Patrick Field – Page 6

barriers to cycling (part 1.1)

So it turns out that last week’s bold assertion…”nobody has denounced Andrew Mitchell as a cyclist” was contradicted by a classic ‘will this do?’ space-filler from Tony Parsons, who is mostly known for being Julie Burchill‘s child bride and his sub-Hornby formula novels. Doubtless Tony is tortured with envy and disappointment that he can’t follow his peer group onto high-end bikes without looking like he’s wheel-sucking Robert Elms.

So it turns out that last week’s bold assertion…

“nobody has denounced Andrew Mitchell as a cyclist.”

…was contradicted by a classic ‘will this do?’ space-filler from Tony Parsons, who is mostly known for being Julie Burchill‘s child bride and his sub-Hornby formula novels. Doubtless Tony is tortured with envy and disappointment that he can’t follow his peer group onto high-end bikes without looking like he’s wheel-sucking Robert Elms.

It just goes to show that in this era of mixed messages not everyone is keeping up.

A second assertion from that post…

“that a posh person choosing to get about on an – insert compulsory adjective – humble bicycle is now a non-story”

…awaits contradiction.

But a third…

“that authority has trouble categorising bicycle-traffic”

…is incontrovertible.

barriers to cycling (part 1)

In a week of waffle – on the ugly spat between Andrew Mitchell and his gate-keepers – there’s been exactly zero comment on the fact that a senior member of the Government might choose to travel by bike. Fifteen years ago such zany behaviour would have had him labelled as an odd and remarkable fellow; ‘the bicycling whip’. A first lesson to draw from the affair is that a posh person choosing to get about on an – insert compulsory adjective – humble bicycle is now a non-story.

It’s now unworthy of comment to find toffs travelling by bike, after all their social status is inviolable. This may not be much help to others who had less money spent on their education and whose parents were not Government ministers, but it’s still a positive development. In all the talk of contempt and condescension, even though bicycle-travel is a key element in the narrative – nobody has denounced Andrew Mitchell as a cyclist.

The tale of hot-temper has another lesson; that authority has trouble categorising bicycle-traffic. In this period in history, in the UK, if you enjoy the simple luxury of cycle-travel, you have to get used to occasional, ritual humiliation.

The third lesson is that Andrew Mitchell is clearly not much of a politician. When confronted with injustice an activist has three basic choices…

To fight, Mitchell has a military background but clearly shooting his way out of the vehicle gate was not a practical option. The streets of SW1 are made for tanks, there are barracks of elite troops standing very close by. If he’d gone for the Maoist option – “political power comes from the barrel of a gun” – he may have got away with his life but it probably wouldn’t have helped his career?

To defer, politely to ‘jobsworth’ authority and make, in due course, reasoned complaint, to the proper authorities, that the new Downing Street Gate policy is both unfair and inconvenient.

To take non-violent direct action; on being told that the riding gate could not be opened, that ‘for reasons of security’ he’d have to dismount and walk back to the pedestrian gate, Mr. Mitchell could have explained courteously to his obstructors that they were clearly discriminating against human-powered vehicular traffic and calmly insist that they arrest him so he could make his case in court. If this demand had been refused he could have used his handy ‘D’ lock to shackle himself to the gates and wait for something to happen. If convicted he could have refused to take any conditional discharge, refused to pay any fine, gone to jail and started a hunger-strike.

All he actually did was rant. The exact terms of his discourse are still contested but nobody is denying he lost control. He became impolite which is impolitic.

Mitchell’s verbal incontinence has obscured the real issue. His grovelling apologies say nothing of the injustice that provoked his childish wrath. His lack of self-control means an opportunity, to focus national debate on whether it’s OK to force people on push bikes to WALK, when those in limousines get to ride, has been lost.

He must resign.

magnanimity in victory

There’s too much bicycle-centred miserablism published these days. Not that people who try and travel by bike in London, England, the UK, Europe, the World, the Solar system, the Galaxy, the Universe, haven’t got stuff to moan about but we are winning

Play sound.

There’s too much bicycle-centred miserablism published these days. Not that people who try and travel by bike in London, England, the UK, Europe, the World, the Solar system, the Galaxy, the Universe, haven’t got stuff to moan about but we are winning.

Never forget that the primary victims of motor-dependence(MDVs) are the bicycle-deficient losers who actually have to struggle to move all those almost-empty mobile-front-rooms around. They may sometimes drag us down toward their own tragic level but the main people who suffer from their lack of imagination are their sorry selves.

