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I really do hate to sound like a cheerleader for the BBC but someone has to…here we go again, more armchair bicycling.
Anyway, I was pleased to note that the BBC has picked up on the apparently growing number of ghost bikes appearing in London… To be honest, until now, I was only aware of this phenomenon through the Yehuda Moon comics.
It is less than a year since we lost a young friend of the family and anything that might prevent other families experiencing such a tragedy has to be both welcomed and applauded. As the anniversary comes around in a few months, I might consider doing this myself…
Story here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8106747.stm
r:B
The bicycle was defined as a “carriage” in an English court-room in 1879 – an attitude subsequently fossilised in a parliamentary Act of 1888 – at a time when the only competition for the road were pedestrians, horses and horse-drawn traffic; the bicycle was quite literally the fastest thing on wheels. This rationale would have seen the term extend also to prams and wheelchairs.
Indeed, until the change in local government legislation (1994?), I can attest that a local bylaw in Dundee made it illegal to “push a perambulator” or “move on roller skates” across the City Square – although I believe you could drive a herd of sheep down the main thoroughfare opposite the square on market days! Current UK legislation does, however, identify the potential for classifying push-along scooters, skateboards and roller-skates as vehicles despite acknowledging the obvious practical problems of enforcement.
As I’ve touched on briefly in an earlier post, any time the opportunity arose in the first half of the twentieth century to create a codified bicycling policy which would have made provision for cycle paths similar to those now envied in north-western continental Europe, it was rejected by cycling organisations representing the narrow interests of the (un)sporting minority. Thanks to these elitists, we now have the privilege of conveying our bicycles – and potentially skateboards and roller-skates – through the dirt and madness of today’s traffic as the alleged equals of cars, trucks and buses. This is clearly nuts!
In the past I’ve ridden – with no real concern – in traffic conditions that would simply terrify me today and I honestly find it increasingly difficult to advocate anyone take up vehicular city cycling. Some people may enjoy pretending to be a “vehicle”, not me…I just want to ride my bicycle.
Messrs Obree, Beaumont and Hoy aside, Scotland has another, lesser-known, bicycle-riding hero. Now, I’m not suggesting this is how to ride around the streets of Edinburgh, but Danny Macaskill is an excellent – if eccentric – example of why the notion of the vehicular bicycle is a nonsense. Let’s see you do this in a “carriage”…
R:B
Transform Scotland yesterday released a report which suggests the Scottish economy would benefit by as much as £4bn if cycling could account for 27% of all journeys currently undertaken by car.
This report should be welcomed as an important step in the case for an effective, modern cycling infrastructure in Scotland. The only real obstacle to this in the past has been lack of political will and this, in turn, is generally something that can be bent by judicious and repeated application of a suitably-large financial incentive. This report provides the fiducial clout.
This is a longer post than usual…but please read on.
There is a widespread misconception that the “white patch” on the rear mudguard of British roadster-type bicycles was introduced during the Second World War. In fact it has its origin in earlier traffic regulations and is therefore only of limited accuracy in dating bicycles of this period.
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| From 1947 Rudge |
