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Tomorrow! Awesome! We’ve got the lesson plan all set up:
Sat, Nov 28 (tomorrow!)
$20
10-4 @ B!KE: The Peterborough Community Bike Shop (400 Wolfe st @ Park and Wolfe).
Call 745-3238 x221 to let me know if you’re coming.
I love riding home from work, the sun warms my face and makes everything seem a little quieter.
Bike Parking at Green-Up: Beware Scratchy Pedals
Of the 16 or 17 people regularly working out of Peterborough Green-Up’s office (I’m one of ‘em!), between seven and nine people bike every day during the warm months.
As the cold weather ramps up, you can see a slow attrition at the Green-Up bike rack (often so cluttered that I stopped riding my Marinoni in because it was getting wickedly scratched). Today, there are four bikes — mine is the brown Surly, soon to be outfitted with studded tires for the Winter Cycling Course.
Will these folks be the stalwarts pushing through the snow in coming weeks? I’ll keep you posted!
From the always excellent Ecovelo blog,
A new report out from the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) confirms what we already knew: ditching a car can save you thousands of dollars per year. According to the report, the average savings for public transit users who eliminate a car is $724 per month ($8,691 per year), based on the cost of parking and the 5/5/09 average gas price of $2.079 as reported by AAA.
And, yes, while car-free living isn’t a possibility for some, it likely could be a reality for many folks with cars today. Anyone have experience making the shift?
In my experience (having owned a car for a few years before sticking with the bike), the biggest change that you have to face is accepting a limited range of travel. Not limited in terms of within your city (that’s what your feet, bike, and public transit are for!), but limited in terms of, say, visiting family out of town, or going to a different city for an event. These haven’t been insurmountable hurdles: inter-city transit has worked out pretty well for me (especially now that we have GO service in Peterborough), but you’re subject to the times and constraints of travelling by bus.
I’ve reconciled the frustration that sometimes accompanies travel on transit to the understanding that what we take for granted – unlimited, independent travel across great distances – is still virtually brand new in human history. So long as I remember that independent automobile travel is at best a privilege, and at worst an unsustainable blip of activity on the timeline of global culture, I feel pretty comfy on the bus!
In the 1970s, Copenhagen was a city similar to many North American cities today. Struggling with single-occupant vehicle automobile congestion, pollution, and a decreasing/disconnected quality of life in urban environments, they were faced with the possibility of heading in one of two directions:
Yup! They chose the latter! Like contemporary NYC, Copenhagen came up with a massive plan to build hundreds of kilometres of separated bike facilities (including magnificent cycle tracks). Around thirty years later, bicycles now command 36% of the transportation mode share — with automobiles at a lowly 27%!
For a much better sense of the cultural integration of active transportation, see Copenhagenize and Copenhagen Cycle Chic
C’est incroyable! It feels like a cultural movement…
Tags: Bike Life
A few months ago, photographer/blogger Russ and sculptor Laura gave away, sold or put into storage nearly everything they owned. The remaining items were carefully packed into a few panniers, and the couple embarked on two wheels.
I’ve been following their travel blog for some time now (and, before that, Russ’s decadent Epicurean Cyclist blog). Both sites are a real treat because of Russ’s excellent photography.
And there is a vicarious thrill seeing the real-life unfolding and experiences of a dream.
(Though, I gotta say, it’s sometimes frustrating to watch people bike in sunshine in California year round! The same thing goes for several sustainable living/farming/eating books I’ve read – the authors live in these warm bountiful paradises compared to the cold, coniferous landscapes in Peterborough!)
This ad has been making the rounds for a week or two. Depending on where you find yourself on the sustainable transportation gradient, you’ll either be really irritated or really compelled by this spot.
I feel both ways. It’s irritating because, in playing to every irrational, inconsiderate and hypothetical extreme fear and stereotype – why else would they choose a Volvo station wagon? – it belittles and diminishes the work we do, the changes I’m interested in, and the choices I make. Buying another car is not “doing your part”. Come on.
The ad says:
But, at the same time, I’m compelled by it. It’s amazing, as copenhagenize pointed out, how such an incisive blow can be dealt to decades of work by thousands of people in just thirty seconds. I suppose it’s always easier to sell an object (conventional, object-based marketing) than to affect behaviour change (Shifting Gears = social marketing). And, obviously, the enduring success of conventional marketing and the cascades of stuff it brings us has very real and very significant effects on people’s behaviour, lifestyle, choices and culture.
This ad has something to teach me!
In alternative transportation campaigns across the world, we do a lot to provide the infrastructure, tips, resources and encouragement to help people make choices. But if you look around, this isn’t the way that any other industry markets their stuff. We believe in an ideal lifestyle – some kind of freedom, simplicity, happiness, friendship, fun, pleasure – and then products, choices, etc are marketed as if they will elevate us to those places. The ad does just that. And, I think, transportation campaigns should do that too: We will choose to join an exciting movement, not choose to slog through the rain on a bike in solitary confusion.
How would you market alternate transportation? Or, in other words, what does it mean to you to bike, take transit, walk, or carpool?