Irrational, you-people-are-all-the-same antipathy towards we who travel by bike is based partly on envy. In current conditions people who don’t ride often see those on bikes as winners, and there are few things less attractive than an ungracious, whingeing winner. ‘Not only do they act like they own the road but all they ever do is moan’.

Don’t just moan. That’s what everybody else does. That’s what’s expected.

Last week I was complaining about an unfortunate lack of permeability for cycle-traffic at the junction of Hermitage Road, St. Annes Road and North Grove, London N15. I did offer an alternative practical example but, in the interests of positivity, would like to add this excellent item of street photography, endorsing the concept of filtered permeability. Shot just over the hill in N4, it’s the work of noted bicycle-educator and cricket fanatic David Dansky.

So much more elegant than the speed hump and they can get out of the way if an ambulance needs to pass.

substitute

Travelling without a bicycle can be an unsettling experience. Looking up from your reading book, glancing round the train carriage with the ominous feeling that something’s missing; only to remember, with relief, that – because you’re rattling South from London-Waterloo in the rush hour, and can walk from the station to the appointment at the other end – you left your trusty, rusty push-rod locked-up on platform 11.

Travelling without a bicycle can be an unsettling experience. Looking up from your reading book, glancing round the train carriage with the ominous feeling that something’s missing; only to remember, with relief, that – because you’re rattling South from London-Waterloo in the rush hour, and can walk from the station to the appointment at the other end – you left your trusty, rusty push-rod locked-up on platform 11.
If you have to travel without a cycle always consider taking an umbrella. An umbrella is a useful tool but can also serve as bicycle methadone. Umbrellas and bicycles have a lot in common. Both are invaluable when required but can be awkward encumbrances when not in use. Both are prone to technical failures, particularly if not of serviceable quality, or used inappropriately. You might have to fiddle with them to make them work. Beware of USO’s(umbrella shaped objects) sold at unrealistically low prices.

An investment-grade cotton gamp from here…

…is a nice accessory, and when rolled, can serve as a makeshift ice-axe in emergencies, but carrying a 200 quid example – like riding round town on a three-grand bike – may be nerve-wracking. If something of this quality…

…ends up in lost-property, it’s got to hurt.

A personal favourite – a nice compromise between economy and durability – is the Rohan treking umbrella.

The G.R.P. stick and frame make a lightweight package that can flex nicely in strong winds reducing risk of sudden failure. It will never corrode. The manufacturers make no claims for the canopy’s UV protection, suggesting carcinogenic rays can get through – which won’t happen with the old-school cotton example – but it’s still cool in the shade.

It comes with a mesh sheath so will dry while rolled and can be toted slung across a shoulder rifle-style. Alternatively strap it on your big, butch courier bag for the ultimate in paramilitary picnic chic.

starting pistol

England is mysterious country, so far North that Summer daylight lasts past bedtime, yet warmed by ocean currents to avoid any prolonged Winter, suspended between Europe and America, balanced between Germanic and Latin Europe, with a rich language that fuses both traditions.

“And Norseman and Negro and Gaul and Greek Drank with the Britons in Barking Creek”

Rudyard Kipling

The London 2012 Olympics™ were a magic time.

Imperial history adds more layers of richness. Great Britain is a Scottish concept, London an Irish city, we’re all Jamaicans now and right across South Asia schoolboys, who may never visit Yorkshire, do impressions of ‘Sir’ Geoffrey Boycott.

Stuart Hall – Anglo-Jamaican sociologist – said: “In the modern World, if you ask someone where they come from expect a long story.” The people of this archipelago have a head-start on modernity, the Romano-British were hyphenated even before the Anglo-Saxons blew in.

Invite an elite selection of the one-track-minded to come and show off in the World crucible of London, revise the budget upwards as often as necessary and the resulting magic will shine through even the grey haze of McDonalds, mondialisation and militarism.

There’s appetite for change in British Society. Tony ‘mad-bomber’ Blair becomes prime minister and it’s hailed as a bright new morning. Diana Spencer is slaughtered in a car-wreck and the temper of the nation is supposed to have changed forever. Men are finally jailed for killing Stephen Lawrence and nothing will ever be the same. Expect the current, sorely belated revision of the Hillsborough Stadium crush narrative (what an emborisment) to generate the same kind of waffle and Ferry Lane, Tottenham Hale to be renamed Mark Duggan Boulevard amid a blizzard of insincere apologies around 2035?

The great festival of running and jumping is the latest candidate for ‘nothing-will-ever-be-the-same’ status. Let’s not get carried away.

