Bonus Sunday philosophy post: Is Cycling a Constitutional Matter?

Dario sends this along to be posted:

Dear Tony,

Thank you for posting my response to the NPR segment dealing with bicycle culture in the U.S. ("NPR and Velosophy", August 4, 2012). And thank you to those that posted comments. If I may, I wish to respond and to elaborate on those comments because each commenter posed an interesting problem or perspective. My aim is to promote further discussion.

I wish to respond to what I see are two main issues in the comments: conceptualizing cycing culture (excuse the alliteration) and the relationship between consumerism and cycling. I will also try to respond to your (Tony's) three recommendations for improving cycling culture, I asked you, "If you were king for a day, what three things would you do ...?" and you responded succinctlty. I wish to discuss your recommendations. I'll limit this post to discussion of the first point (about conceptualizing cycling culture) and deal with the other topics in subsequent posts if that is all right with the blogs' editors.

Gabriel Sistare in his comment to my "post" writes that the mayor of Bogota, Colombia, Enrico Penalosa, has taken an innovative position about cycling. It would seem that Penalosa's view about cycling (vis-a-vis cars) is far reaching. Can you imagine taking Penalosa's view and informing American drivers that the right to park is not constitutional? Car drivers often behave as if it is their right to rule the road. Asphalt roads were created for driving cars, in fact. So, drivers must rule. But between the two, cars and bicycles, the mayor of Bogota has rightly deemed that bicycles are the more ethical means of transport because (I'll assume) they occupy less space, do not cause pollution, and are overall safer for the riders and other citizens on the street. And they reduce urban congestion. The one thing I disagree or, rather, wish to challenge Penalosa (and Gabriel perhaps) is on whether or not cycling is a constitutional matter. They seem to think not. I differ. I will make a case (likely an extreme one) for cycling being a constitutional issue.

Bicyles and arms (guns, forget about swords) have a lot in common. The BeatBikeBlog is based in Hartford, historically the city of Colt firearms and of Pope bicycles, two industries and two technologies that are intertwined. Guns are a polarizing topic. The bicycle, thankfully, less so, unless you live in NYC. The debate today about the right to bear arms has never been more heated and relevant especially because of recent tragic events. When the writers of the Constitution included the second amendment about the right to bear arms, they had a specific historical context in mind: to protect the citizenry against despots and tyrants and to be able to form militias against would-be usurpers of power. Our founding fathers had a lot more good sense than we do, so they didn't legislate transportation. They left that for us. Cars and bicyles had yet to be invented. But bicycles, like cars, are a sophisticated technology, not to the same degree as the automobile, but they are sophisticated because of the materials, design and construction. Cars, in particular, are arguably a weapon, not unlike guns. Whereas, fortunately, it is illegal for me to wave a gun around in public, there is considerable leeway in how I am allowed to use a motor vehicle. Road rage and indifference with mortal consequences (See Ken Krayeske's post about Mr. Harrison's death.) are just two instances of how the car is frequently a weapon in the hands of some people. Aside the occasional "scorcher" (the nineteenth and early twentieth-century term for rogue cyclists who terrorized the streets), cyclists rarely do harm. The bicycle is not technically a weapon because of its scale (speed and size) and because of its humanizing quality about which I talked in the last post, unlike many, especially, larger motor vehicles. Most cyclists are automobile drivers and would never think of their motor vehicles as a weapon. Most car drivers who don't cycle also don't think of themselves as engaging in a ballistics arms race when they drive. But how many drivers choose to purchase a vehicle for its defensive capabilities (the SUV versus the compact car in case of an accident)? That is a weapons choice, defensive, but still a choice about object/subject relations in terms of potential violence and harm. That is not generally how cyclists choose a bicycle, I think. When our founding fathers included the second amendment about the right to bear arms, they thought of protection. Hence, cars are analogous to, if not like, guns. Whereas the bicycle is not. Nonetheless, because cyclists and bicycles necessarily share the road … Well you get my picture. As I said, I'm trying to push the limits of discussion, but I don't think we can dismiss the argument entirely. What do you think? Read more!

