Pro bike doesn’t mean anti-car
A buried Hummer in Detroit
It makes sense that the cars-are-satan crowd are naturally inclined to join forces with those promoting bicycling. As one might expect, we haven’t seen much of the former in the Motor City — or at least we know to tone down the rhetoric a bit.
That said, here’s one example of a little push back from a Seattle motorist — a clever and seemingly light-hearted column from Crosscut.com called Beep-beep: a cars-user’s manifesto.
Although the article has its funny moments, including referencing lycra cycling outfits as leotards, it does finish with a little more seriousness.
Weaning ourselves from the automobile does not require us to treat cars as mechanical demons from an environmentally profligate past. Carrying on an anti-car crusade may curry favor with a younger crowd that lacks appreciation for anything that can’t be held in one’s palm or stuck in one’s ear. But it’s hardly the way to advance the serious conversation we all have to be engaged in, regarding a more environmentally sensitive future.
Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised by this message.
The column’s author, Hubert G. Locke is a former Detroiter.
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Tags: Seattle
October 11th, 2010 at 7:42 pm
Fascinating. Professor Locke is also the author of “The Detroit Riot of 1967,” one of relatively few books on that event; at the time, he was serving as a special assistant to the Detroit Police Commissioner under Mayor Cavanagh.
Reading the column, I found myself missing the more measured tone of the book. The beef here appears to be more with increased parking charges than anything else, so it’s not really clear why bicyclists are targeted, although Seattle Mayor McGinn has certainly advanced the cause.
“Anti-car crusade” is a rather strong phrase. Frustrating as some bicyclists’ behavior may be, I know of no instances where any bike rider has ever struck and killed a motorist, and no instances where huge swaths of cities have been demolished to build bicycle infrastructure. A little perspective might be in order.
If I may paraphrase Professor Locke’s book: if we can’t find a way to make our streets safe for all users, our cities will not only have no future, they will not deserve one. I’d go so far as to argue that the bias towards cars is wrapped up with environmental injustice, nowhere more so than in Detroit: http://www.transportmichigan.org/2010/09/magazine-dramatizes-detroit-pedestrian.html