The golden trio of Greg Rutherford, Jessica Ennis and Mohammed ‘Mo’ Farrah inspired a joke that’s funny and progressive…

“A ginger, a mixed-race woman and a Somali refugee walk into a pub…

…and everyone cheers.”

…while in other news the UK border agency are spitefully terminating the courses of a load of people – who’ve spent thousands on studying in this country – only because they happen to come from outside the European Economic Community.

I enjoyed the Olympics – an all day roadside drinking session in the Mole Valley, hearing a prolonged chant of “One, Two, Tree.” boom joyfully down the street on the night of the men’s 200 metres final, a trip to the Paralympic athletics with my Grandsons – but it’s now a relief not to hear the propaganda, about Olympopolis being ex-wasteland, repeated almost every day by Sebastian Coe, Tessa Jowell or some other land-grabbing liar who doesn’t give a fuck about grassroots sport or the prosperity and quiet enjoyment of the people of the Lower Lea Valley. Folks were working, living and recreating there before the bulldozers rolled in. The promised velo-park is not a gift. If secured it will be reparation.

The prolific web-log ‘Crap Cycling & Walking in Waltham Forest’ – said by some to be the work of Ron Binns, an old comrade from the glory days of the NO M11 Link Road Campaign and former editor of ‘Walk’ magazine – usefully highlights the first promised deadline of the ‘morning-after’ era. I’d have asked for permission to reproduce the images and copy but CrapWalthamForest doesn’t take comments. So here they are pirated. If you are Ron Binns or any other brain behind CWF feel free to endorse or object.

15th October 2012

By this date these temporary and highly controversial structures built for the Olympics on green open space in the Lea Valley (including, naturally, a tarmac car park), will have been demolished and the entire site will have been returned to green, grassy space where local residents are free to wander. Nothing can possibly go wrong and there is no reason to believe that this deadline will not be met. Trust them – they’re Waltham Forest Council.

Let the ‘Legacy Wars’ begin.

mixed messages (part 1)

I’ve moved, five kilometres and two villages north-northwest; from West Hackney, London, E8 to West Green, London, N17.

West Hackney is a centre of bicycle paradise, where – in certain demographics – cycling is the default non-walking mode. As a former coordinator of the London Cycling Campaign in Hackney I naturally like to assume most of the credit for this.

Inner London is the easiest place in Britain to travel by bike. Bicycling makes sense, distances are short and nobody is surprised to find cycle-traffic on the road. There’s a convincing case that Outer London is the worst place in Britain to travel by bike.

My new locale – on the ragged coastline where Inner and Outer London bleed into each other – is an ideal place to savour the current era of mixed messages. A time when people who choose to travel by bike may be treated as heroic role-models for a sustainable future; or as vermin.

Here’s a junction on St. Ann’s Road in South Tottenham. One arm of the mini-roundabout crossroads is obstructed by a galvanised fence. You can get through walking but it’s awkward. On a bike you may dismount and walk or creep awheel, across the pinched foot-way as a guest. If you go for this riding option there’s no obvious way to rejoin the highway.

almost a closed road

A banner is currently hanging beside the barrier.

‘Turn over a new leaf, leave your car at home.’ Nearly half the households in Haringey – my new home borough – do not own a car so this dopey message ignores the majority of the local population. Do it’s authors want me to buy a car so I can leave it at home, or would they be satisfied if I just joined a car club?

Meanwhile, down on Southgate Road, London N1, where Northchurch road crosses from the LB Hackney into LB Islington there’s a crossroads with a similar layout except instead of a galvanised fence there’s a modal filter. And no banner pleading lamely for behavioural change.

modal filter

Armstrong’s greatest achievement?

As the endgame of Lance Armstrong’s fall develops let’s remember that as well as a former hero he is a man.

As the endgame of Lance Armstrong’s fall develops let’s remember that as well as a former hero he is a man; son of a teenage single-mother, a professional athlete – in the infant sport of triathlon – from his teens. Remember also the pathetic fate of his baldy-headed, jug-eared rival ‘Elephantino’.Don’t consider these people to be super-human. The beauty of their achievement rests on the fact that they have only two arms, two legs and two lungs, one heart and one brain. They are people like us. They are not super-humans, and they don’t become evil incarnate when it turns out they crossed an arbitrary line. Dishonesty and hypocrisy are deplorable, compassion and empathy, virtues.

Lance and Sheryl met at a charity dinner in 2003. Sheryl Crow is ten years older than Lance. He was the winningest professional bike racer in the World, she a big-time rock’n’roll singer. It’s reported Sheryl suggested they go on a bike ride. ‘The coffee grinder’ managed the request well enough that their romance lasted for three years.

