It is always painful to see something useful being turned into rubbish, and that may be the tragic fate shared bikes are embracing.

Less than one year after shared bikes were introduced in major Chinese cities to solve the last-mile problem for commuters, they are quickly degenerating from a new lifestyle, a symbol of fashion for the urban young people, into eyesores, and even public nuisances, on the streets.

You can see the chaotic scenes no better than close to bus stops and subway stations, where shared bikes of all colors and designs are parked, in such random and jammed ways that they become roadblocks on sidewalks for pedestrians. In my neighborhood, security guards, answering residents' complaints, once heaped a dozen shared bikes they had cleared from the community like scrap steel at the entrance of the compound, which basically rendered them out of use. Now a no-entry sign for shared bikes has been erected there.