The Myth of the Open Road
I bike pretty much everywhere in the city these days. But I also have a driver’s license and 16 years of driving experience. And occasionally I still drive. Like the other day I ended up driving across town to run an errand. Now, if you live anywhere near a city, you know that the driving experience is not exactly as advertised:
It’s a little bit more like this:
Which is not a good advertisement for cars. But this is exactly what I found myself driving in.
After my errand, I decided I wanted to stay out. I was hungry and there are great restaurants downtown. And some shops too. (I know, because I discovered them all by bike.) But in a car, I realized that I couldn’t casually go to any of them. I was trapped…
…and had to pass them by. It was like I was carrying the weight of the car rather than it carrying me. And I was tired. So I went straight home instead. Cars are useful, but driving in a city is kind of like trying to thread a needle while wearing a boxing glove.
As usual you have hit the nail on the proverbial head. I am fortunate to live very close to a hub of shops and restaurants and almost without fail when I drive there instead of walking/biking I literally spend more time looking for parking that I do driving to where I want to go, whereas with the bike -it ain’t no thang to find a spot to lock up.
Entirely way too much time and energy is (mis)spent glorifying the bicycle (rider) and scorning the automobile (driver).
Well, there is something to be said for glorifying cyclists – after all, cycling does have a certain iconoclasm to it. It’s a kind of new frontier of independence and rugged individualism in a culture that has always secretly despised all those things even as it pretends to be defined by them. Essentially, in a world in which nothing has come along in 30 years to shake up the status quo, cycling is the new Punk.
And let’s face facts: motoring is no longer cool or individualistic – it no longer inspires independence of spirit, as it used to do when car ownership was somewhat rare. Driving a car used to be special, but now anyone can do it – worse – everyone is expected to do it. Not only is it not special – it’s boring! Despite the best efforts of marketing companies to make it appear cool, the car has become the modern equivalent of the pocket protector.
And as I said earlier, the car, thanks to its popularity, has become a ubiquitous horror – a disgusting blight on the environment and on our health. So its devotees naturally fall victim to some measure of scorn. The automobile ‘was’ a part of the new frontier back in the early 20th Century, but like so many revolutions, it eventually got stale and staid. It had its 15 minutes of fame but it wouldn’t get off the stage, and when something gets that stale, people start to look at it more critically, and let’s face it, the car (and motorists) do leave something to be desired. When people in the ‘in group’ kill a million people a year, and when they aren’t even interested in curtailing their own abuses, it kinda leaves a bad taste in the mouths of the ‘out group’. If motorists would stop the killings, stop the polluting, take their responsibilities a bit more seriously, then maybe they would deserve a bit less scorn.
And if you poll motorists, you find they don’t even like to drive! They are like abused spouses – they keep coming back because they just can’t imagine life any other way. The love affair was bound to end at some point. I’m just surprised the honeymoon lasted so long.
One thing is certain – when the last car finally goes the way of the dinosaur and we get our natural world back again, a lot of people will breathe a sigh of relief (mainly because they won’t risk choking when they take their next breath).
In the meantime, at the very least, motorists deserve scorn. It disappoints me that they don’t get a lot worse than that.
This is very true here in Toronto. There is a very good reason why downtown car commute mode share is at 26% and falling fast. That is because on major roads average car speeds are as low as 11 km/hr (6 miles per hour). And that is the average, achieved by averaging in a lot of zero speed. Here is a fascinating newspaper article about this:
http://www.torontosun.com/news/torontoandgta/2010/01/09/12401501-sun.html
One key thing about cycling is that commute times are always and predictably the same. Cyclists can simply go around an obstruction that completely blocks car drivers. Car trips take unpredictable amounts of time. If someone has a job where the boss expects them to show up at a certain time, it is just not feasible or practical to drive a car.
Cycling is simply the fastest, easiest and most convenient way of getting around. Interestingly enough, a lot of people on bicycles really don’t like cycling. They lead busy lives and are just trying to get to where they are going without wasting any time.
This. Is. Ace.
So many accurate observations in such a small panel.
I would only add a couple of additional things about not being able to stop in a car.
The biggy is when you’re suddenly unsure of your directions, or location, or if you want to change destination and therefore need to plan a new route. On my bike I hop onto the pavement (US: sidewalk) and get my map (or more likely phone GPS/google maps) out. In the car I often feel like I’m stuck with “keep driving and hope”. It feels really stressful.
Or when the phone rings? OK, there’s hands-free in the car, or just plain breaking the law (in the UK) by answering and driving. But so much nicer on the bike to just pull over carefully and stop for a quick chat.
Yep. Bussin’ & bikin’ it here for over a year now. I’ve discovered things on a bicycle that I would not normally have behind the wheel of a car. It’s liberating to be free of arbitrarily imposed taxes (speeding tickets, etc.) tags, insurance, and most of all, gasoline. In fact, I laugh uncontrollably each time I roll past a gas station.