In Hangzhou, This Field is Where 20,000 Confiscated Bikes Have Gone to Die [UPDATE: Now with Video]

The proliferation of dockless shared bikes in China has been nice in many ways, easing everyday commutes and weaning countless drivers off their dependence on four-wheeled vehicles, but competition between various bike sharing companies has been so intense that it can sometimes seem like they’ve lost their sense of moderation. It creates scenes like this one in Hangzhou, a city where authorities have reportedly confiscated 23,000 shared bikes to date, most of them since March.

And where do those bikes go? According to reports, to 16 different places around the city. The one featured here is a field near a gas station on Qiutao Road in the south of the city.

A Hangzhou Daily reporter interviewed an urban management official to get some details, and was told, “Individual randomly parked shared bikes, (we’ll ask) volunteers, officers, sanitation workers, etc. to move them to a place that doesn’t affect traffic; but for large-scale violations that seriously affect city residents’ commute, we’ll take confiscation measures.”

And how!

The pictures here only show part of the fields where these bikes get taken. Seen from some angles, it’s almost artistic, post-impressionist. This one’s a god-dang Van Gogh:

And here’s two-wheeled pointillism, on grass:

What will happen to them next? Wukong Bike recently went bust after 90 percent of its bikes went missing. They can restart their business from all the recyclable parts found here:

By the way, here’s what the field looked like earlier this month:

UPDATE: