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Friday, March 01, 2002

13:57    archived     No dear, it's not the road
Roads aren't dangerous.

No, they are not. They are not dangerous and it doesn't matter whether you are driving, cycling, walking or even rolling around on the ground, roads, in general, are not dangerous. Car drivers are.

Allow me to demonstrate by means of a thought experiment.

Cyclists are "encouraged" (as Devon and Cornwall Constabulary put it) to use the cycle paths for their own safety. Cycle paths are seen as being more safe. Alright then, what happens if we allow scooters onto shared use paths. Are they safe then? What about motorcycles? Would you consider the path to be safe if motorcycles were charging up and down?

No? Was that an "Of course not!"? So the difference is..... the presence of motor vehicles? Yes? So if we were to take the cars off the road then the road wouldn't be dangerous?

It's not the road at all. The road is as safe as the pavement - safer in many circumstances because it is wider and better maintained. Take all the cars off the road and you have a brilliant piece of surface, wide, with good visibility and even topography. What makes cycling on roads dangerous is the car drivers, sitting at the controls of a tonne of metal while talking on their mobiles, trying to change the tape, light a fag, worrying about the kids, the shopping, the affair, or being distracted by screaming brats in the back or a host of other things.

So, if we say that we are going to solve this problem by removing cyclists from the roads and shoving them onto paths with pedestrians, thereby introducing a greater hazard risk for both cyclist (pedestrians don't obey traffic regulations) and pedestrian (cyclists have some metal underneath them and go quite fast), we are saying that we are condoning dangerous driving habits and that we don't care much about pedestrian or cyclist safety. Not as much as we do about car drivers being allowed to drive carelessly and dangerously. What we say, when we demand to have cycle paths installed or say that roads are dangerous, is that car drivers are right to behave the way that they do. We say that we are going to take lying down behaviour that would be unacceptable in any other context. We say that we are going to step aside and allow anti-social, physically threatening behaviour to go on right in front of us and do nothing about it.

Roads are not dangerous. Roads would be less hazardous if more people got out of their cars and onto their bikes, or walked. The fewer hazards, the more people would feel it was safe to ride. The more people who feel it is safe to ride, the fewer hazards. And so on and so forth. It is a glorious feedback loop.

We have to start somewhere. A car nearly took me off this morning, but I took a deep breath and got on with it. Sometimes I fantasise about being hit by a car, to have my day in court, to make it as public as possible so that I could have a chance to make others question their assumptions. Traffic policy shouldn't be about what piece of tarmac goes where - it should be about our attitudes towards our rights and freedoms. Just as the USA is standing there, petulantly saying that we cannot impinge on their freedom to make money in order to save our planet, car drivers complain about curtailing of personal freedoms when they are responsible for destroying those freedoms for so many others.

Driving a car is not a right to which one is entitled. It is a privilege, and it is a privilege that should be used wisely because it is a privilege that can and does impact negatively on the freedom of others. Those others are granting you the freedom to use your car and they are paying for it with their sanity, their health, their open spaces, their freedom to breathe clean air. Be courteous, be considerate, be kind, be grateful.

12:24    archived     Fear

I rediscovered this today:

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are more powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?' Actually, who are we not to be? Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to manifest the glory that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our fears, our presence automatically liberates others."

Nelson Mandela's inaugural speech, 1994


 

Wednesday, February 27, 2002

14:23    archived    
I just had to change my trousers. My other leggings were making the skin fall off my legs. Might be the washing powder. Bloody hurts. So I changed back into my cycling leggings, which are at least fleecy on the inside. I'm standing in the photocopier room cursing at the machine for taking so long to copy and Phil (non-consensus) sidles up to me in a manner that would have been Coyote-esque if it hadn't been so forthright, and says "Have you any idea how damn gorgeous you look in those?" I spluttered and coughed and said something along the lines of "You what?!" Then I realised I had spoken out loud.

Ah well.

13:31    archived     Trainsong

I love travelling by train. I used to hate it. Trains, planes, automobiles - all modes of transport that present certain problems for an empath, involving, as they do, being shut up in a metal box with other people. Cars, being of limited size, are not really a problem any more, especially as I can quite happily go to sleep in a car. Planes are still a bit of an issue, especially as the problem is quite difficult to explain. You can't really start rambling on, wide-eyed and staring, to a stewardess about critical density and Faraday cages.

Trains, now trains I have come to love. The secret is the personal stereo. I couldn't do it without one. Music piped directly to one's ears is a great way of shutting out a great mass of signal from other people, and I can stop worrying about 3D enough to give the visual input as much realism as a cinema screen. The empathy is still impossible to block, but trains don't seem to make very good Faraday cages, so that's just a question of focusing outside.

If you can ignore smell (occasionally difficult), you are left with the extraordinary experience of travelling effortlessly through an ever-changing landscape to your own personal soundtrack, complete with a peculiarly soothing, almost sub-sonic, thrumming vibration from the train itself. I have found nothing else so conducive to visionary experiences as a long, solo (important) train journey, preferably in daylight, accompanied by nothing more than a selection of tapes and something on which to play them.

Select a tape, set the mood. Classic FM is another favourite choice. The Land slides by just beyond reach, green hills and collapsing walls inviting speculation. Everything shifts, presenting a series of vignettes that blend together and yet are nevertheless separate. Distant topography appears mysterious; nearby urban landscapes somehow devoid of context and surreal. I am teased by glimpses of silvery water, haunted by the possibilities represented by the warm, friendly glow in a farmhouse window.

The band plays on. Scenery whips past. Houses right next to the track now, gone as soon as they are there. In addition to the train's rumbling I can hear the occasional whoosh as we speed past a track-side structure. The light is failing and the Land seems both to be shifting with a greater sense of urgency and not shifting at all. In the growing darkness it is difficult to see with my eyes but I can feel it swimming through my outwardly-turned senses. I stare through the window at the night.

When all there is is a shifting world and the thread of the music, there is no need to have form. Freed from the gravity of context, my mind can breathe.

I love travelling by train.