The ability to ride a bike very fast is useful when you’re in a race or some other big hurry; for example rushing to catch a ferryboat. The ability to ride very fast is instructive for slower riders, as it is very likely to be – in part – the product of efficiency.

Economy of effort is a target, an object worthy of study for all. Make it look easy, or – at the very least – no harder than you want it to be. Efficiency can be used to arrive at the opera-house with every eye-lash, every grain of foundation, in perfect order, or to cover 40 kilometres in 55 minutes and pass the timekeeper with a beard of drool and snot; both are manifestations of control.

Many hard-riding, performance cyclists eschew ‘junk miles‘, a habit they carry into retirement. Does Ivan Basso ride with his wife? Did Jan Ullrich ever undertake a courtship by acting as amateur reiseführer? For me L.A.’s greatest achievement – the sign he really has some idea how to ride a bike – is his proven ability to ride slowly. Although, to be fair, some of his chosen leisure riding partners have been more than somewhat questionable.

“…so tell me Lance? Why exactly is the Pope against the war?”

brand new bag

Own the city any way you can with this brand-new concept in urban mobility. Designed for speed and easy access, the EASTPAK Velow Collection lets you grab, stash and carry your stuff however you choose to get around. On the road: a stack of high-visibility features make this the bag to be seen with. Underground: the integrated metro card holder lets you tag on and off without even lifting a finger.

“Own the city any way you can with this brand-new concept in urban mobility. Designed for speed and easy access, the EASTPAK Velow Collection lets you grab, stash and carry your stuff however you choose to get around. On the road: a stack of high-visibility features make this the bag to be seen with. Underground: the integrated metro card holder lets you tag on and off without even lifting a finger.”

Riding a bike is better than walking because you’re sitting down. You also get somewhere to hang your handbag. This is a Faustian compact because – if you want to be reliable – you need a bag for your puncture tools. Of course you could ride solid tyres…

…but for that to be practical, at least one of the wheels needs to be preposterously big, to eat up the bumps.

Handbags may be a stereotypically female accessory but really obsessing about what exactly you need to carry is more of a bloke thing; check – for example – Everyday-carry a US-based site where guys compare their penknives and wristwatches. I understand the term ‘guy’ can be gender-neutral in the USA, but guess they’re mostly men?

Maybe it’s because worrying about whether your watch-strap matches your wallet, or the precise make and model of your cigarette-lighter is quite gay – that’s ‘gay’ in the ‘theatrical’ sense nothing to do with sexuality – that an alarming number of the featured pocket-dumps include knives – clearly meant for more than slicing malt-loaf – and firearms? As in… “I may be a detail-oriented hair-stylist but I have got a pistol”.

Eastpak – a noted luggage brand that began by supplying kit to the US military – have moved into the bicycle bag market – they must have been watching – Timbuk2, Crumpler, Chrome, etc. – apparently people use courier bags on the bus? Another symptom that we are unvanishing.

rugged

My dealer passed on an invitation to the launch party – he knows I’ll go to the opening of an envelope – where I was presented with a nice example in butch shades of black and grey, which makes coordination with shoes and handlebar-tape less of a headache. Like most Eastpak products it comes with a thirty year warranty which – at my time of life – is a lifetime guarantee.

Two loops on the flap are meant for red lights but I channelled the roughty-toughty aesthetic by hanging my Lezyne, Micro Floor Drive HPG on with two Zéfal – Eugène Christophe – toe-straps in white leather. This not only makes me look vaguely like a firefighter, paramedic or security consultant, it also means I’m always carrying two extra toe-straps. Their original function may have been superseded by more practical downhill-ski spin-offs, but toe-straps have more applications than anything made by Gerber, Victorinox or Leatherman. I can also never make the schoolboy-error of going beyond walking distance without a hand-compressor.

Courier bags are useful because…

…you don’t have to worry about luggage security when parking, the bag goes with you.
…anything delicate is isolated from road-shock by the rider’s body.
…they work well when carrying only a tube, two levers, a little pump and a ‘D’ lock but can also easily accommodate £35 pounds of impulse-purchase groceries.

Just as the Dunwich Dynamo musette (still available while stocks last)

…is a reworking of the traditional throwaway item…

…the Eastpak Velow isn’t really a courier bag.

Couriers need – or used to need? – instant access to letters and packages with minimum fuss. The Eastpak Velow has two plastic buckles, and Velcro™, and a zip; not authentic but – unless you’re pushing parcels on piecework – much more practical.

