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Kunming to become more civilized

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In the past, Kunming's urban management officers — aka chengguan — have been deployed to patrol the city in search of illegal street vendors and bothersome outdoor café seating. Now they have a new job: civilizing the mean streets of the Spring City.

This past weekend the Urban Management Officers Division (城管部门) issued a statement saying it would form a special task force to root out uncivilized behavior, Yunnan Information News is reporting.

Targeted behaviors include littering, spitting, hanging clothes or bedding to dry in public areas, parking scooters in 'random places' (乱停乱放) and cooking on public streets.

The new task force will concentrate their patrols on the 22 streets that were part of the recent road beautification project (景观大道). Patrols will be random and unannounced, according to the report.

Officers will be armed with video cameras and film offenders in action before confronting them. People exhibiting behavior deemed unacceptable will be issued on-the-spot fines ranging from 10 to 50 yuan. Citizens who witness uncivilized behavior can make a report by calling 3382965.

Officially there are 188 regularly employed chengguan officers for Wuhua District (五华区) supplemented by 406 untrained contract workers (协勤人员). It appears their workload may increase exponentially with this newest assignment.

Image: CCTV

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The spitting is one of the most disgusting thing they really need to educate to masses. Don't hold your breath though. It's like everything else in Kunming. First they give it a lot of attention and then in a few months it's business as usual.

Oh, how I wish this would make a difference! As @Liumingke1234 says, this seems like yet another well-trumpeted drive that will fizzle out within weeks. They could start with the annoying car-based, middle-class vendors on WenLin Jie though....

I was walking up the stairs from the underpass at xiaoximen to catch the bus today, when a middle aged guy decided to blow his nose onto the steps.

It turned my stomach to see and I gave him a disgusted look

It's not just the older generation that's doing this, they need a Singapore style campaign and fine program in place to stamp out this disgusting practice.

How about the officers give out free packets of tissues with each spitting fine, just to help drive home the point.

They did a campaign and did exactly that and of course it didn't work. Just 'click' on the link 'spitting' and it will take you to the article about it. The best approach is to fine the hell out of them. I mean high fines. Not 10 yuan or 20 yuan. It them where it hurts and then they may learn.

I can handle the spitting, if only you could be treated as a human being while dealing with the bureaucracy, now that would be 素质

What's wrong with the spitting? People running in the West spit all the time while they do so. I know plenty people that spit on a regular basis and they're not all Chinese. The only thing that's different is that the Chinese like to lead in with a long loud snort.

Having monsters like the Chengguan enforce civil behaviour is a joke by itself. Last time I saw them in action, two of them picked up an old street vendor by his arms and legs, tossed him into the air and let him land hard on his back. 文明我的屁股

If the chengguan look like the ones in the picture, I will be happy to obey:)

Spitting was common when I was in England, especially among the youth. But they were more discreet. And hanging clothes to dry in public area was common in south of France and Spain.
What bothers me more is people not queueing, others using the two-wheel lane as a pedestrian lane and not even bothering to look right and left when crossing.

It is dangerous to ride the streets on a bike in this city because the cars are all parked in the bike lane. I would think this is a major problem. It is hard to try and get into the car lane with no mirrors and I have seen people get hit. Spitting on the sidewalk brings germs into the home we walk around all day with someone's illness then bring it into the house. I take off my shoes at the door but the germs are in anyway. Who cares about people cooking on the streets-this is China. But the people who ride the wrong way in bike lanes are dangerous. It seems to me that safety should be the main consideration.

It's great the government acknowledges these behavioral problems, but the proposed solution is typical of an authoritarian regime. All of these issues stem from overcrowding, poverty, lack of adequate education stressing critical thinking skills and the lack of the rule of law. Bandaid measures like behavior enforcement by the chengguan will be pitifully inadequate and are stop gap measures at best. They have to start somewhere, so how about having classroom presentations in kindergarten through third grade complete with discussion sessions where real discourse takes place?

They are trying to take away all of the charm of China. Seriously, street vendors and the other stuff are unique and charming, even if spitting itself is pretty gross. I do not want China to become another Salt Lake City.

well there goes shaokao

i dont believe it

April 1 joke...

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