Roadmap to the Future, OnEarth Magazine, NRDC From the comments on my last
bike zealot post:
Anonymous: Also, let's say, as you assert early on, that biking only displaces transit trips, no auto trips. This is like being a chess player who thinks only one move ahead, but let's run with this for now. It's still more environmentally efficient than transit in terms of energy input, wear and tear on infrastructure, etc. My reply: I don't see how a flashy bike network plunked down in the middle of NYC -- that does nothing to ensure the orderly bike traffic necessary to scale-up bike use -- does anything but put on a show. The U.S. grew on and will choke on cheap energy, and the heart of the problem is in the suburbs, not in city centers served by mass transit.
To elaborate a little, arguments like "It's still more environmentally efficient" make no sense. The environmental benefits of urban biking are essentially zero now, and bike use would have to radically increase for it to make a measurable dent in energy use. But how can urban biking scale-up when bikers refuse to be held to the same standard of behavior as other vehicle users, like motorcyclists? The idea that bikers deserve special treatment because their
personal vehicles don't pollute is ridiculous -- congested cities should not encourage personal vehicle use, tailpipe or not. As for the "chess" argument, my favorite environmental organization for years has been the
National Resources Defense Council, or NRDC. It's a dogged and hard-headed group that's been happy to do the hard work -- getting governments and manufacturers to live up to their responsibilities and adhere to tighter standards -- while groups like Greenpeace work the headlines and the Sierra Club dabbles in tourism. At any rate, I just happened to see the NRDC magazine's "Roadmap to the Future" feature on reducing energy use a few days ago, pictured above, and looked for bikes.
Bikes do play a part, but a tiny one, in the last panel of the story (closeup above left). And I'm sad to say that even the NRDC did not think things through, because the bikes appear to be whizzing right through pedestrians boarding a train, just like New Bloomberg City has bikers slicing through tourists on the Brooklyn Bridge, above right. Still, in the Roadmap to the Future, bikes barely beat out the gnat-sized Segway contingent. Note: The same issue of OnEarth also has a great interview with
E.O. Wilson.
1 comment:
Its not so much the pro-biking policy, its the brain dead way the city is doing this. There simply isn't enough room on the Brooklyn Bridge for both bicyclists and pedestrians (though it also true there have been so many tourists there they should start charging admission. Why has the city gotten so clogged with tourists recently?).
There are four East River bridges, all with pedestrian walkways. Two for bicyclists only, two for pedestrians only. That's not so hard. And that is without making the car lanes on one for bicyclists, because obviously that is out of the question.
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