The Velow has a pocket in the bottom for an ‘Oyster Card’ which I’d always assumed was something to do with seafood but is, apparently, some kind of bus pass?

who is killing who?

Reader – and black-belt bollard farmer – Richard Lewis asks this pertinent question… “In a recent post you asked whether Wiggins’ victory would make more people cycle. Now, the question is, could he be the agent to undo progress with cycling as a transport mode in this country, if the risk-averse and anti-cycling lobby hear what he says and make helmet-wearing compulsory? Shouldn’t he just stick to his day job?”

Reader – and black-belt bollard farmer – Richard Lewis asks this pertinent question…

“In a recent post you asked whether Wiggins’ victory would make more people cycle. Now, the question is, could he be the agent to undo progress with cycling as a transport mode in this country, if the risk-averse and anti-cycling lobby hear what he says and make helmet-wearing compulsory? Shouldn’t he just stick to his day job?”

It is indeed unfortunate that Wiggins was drawn into commenting on the tragic slaughter of Dan Harris. Interpret Wiggins remarks as misplaced professionalism. He was asked a question and gave an answer. Talking to the press is part of his day job. The fact that Wiggins’ remarks are widely reported as if he were an expert on public health is another manifestation of ‘you-cyclists-are-all-the-same’ foolishness which treats people who ride bikes as a homogeneous out-group.

Wiggins is not an expert on public heath. Indeed his chosen métier takes him into the elevated area of performance where health and fitness – which normally complement each other well – diverge drastically.

People get unnecessarily aerated about crash-hats for utility cycle riders because they don’t want to talk about more important stuff. The main thing about helmets for cycling is that they’re a marginal issue, not that important. It’s usually best to avoid getting drawn into arguments about them and move onto something more significant.

We need to be vigilant against creeping normalisation of helmets – for anything other than antagonistic sports riding – and to challenge the exaggerated value some people assign them, despite the very modest claims made by their manufacturers and testers. As this belief is often quasi-spiritual the challenge needs to be made gently to avoid putting
people on the defensive.

It’s a mistake to encourage or discourage an adult to wear – or not wear – a helmet. For adults personal risk assessment is best left to the individual.

Lot’s of people wear bicycle crash-hats on the back of their heads – where they can’t protect their brows and cheek bones in a forward fall – or with the straps so loose the helmet would be useless in an impact. Their helmet is a lucky charm, some kind of bulky and awkward St. Christopher or Ganesh. I once heard a youth worker – with ambitions to become a cycling instructor – say:- “So long as I’m wearing my helmet I feel safe.”

You can find everything – and probably more – than you need to know clearly and calmly expressed here. This page – in particular – is a useful corrective for people who imagine a helmet will protect them in anything beyond a relatively minor impact. It also stresses the importance of correct adjustment. If a helmet is worn it needs to fit, and be held firmly in the right place otherwise it’s value is only symbolic, which is at best no value, and may increase your risk of injury.

It’s true that in Spain national outrage following the running down and death of Ricardo and maiming of Javier, Otxoa led eventually to – lightly enforced – helmet compulsion. In Britain – where bicycle madness has bitten deeper – we who take a professional or amateur interest in public health can use any hysteria over crash hats to rehearse the important truths about who is killing whom.

Use the following simile with care – it’s inflammatory – but nonetheless instructive. When a person who doesn’t travel by bike tells somebody that does travel by bike that they ought to wear a crash-hat it’s not at the same level of infamy as people who aren’t Jews telling Jews to wear yellow stars but there is a clear equivalence.

regeneration?

As London was basking in the first weeks of the Wiggins era, following… on Wednesday the very evening of Wiggin’s coronation at Hampton Court – over at Olympopolis on the Lower Lea, a man driving a bus ran over, and slaughtered a man riding a bike

As London was basking in the first weeks of the Wiggins era, following…

…Friday’s star turn in the opening ceremony

…Saturday’s demonstration of loyalty and fallibility – like a circus performer falling off the tightrope on purpose to remind the audience that she only makes it look easy

…on Wednesday the very evening of Wiggin’s coronation at Hampton Court – over at Olympopolis on the Lower Lea, a man driving a bus ran over, and slaughtered a man riding a bike.

Suburban land-use encourages and enables motor-dependance. It also encourages careless and reckless driving. Reports state that the bus – an ‘Olympic bus’ – was ferrying journalists between venues. I expect the passengers were delayed and distracted by their involvement in this terrible systems failure? Maybe it would have been more practical, more reliable to encourage and enable them to travel by bike?