Vote (maybe)

There are municipal primaries today in 22 Connecticut towns. I voted in Hartford by bmx ballot. The poll workers look lonely. I was voter #40 and it was already 9:30.

If you live in Hartford, here are some insights. Read more!

Another green world

As I'm no longer a worker and now a student, I was worried that all these books would prevent me from riding my bike. In the first two weeks, it would seem that rain has been the biggest preventer. Although, the big books make it difficult to go for a very fun ride directly from school, so rides leave from home. I'm told there's a locker lottery, which I would be very glad to participate in. Also, the wonderful urbancompass has allowed me to use her porch for bike parking, so my bike stays dry when it rains and I can leave my pannier attached to my bike. Having a cubicle really makes you spoiled. You don't realized it when you're a cubicle dweller.

Erstwhile beat bike blogger, Ken, survived the law school and still seems to know how to ride a bike. I hope the same applies to me.

Read more!

We are not soft!

While Salem rode off to some towns no one has heard of, we three remaining Snails, filled with coffee rode our bikes, too. Hard! Really hard! We rode up Bunker Hill and it's really steep, like 80% or something. After that, we had to ride up Turkey Shit Road, which is like 115%! These hills were so steep, Dario had to shift and that's a very involved process that involves taking his wheel off and a lot of math.

Just when I thought I was safe, I had to go out to dinner! Then Johanna and I looked at baby pictures of me (I was just as awesome then as I am now). Then I met my parents and got a free beer.

Sunday was no easier. After eating soup, Johanna and I rode to the grocery store that I don't like to buy food. After cooking AND eating the food. I rode around on my BMX for awhile until I got flat tire next to the AG's office and had to walk home.

On top of that, my weekend was only 47 hours. I'm a glutton for punishment.

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The BMX commute

I have a BMX bike. It's a Specialized Fuse 2. It's not the best bike, but it had a low buy it now price on eBay and free shipping. I don't really know anything about BMX. I didn't grow up riding it like a lot of people and I'm kind of scared to do cool tricks. It came with no brakes, so I was terrified to ride it anywhere. I bought a u-brake for it, so it stops just slightly better than it did with the soles of my shoes.


For some reason, I decided that I wanted to ride my BMX bike to work today. Dario does it all the time and it seemed to work out well for him, but he work much closer to work. 2 1/2 miles isn't exactly an epic commute, but is kind of a long way to go when you can't really pedal and sit at the same time.


While not expeditious, it's great. I got to work in pretty much the same time, but on the way home I spent some time riding around Constitution Plaza, the parking lots of State buildings and other back alleys, hoping off little ledges and stuff. I'm not very good at it, but I'm good enough to have fun (sort of like my skateboarding skill). I think because I'm low to the ground and can't go very fast, poking around feels more right.

This would certainly make the boringest BMX video ever. Stay tuned! Read more!

New Ross, County Wexford

If you ride BMX in Hartford, you probably go to New Ross, County Wexford Park and have arguments with skateboarders. TJ and I sit on the skateboarding task force and we working on making NRCW (or Heaven, as everyone knows it, but I like to call it New Ross, County Wexford Park in honor of Hartford's sister city in Ireland) a real park for skateboards and BMX (with some other stuff, too). PBS did a short documentary on it. It's really cool and you can watch it here. For a few brief second you can see me ride a skateboard pitifully.

And, if you want to lend some input to the design process of the park, come down on September 26 at 1pm for a public input session.

Read more!

Real Ride Hartford (and West Hartford) Bicycle Parade

Preface: There were photographers with actual camera mounts for their madly expensive gear, so if you want to see "professional-looking" photos, I'm sure those will be online somewhere in a few days.

