Thursday 4 April 2013

Urban Sprawl Myths, Bicycle Tariffs in Canada

The debate I've heard on bicycle tariffs has brought up some interesting side discussions.

One is that cycling as transportation is not feasible with the size of sprawling North American cities, Calgary included.  I tend to reject that, this article and link give that some creedence.  I'd say the more practical barriers are weather and road attitude.  Road lanes, bike paths are great for riding on, convenient, and help deal with road attitude via separation of transport types, but in the presence of a collaborative citizenry, probably wouldn't be as necessary.  Excellent google work from Copenhagenize.com!

I've actually been on a several month stretch where, for the most part, car traffic has been totally cooperative.  It's nice, as I try to be the cyclist that is predictable and follows the rules, such that I'm not actually irking motorists by disobeyment of the law (although some will always be irked by the mere presence of a bicycle). 

It's helpful when people's minds function more like "oh, some person riding a bike.  interesting.  I'll just nudge over and give them a smidge of space, no big deal, I'll still get where I'm going just fine."  That's great.  Only once in the last few months have I had the "oh look, some dumbasses on a bike.  ha I'll show them.  I'm gonna downshift my 1989 Dodge diesel truck, semi flood the engine, then smoke them out with black exhaust soot.  Ha, watch this.  I'm so unaware that each of their bikes is worth more than my truck right now and that besides being on bicycles, these are productive members of society who will help subsidize the costs of my eventual emphysma, but I'm emboldened by my truck's size, and really enjoying my cigarette, and I own these roads!".

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