly reduce car volumes.

這麼寬的街道肯定應該有真正的人行道，而且這些人行道應該比這條小綠條大得多。但在較窄的街道上，我不認為這些畫出來的區域有什麼用。我最近製作了一個視頻，介紹了為什麼日本的狹窄街道如此之好，我提到的其中一點是，因為汽車很少，人們可以直接走在街道中間。日本有時確實會有這樣的白線來訓示汽車應該在哪裡行駛，但我們仍然鼓勵人們想走到哪裡就走到哪裡。但如果像這裡一樣，畫出一個非常清晰的區域並標註為人行道，那就意味著司機可以使用其餘的空間，如果你在他們的空間裡行走，他們會對你感到不滿。我認為，在狹窄的街道上，道路安全的真正

These streets should never be used by through traffic. The only cars that should ever be here are those of the people coming from or going to a destination in this neighborhood. This can be done by making these areas a maze of one-way streets or they can install modal filters that prevent cars from passing but allow people walking and cycling to go through like is common in the Netherlands. This is complicated in Taipei because there are so many people driving mopeds who would probably just go through the modal filters anyway but as long as they're driving slowly this may not be a problem. The other major difference between Taiwanese and Japanese streets is parking. Japan has strict laws against street parking so their streets are almost completely free of parked cars. But these small streets in Taiwan are often full of parked cars and mopeds which makes the street much less inviting to people walking. A lot of these cars should be moved to off-street parking and to allow more space on these narrow lanes and thankfully some of that is happening already. I took this video of my typical walk home from our local metro station in 2011. Notice how much car parking there was on this street. Now it looks like this which is a huge improvement. And one thing that's much better about the streets in Taipei versus Tokyo is the trees. The streets of Taipei have trees everywhere which makes them look so much nicer. They also provide shade and the temperature is noticeably cooler on a street like this with good tree coverage. The main roads have far fewer trees unfortunately but one thing I really like about Taipei is how the shops are set back from the road and covered by the buildings above. This provides excellent protection from the sun and the rain, two things that are very common in Taiwan. I think that a lot of other hot countries could learn something from the design of the streets and roads in Taipei. I did not visit in the hottest time of the year but it was still around 30 degrees every day that I was visiting. Yet I almost never felt too hot because the sidewalks were covered on the main roads, the trees provided shade in the lanes and the metro was air-conditioned. So I like the way these areas are covered from the elements but one of my major complaints when we lived here was that the sidewalks were often really uneven. It was common to see huge jumps in the level of the sidewalk like this which were not just annoying, they were a tripping hazard. So I was really happy to see that a lot of these had been smoothed out with ramps like this. It was still not perfect but it's so much better than how it was. For this visit I decided to stay in the Xinyi district of Taipei. I know, I know, Xinyi is nothing like the rest of Taipei, never mind the rest of Taiwan, but it's always been the district with the best urban design and it's a really easy place to stay as a tourist. Xinyi is the financial district of Taipei. It's where you'll find the offices of major international and Taiwanese financial and tech companies, high-end shopping and the iconic skyscraper Taipei 101. And I booked a hotel that was directly across the street. As soon as I exited the metro station it was clear that this place had definitely changed since I was last here. First of all there was a new bike lane and people were actually using it, something that was almost unheard of when we lived in the city. And next to the metro station exit was this u-bike station with lots of bikes. U-bike is a typical docked bike share system like you'll find in many other cities but I was genuinely impressed by how many docks there were. Apparently there are already over 1,300 docks and there are plans to expand that to over 2,000 in the next few years. What's nice is that bikes can be unlocked with the same card that is used for public transit. But I didn't ride a bike while I was visiting Taipei for reasons that will become obvious later. But regardless I prefer taking the metro anyway. That's part of the reason why this channel is called Not Just Bikes. The other parts of Xinyi were more or less the same. This district has always had the best urbanism to begin with and it has always had the most financial investment as well. Still it was nice to walk through the pedestrianized areas and they were even better at night with lights and decorations everywhere. Areas like these are the best parts of Xinyi. Though this giant car ad is maybe not the best use of space in a pedestrian area. The inside of Taipei 101 was just as I remembered it. Basically a glitzy shopping mall with high-end brands where international electronics companies sell overpriced products back to the Taiwanese people who designed them. For a short time my company's offices were in Taipei 101 and apparently it was super fun during earthquakes. But it's kept safe thanks to a huge mass damper system that keeps the building from swaying too much during earthquakes and typhoons. And you can even go see it as a tourist and have the damper babies teach you about skyscraper engineering.

