Jonathan Ansfield on how image-oriented Beijing officials in the run-up to the 2008 Olympics want to force taxi drivers to dismantle the scrap iron cages built to protect them, because they make the city look unsafe.

"The basic purpose was to improve Beijing's safety image, but what would it prove?" huffed driver Fu Xiaomei...."Are they also going to eliminate security at big banks and government offices? Would they call off the guards at Zhongnanhai?" he asked tongue-in-cheek, referring to the Communist Party leadership compound...."Every big city has some crime and Beijing is no different," he said. "This would only fix things on the surface. It does not resolve the basic underlying problems."