Saturday evening's bicycle parade made me very proud, happy, and relieved that I live in Hartford. More on that later. We began at Real Art Ways on Arbor Street. Here, people had the chance to tart up their bikes with lights and random art supplies provided by Anne Cubberly. There was a fish bicycle
(perhaps a reference to the quote often falsely attributed to Gloria Steinem?), cat bike, horse bike, clock bike, and demon bike. Those stuck out the most in my memory. Others were piled with lights and glowing orbs. One gal had a plastic flower on the front of her bicycle -- it dispensed bubbles! I did not get the chance to talk to her, but I see a mobile bubble dispenser as part of my future. At least two riders had awesome camera mounts which I am sure enabled them to take focused, high resolution, non-blurry photos that they are not going to be ashamed of showing to the public. There was at least one tandem and it was rigged with a souped up vuvuzela. That I can not describe each and every bike says something about the turnout. There was at least four times as many people there than I expected would show -- some coming down from Boston for the event.


The parade turned right onto Arbor Street, then right up Capitol Avenue. We turned left down Flower Street, crossed the railroad tracks, and then turned right onto Farmington/Asylum. The ride stopped at ArtSpace (555 Asylum Street) so that we could meet up with people who were attending the Art for AIDS fundraiser. It would have made more sense to stop in the back lot instead of on the incline of the street, but it also would have made sense for the stops to last ten minutes or more to allow for a drink/bathroom break. We did not go inside ArtSpace or Billings Forge, so the purpose for stopping at each place was unclear. In the future, more work could go into allowing for people at each venue and on bicycles to mingle, if that's the point. I'm not saying it wasn't fun. I thought it was a blast. But the stops could have been a bit longer. Anyway, I know that the original plan was for this ride to take an hour. I think the route planners forgot that it was going to be a slow ride, made perhaps even slower by the presence of a DJ being hauled on a trailer behind a bicycle. You just can't take corners fast on that kind of rig and who wants to rush along a trailer full of awesome?

From ArtSpace we continued into and through Bushnell Park, but only a sliver of it to cut behind the Legislative Office Building and Armory. We looped back onto Capitol Avenue and then Broad Street so we could stop at Billings Forge. Since an artist briefly spoke to the group, this stop seemed more meaningful. There was some kind of solstice event supposedly going on at Billings Forge. When we rode through, it seemed like only a few people were outside of the venue/compound.


Here is where dynamics got weird. And by dynamics, I mean that almost everyone in the parade was white and we were about to head further into Frog Hollow -- an area I am convinced was virgin territory for a number of the cyclists. Disclosure: I am perhaps being overly sensitive about this because I live here and am very familiar with the area and people. Before heading back on Broad Street and down Park, I overheard a couple people making remarks about how they hoped the musical selections for the area were "appropriate." This was followed by several Speedy Gonzalesesque cheers. Very not okay. Very WTF. Guess this reminded me that I can not stereotype all artists or bicyclists as being open-minded or aligned with progressive values. Maybe instead of a bubble machine, I could rig my bike with a flamethrower in order to more productively deal with racially and ethnically bizarre comments.


Riding up Park Street made me proud to live in Hartford. It was around 9-9:30pm, I'd guess, and the sidewalks were busy. People were outside cheering us. Really cheering us. There is this great vibe that emanates from the area and makes it hard not to smile, honk, wave, and holler back. A strong contingent of kids joined us for a ways, riding their BMX, department store, and low-rider bikes on sidewalks and in the streets. The photo at the beginning of this blog post is of two of them. I yelled for them to join in, and two or three stuck with us for the rest of the ride. These kids made the event seem more like a parade and less like a regular old ride. Another funny indication that some riders had no idea where they were: I overheard one woman getting nervous about the presence of a police cruiser coming down Park Street. Really? Really?! I got stopped by a cop on Park once for looking suspicious while pushing a wheelbarrow filled with shovels and pitchforks. He wanted to know why I had these tools, so of course I told him something like they were for stabbing someone to death and then burying her. My memory on that conversation blurs a bit. Maybe I said they were for farming. I don't recall. A little traffic on the street is nothing they aren't used to. Hell, just a couple weeks ago, in the lead up to the Puerto Rican Day Parade, the street was used to showcase everyone's decorated rides, causing far more severe traffic jams, and the police involvement was kept to a respectful minimum. The government that governs best governs least.