這些街道不應該被穿行的車輛使用。唯一應該在這裡通行的車輛，是來往於這一街區的人們的車輛。要做到這一點，可以將這些區域打造成迷宮般的單行道，也可以像荷蘭一樣安裝模式過濾器，阻止汽車通過，但允許步行和騎自行車的人通過。這在臺北很複雜，因為有很多人駕駛輕便摩托車，他們可能會直接通過模式過濾器，但只要他們開得慢，這可能就不是問題。臺灣和日本街道的另一個主要區別是停車。日本有嚴格的法律禁止路邊停車，所以他們的街道上幾乎沒有停放的車輛。但臺灣的這些小街道上經常停滿了汽車和輕便摩托車，這使得街道對步行者的吸引力大打折扣

Taiwan is like the only country that would anthropomorphize a tuned mass damper and I love it. Xinyi has some places that are really nice but other than taller trees this is the same as it was 15 years ago. I was really hoping that some of these roads would have been narrowed to make more room for bigger sidewalks, parquets, or bike lanes but no they're just as wide as ever. There are some pedestrian bridges through this area but a few of them were closed for repair when I was there so it meant waiting a long time at stoplights in order to cross. But to be honest I didn't spend too much time in Xinyi when we lived here because it sometimes just feels like you're walking through an upscale shopping mall. The biggest thing I noticed is that there were a lot more people cycling. When we lived here it was too dangerous to walk never mind ride a bicycle. But this time I saw lots of people riding bicycles around the city.

臺灣就像是唯一一個會把調諧品質減震器擬人化的國家，我喜歡它。信義有些地方確實不錯，但除了樹長高了，這裡和 15 年前沒什麼兩樣。我真希望有些路能變窄，騰出更多空間來修建更大的人行道、廣場或自行車道，但它們還是一如既往地寬敞。這個地區有一些人行天橋，但我去的時候有幾座天橋正在維修，所以過橋需要在紅綠燈前等很長時間。但老實說，我們住在信義的時候，我並沒有在這裡花太多時間，因為有時感覺就像在逛高級，上等購物中心。我注意到的最大問題是，騎自行車的人多了。我們住在這裡的時候，走路都很危險，更別提騎自行車了。但這次我

This bicycle path was installed decades ago but it was actually in use and the

這條自行車道是幾十年前安裝的，但實際上一直在使用，而且

U-bike station was a welcome addition. Some of the new bike lanes were pretty good like this one. Here the road was narrowed slightly to make room for a wider sidewalk and a bicycle lane which is great. There were unfortunately no protected intersections but that's not really surprising because they're still pretty rare outside of the Netherlands. Though even at driveways the sidewalk and bike lane would drop down rather than staying at sidewalk level which is a bit disappointing on newly designed infrastructure. Other bike lanes were not so well designed and would suddenly end for no apparent reason. The worst example was this one which runs right into the stairs of a metro station which is really frustrating to see because there's plenty of room to build something better if they had taken away even just one of the eight lanes for motor vehicles. In general the roads are extremely wide in Taipei not just in terms of the number of lanes but also the width of those lanes so there should be lots of space to build proper bicycle lanes. But instead most new bike lanes take space away from the already narrow sidewalks rather than taking any space away from cars. The most objectionable bike path I saw was on Ren'ai Road. We used to live here and I still remember the Chinese for the address Taipei

