the people's bicycle

funny you should talk about the cotter pins; i went through 2 already.
they never seem to fit perfectly. either drop right through or i have to use a sledgehammer on it for 10 min.
it seems like they no longer make 28in wheels here anymore. i looked around around for them everywhere. you can buy used but they are bent to hell.
the rod brakes are just for show, they are relatively useless. i kept the ones in front but they dont exert enough pressure to really stop the bike.
i am really curious: what was the bike traffic like in the 80s?

In the 80's, in Chengdu, there were few streets, and the main streets mostly had seperate bike lanes on both sides. At rush hour, bike traffic sometimes ground to a walking pace, but at least moved. It was a lot faster than cars. Cars, as far as I could see, were for status, not practical transport. I liked to ride during the rest time after lunch, when the streets were pretty empty.

The cotter pins I got fit, but they were too soft for me.

Too bad about the demise of 28" wheels. I understand they are still in production in India. Somewhere I read that more than half the bikes that have ever been made are roadsters.

I was used to steel rims, so my rod brakes weren't much worse than my bike at home before I put Scott Mathauser brake pads on it. Still, Chengdu was flat, and you usually didn't go very fast. I once knocked down a lady I was passing on the right, who turned in front of me without looking. With a fixie I could probably have stopped.