I hope this ride was educational for non-local or non-bike-commuters, as the amount of broken glass in the bike lanes and streets is something that a large number of people are now aware of and could complain about. There are some immediate infrastructure differences between Hartford and West Hartford. The moment we crossed into the suburb, the pavement became smooth. The only real debris there was roadkill. While a less comfortable ride, I felt safer in Hartford. Cars seemed to give us more space and props in the city. The horns were cheering us, not expressing impatience with us and then zooming past at 50 miles per hour. During the week, I experience plenty of impatient, distracted drivers whizzing past me in the city, but on Saturday night, they all seemed chill.


And then we crossed into West Hartford. The pavement became so smooth and we could hear the sound of our tires against it, which is to say that nearly all of the observer encouragement ceased. While passing one of those restaurants with outdoor patios (I know which one, but I'm not going to give them free publicity) on Park Road, we actually received polite golf claps (not to be confused with booty claps. we received no booty claps that I am aware of). There were a few cheers, but the ratio of noise to people was sorely disappointing. C'mon! Live a little! It's okay to break with decorum, particularly on a beautiful Saturday night in the summer.

Around this area, someone asked, "What are you doing?" to which I responded, "Riding a bicycle!" Duh! "But what for?" "To ride. Because it's fun." Someone else jumped in to give a convoluted explanation of what we are doing. My policy? When people ask stupid questions, keep the answers short so that they can understand. If we were riding for "something" we would have had signs or shirts announcing that probably.


We turned onto South Quaker, then left onto Boulevard. Here, the street got very dark and even quieter. Up in the Center, we did some zigzagging and I did not bother paying attention to all of the road names. Some of the people dining outdoors on LaSalle Road were more supportive. We looped around, returning to Main Street and then cut through Blue Back Square. Again, a decent number of people outside, but too, too quiet. We took Farmington Avenue down to Sisson Avenue, Capitol Avenue, and then Arbor or Orange (depending on whether or not the cyclist felt like following directions), back to the Real Art Ways parking lot. The only part of the ride where there were impatient motorists seemed to be on Farmington Avenue, in West Hartford Center, and Blue Back Square. But for the few jerks behind steering wheels, there were a number of patient motorists who waited calmly while everyone passed.


Despite the amount of broken glass and potholes, I do not think anyone popped a tire. I only saw one person fall, and it was one of those "can't get my foot out of the clip" incidents -- toppling over, more than a violent collision. She said she was okay. I heard something pop or snap on another rider's bike but don't know what happened. Some shit fell off my bike when I hit one of the many potholes, but the lost items were not integral to the operation of the machine, and I basically knew they were not going to stay on because I rushed the decoration process.

It was heartening to see so many females and even a few children riding, which of course begs the question -- why am I not seeing this many women on the road normally?


Read more!

Cold

It's cold and not fun to ride a bike today.

So, try this instead: http://www.cbc.ca/kids/games/bmxpark/. My high score is 86467 94653 101582, which apparently is not very good.
Read more!

BMX in the Olympics

I stole this picture from nytimes.com. I wasn't at the Olympisc to take it.

So, the New York Times wrote a bunch about BMX in the Olympics this year. I haven't read much anywhere else about it. The cycling world hasn't made a big deal about it. I think it's fitting, since road, track, and mountain biking are in it. The only thing that mystifies me is that it made its entry like 15 or so years after the sport's major popularity. The only people I see riding BMX with talent now are doing cool tricks, instead of riding around a track fast. What do you think? Read more!