U 型自行車站是一個受歡迎的補充。一些新的自行車道很不錯，比如這條。這裡的道路略微變窄，為更寬的人行道和自行車道騰出了空間，這非常好。遺憾的是，這裡沒有受保護的交叉路口，但這並不奇怪，因為在荷蘭以外的地方，這種交叉路口還很少見。不過，即使是在車道上，人行道和自行車道也會向下傾斜，而不是保持在人行道的水準，這對於新設計的基礎設施來說有點令人失望。其他自行車道的設計也不盡人意，會莫名其妙地突然終止。最糟糕的例子就是這條自行車道，它直接撞上了地鐵站的樓梯，這讓人非常沮喪，因為如果他們能取消八條機動車道中的哪怕一

Ren'ai Road 3.41. Apologies for my terrible accent I promise it used to be better. It's almost impossible to capture just how large this road is on camera because there are so many trees that obscure the view. But you can see here that there are two lanes one way and then a median with trees then another two lanes one of which is a bus lane then another median then another bus lane in a traffic lane then another median and then another two lanes. If you look really far in the distance you can see just how far away the other side of the road is on this pedestrian crossing. So there is no shortage of space on Ren'ai

仁愛路 3.41 號抱歉，我的口音很糟糕，我保證以前會好一些。這條路有多大，幾乎無法用相機拍下來，因為有太多樹木遮擋了視線。但你可以看到，這裡有兩條單向車道，然後是一條有樹的中間隔離帶，然後是另外兩條車道，其中一條是公車道，然後是另一條中間隔離帶，然後是另一條公車道和一條車行道，然後是另一條中間隔離帶，然後是另外兩條車道。如果你把視線放得很遠，就能看到人行橫道的另一側有多遠。是以，仁愛路上並不缺少空間。

Road and yet when a bike path was put right in front of our old apartment it was put here on the sidewalk so that people cycling and people walking are in conflict with one another. It's so frustrating that they couldn't even take just one of the many car lanes to build a proper bicycle path. This is a common theme across Taipei. There are some small moves to make the city more bicycle friendly but they're only doing it where it doesn't inconvenience drivers. One of the challenges of building cycling infrastructure though is that Taipei is a city of mopeds. They are absolutely everywhere. Around every corner you will find lines of parked mopeds and at every stoplight you will see a large group of moped riders. Taipei is what Amsterdam would look like if all of the bicycles were replaced with mopeds. It's interesting that mopeds in Taipei are treated very similarly to the way bicycles are in many North American cities. Where you might find a bike box at a stoplight in North America you'll find a moped box in Taipei for the same reasons. This makes mopeds more visible at stoplights and it allows moped riders to do two-phase hook turns for safer left turns at large intersections. There are even moped only lanes along some major roads the same way you might find bike lanes in other cities. These lanes also allow people cycling to use them but most people choose to ride on the sidewalk instead because mopeds and bicycles do not always mix well. The

然而，當自行車道就建在我們以前的公寓前時，卻建在了人行道上，這樣騎自行車的人和步行的人就會相互衝突。令人沮喪的是，他們甚至不能從眾多汽車道中抽出一條來修建一條合適的自行車道。這是整個臺北市的共同問題。有一些小動作讓這座城市對自行車更加友好，但他們只是在不會給司機帶來不便的地方才這樣做。建設自行車基礎設施的挑戰之一在於臺北是一座輕便摩托車之城。輕便摩托車隨處可見。在每個街角，你都能看到成排停放的輕便摩托車，在每個紅綠燈前，你都能看到一大群輕便摩托車騎手。如果阿姆斯特丹的自行車都換成輕便摩托車，那麼臺北就是阿

Netherlands sometimes has problems with moped riders driving too quickly in the bike lanes. In most of the country the blue plate Snorfietsen are allowed to ride in bike lanes but these are supposed to be capped at a maximum speed of 25 kilometers per hour. However approximately 100% of all Snorfiets riders have illegally removed those speed limiters which is why a few years ago Amsterdam banned all types of mopeds from the majority of bike lanes in the city. Moped riders now use the roadway with all other motor vehicles and the speed limit on most streets in Amsterdam was recently lowered to 30 kilometers per hour. So I'm used to seeing mopeds quite often but in Taipei they drive a lot faster. I would guess somewhere between 50 to 80 kilometers per hour.

