and in our conversation I told him I was going to rent a bicycle to ride on the city wall.  He found it hilarious that Americans, who can afford to drive, would choose to ride a bike for fun.  Cars are valued above most everything there, and completely rule the roads - pedestrians and bicycles have to wait for a break in traffic to cross car lanes.

I did notice an overwhelming number of electric scooters in both Beijing and Shanghai - at first I assumed everyone just went around coasting their scooters downhill to save money, until I realized they were all electric and therefore silent.

I rode the subways in both Shanghai and Beijing last year, and they're great. They have plenty of signage, much of it with English translations for visitors. (The ticket machines in Shanghai were less consistent with the English translations, but a couple of English-speaking local residents helped me out.)

The maglev train from the airport is pretty impressive, too.

One question is whether the subways can handle the huge annual ridership increases that will probably occur if people continue to move from rural to urban areas at the current pace.

I was in Beijing for a couple weeks in April --- met a guy from Shanghai.  According to him cars are a status symbol in Beijing, whereas apartments are in Shanghai.  Interesting...

Cory

I lived in Beijing in 2001-2002.  On my first day there, in August 2001, I looked up at the beautiful blue skies and asked my friend who had already been living there, "Where is all this pollution you told me about?"  He said, "I promise, today is the first day it's been like this.  I don't understand."   On the second day of blue skies, I actually started to seriously doubt him.  On the third straight day of blue skies I was convinced he'd exaggerated. But then we ran into a journalist that afternoon, and my friend asked her about it and she said, "Oh, the intercollegiate olympics are in town and the track events have been going on for the last three days and they shut down a number of power plants."  It was that simple.  Keep a good image.  Ruin the week for tens of thousands of poor people. The fourth day, and every day thereafter, the pollution, was back, hard core.  Then, in February 2002, when the air was worse than in summer and the sky essentially black from coal-burning heat, President Bush came to town for two days. Presto: perfect blue skies for those two days, and, I presume, no power for thousands without a voice.
So I have no doubt the running events at the Olympics will be fine, but it won't be fine for many many Beijingers.