Imagine no motor vehicles

Coline commented on the previous post: "I have just returned from a family visit to France where cyclists are everywhere and not targets of abuse. This may change as now great numbers of electrocycles are being moved about badly by non cyclists who do not seem to think that they need to learn how to use them!

Worse were the trottinettes, scooters which hurtle silently about with total disregard for anything or body, least of all their own safety. Brave new world!"

I had said that I would rather share the road with smokeless mopeds than with monster trucks, but Coline raises a good point about the behavior of newcomers who make up their own rules when they buy equipment and dive into alternative transportation.

Back at the University of Florida in the mid 1970s, most people got around campus on bicycles. Cars were barred from most of it, and the sprawling distances made walking from class to class difficult for many. People did walk, but large numbers of riders would hit the streets at every class break and at the beginning and end of the day. The town supported at least four bike shops.

If you weren't a cyclist, just a bike rider, you would join the flow and move placidly with it to your next stop. But if you felt fit and frisky it was as frustrating as any traffic jam. It even included a few real mopeds, puffing clouds of blue smoke. I had a good crash one time when I tried to push the pace and got hooked by a rider in front of me with a sudden urge to turn left. My error. 

Crowded multi-use trails also provide a preview of what a motorless -- or at least less motorized -- society would be like. The herd average would set the speed limit. Because the vehicles are much more maneuverable than big, bulky automobiles and trucks, they can behave more erratically and swerve more unpredictably.

It would reduce the amount of distracted piloting. You can stare at your phone and walk into a fountain, but you can't really bury your face in the screen for too long when you're trying to stay up on two wheels in a crowded field. I'm sure that distracted cycling happens already, but it's more self-limiting than distracted driving or distracted walking. You hit that lamp post much harder on a bike.

We who ride in traffic complain about the range of hazards we face from the masses of metal charging along beside us. But the simple fact of our weakness licenses us to work to the limit of our strength more often than would be the case if everyone moved by meat alone. It's nice to find a quiet road where we can set our own pace, fast or slow, but those roads are made quieter by the fact that so few people cycle on them. The dominance of motor vehicles means that the road is seen as reserved to them. If the system was built solely for bikes, would the lanes be as wide? Would the grading be built for the speeds that some of us are willing to reach? Think of your average bike path. Even if a descent would allow you to top 50 miles per hour, do you think that the designers would have planned for it? The motorways are a playground because of motorized speeds. Some stretches are a slog because the terrain is boring, or stressful because the motorized users are always abundant, but the good parts can be very good indeed.

I'm more in favor of Biketopia than of continuing our current exaltation of horsepower, but I can appreciate the accidental benefits that the culture of speed has conferred on those of us who work for our momentum. A true Biketopia would design with that in mind. We would need some motorized equipment to maintain the network of bike routes at a high standard. We are not an afterthought. We shouldn't be, anyway.