荷蘭有時會遇到輕便摩托車手在自行車道上超速行駛的問題。荷蘭大部分地區允許藍牌輕便摩托車在自行車道上行駛，但最高時速不得超過 25 公里。然而，大約 100%的斯諾菲特車手都非法拆除了限速裝置，這就是為什麼幾年前阿姆斯特丹禁止所有類型的輕便摩托車駛入該市大部分自行車道的原因。現在，輕便摩托車騎手與所有其他機動車一起使用道路，阿姆斯特丹大多數街道的限速最近也降低到了每小時 30 公里。是以，我習慣於經常看到輕便摩托車，但在臺北，他們的車速要快得多。我估計時速在 50 到 80 公里之間。

Moped riders definitely present challenges for road safety because they drive very fast, their movements are hard to predict and they sometimes also ride on sidewalks and in pedestrian areas.

騎輕便摩托車的人無疑給道路安全帶來了挑戰，因為他們的車速非常快，他們的行動很難預測，而且他們有時還會在人行道和行人區騎車。

Also almost all of these mopeds are gasoline powered so they are very loud and there is a constant hum of moped noise on the streets of Taipei. Coming directly from Japan it was really jarring just how much traffic there was in Taipei. Tokyo has many very wide roads like this one but there isn't a lot of car traffic whereas in Taipei the roads are busy most of the time and widening the roads hasn't made the traffic any better. Which is expected of course because decades of research has proven that there's no solution to car traffic except viable alternatives to driving. So one of the worst things you can do as a city is to let your buses get stuck in traffic and scenes like this are way too common in Taipei. There's no excuse for this bus sitting in traffic when there is more than enough room for a bus lane. Taipei has some dedicated bus lanes like this one which are great but if they're going to reduce traffic congestion then they need to build a lot more of them so that it can be faster to take the bus than to sit in traffic. But while Taipei may not be building enough dedicated bus lanes they are investing heavily in their metro system. I was absolutely blown away by how many new metro stations there were since we left in 2011. Like the metro station in front of my hotel wasn't there when we lived in

此外，幾乎所有的輕便摩托車都是以汽油為動力的，是以它們的聲音非常大，臺北街頭不斷傳來輕便摩托車的嗡嗡聲。從日本直接來到臺北，交通流量之大著實令人震驚。東京有很多像這樣寬闊的道路，但汽車流量並不大，而在臺北，大部分時間道路都很繁忙，而且道路的拓寬並沒有改善交通狀況。這當然是意料之中的事，因為幾十年的研究已經證明，除了可行的駕駛替代方案，沒有任何辦法可以解決汽車交通問題。是以，作為一個城市，最糟糕的事情之一就是讓公車堵在路上，而這樣的場景在臺北太常見了。在有足夠空間開闢公交專用道的情況下，這輛公車堵在路上是沒

Taipei. For reference this is what the metro map looked like in 2011 and this is what it looks like today. I always used to have to take a taxi out to the airport when we lived here so the new Airport Express line opened in 2017 was very welcome. And I've seen USB chargers on transit but never Qi wireless charging pads. You can even check in your bags for your flight in the city before boarding the MTR. This should really be the norm in cities everywhere.

臺北。作為參考，這是 2011 年的地鐵地圖，而這是今天的地圖。我以前住在這裡的時候，去機場總是要打車，所以 2017 年新開通的機場快線非常受歡迎。我在公車上見過 USB 充電器，但從未見過 Qi 無線充電板。在乘坐地鐵之前，你甚至可以在市區辦理行李託運。這確實應該成為各地城市的常態。

I visited my old metro station. It was great to see the new connection to the expanded Zhonghe Xinlu line. This would have saved me so much time getting to work if it existed in 2010. And Taipei hasn't stopped building either. There are an additional three new metro projects that are currently under construction. It's pretty rare to see a city that is constantly building new metro lines the way Taipei is. It means that the metro system is consistently getting better every year but it's also one of the best ways to keep construction costs down. With constant construction a city can build local expertise in building transit and when one project is done those experienced people can immediately move on to the next project. But when your city only builds new rapid transit once every decade or two every project is like baby's first transit project which requires lots of expensive international contractors and results in lots of costly amateur mistakes that make it impossible to deliver on schedule. Eglinton LRT in Toronto. The MRT also connects in several places to

我參觀了以前的地鐵站。很高興看到新的中河新路線連接擴建後的地鐵站。如果在 2010 年就有的話，我就可以節省很多時間去上班了。臺北也沒有停止建設。目前還有三個新的地鐵項目正在建設中。像臺北這樣不斷建設新地鐵線的城市非常罕見。這意味著地鐵系統每年都在不斷完善，同時也是降低建設成本的最佳方式之一。通過不斷的建設，一個城市可以積累當地的交通建設經驗，當一個項目完成後，這些經驗豐富的人可以立即投入到下一個項目中。但是，如果你所在的城市每十年或二十年才建造一次新的快速軌道交通，那麼每個項目都像是嬰兒的第一個軌道交通

Taiwan high-speed rail which can take you to other cities on the island at up to 300 kilometers per hour. The trains are reminiscent of the Japanese

臺灣高鐵可以每小時 300 公里的速度將您送往島內其他城市。這些列車讓人想起日本的

Shinkansen both on the outside and on the inside. There are trains departing frequently with about 160 trains traveling in both directions each day and with an on-time performance of over 99%. I wasn't in town for very long though so

新幹線的外側和內側。新幹線的發車頻率很高，每天雙向約有 160 班列車，準點率超過 99%。我在城裡逗留的時間不長，所以

I only had time to go one stop on the high-speed train. Most of my travel was on the MRT and I was able to get everywhere I wanted to go by metro while

我只來得及坐一站高速列車。我的大部分行程都是乘坐地鐵，我想去哪兒都能坐地鐵到達。

I was visiting. Well except my old office but I'll get to that later. The system is made up of a mix of underground and above-ground lines as well as a few gondolas thrown in for good measure. I know some people don't like elevated rail but I think it's nice to be able to see the city and not be stuck underground. Plus it's often cheaper to build than underground metro lines which means more transit is built which is a good thing right? Like most metro systems you can pay for your trip by tapping a reloadable smart card but I opted for a 72 hour travel pass which comes as this funny circular plastic thing but it opens the fare gates the same way. The MRT trains are spacious clean and frequent. Most stations have platform screen doors which are safer but can also prevent delays caused by garbage falling on the tracks. The position of doors and where to wait is clearly marked and all trains have level boarding which makes getting on and off very easy. The signage is really good in the stations and on the trains too and at interchange stations it is very common to have a cross-platform transfer. I love it when transit is designed well. All transit should be as good as it is in Taipei. One thing I don't like so much about the MRT though is that a lot of the metro station exits bring you right out to very wide busy roads. This is something that also bothered me about Montreal where metro riders get out along some of the worst roads and stroads in the whole city. I would like to see Taipei building more metro exits that go directly to the smaller streets especially pedestrianized streets because wide roads are not useful to people walking out of the metro and plus it's hard to get hit by a car when there aren't any cars. One example of this done well is at Zhongshan metro station. This place has seen a nice upgrade since I was last here with this recently renovated linear park connecting directly to the metro station. It is much nicer to exit here rather than at the side of a busy road. There's this open area here that can be set up for events and a little farther down is this entrance to the underground Book Street, a walkway under the park with lots of independent bookstores, cafes and cozy places to read. Taipei has some really great pedestrian and low car streets too like this one in Wanhua and if you get out at the right metro exit it takes you right here to the famous Rainbow Road crossing. It was so funny to see people holding up traffic so that they could get a photo on the rainbow. Another benefit of the new three meter rule for pedestrian crossings I guess. Wanhua is a great neighborhood. There's the Red House