Something is happening on the streets of London. Where did all the bicycles come from?
I’ve been cycling to work, on-and-off, for a couple of years now, and I’ve never seen so many bikes on the road.
This morning, stopped at a junction, I counted more than a dozen comrades-in-saddles. When the lights changed and we pushed off, en masse, we filled the entire width of the carriageway.
It almost felt like a protest – a Critical Mass without whistles. No more cowering in the gutters - we owned the road - but only for a few seconds. A moment later our party thinned and, sadly, the cars reclaimed the streets.
I’ve experienced several of these spontaneous critical masses now, and they seem to be getting more frequent. It made me wonder where all this is heading. We’ve seen an 83% increase in cycling on London’s roads since 2000, and I don’t see any sign that things are slowing down.
How has this come about? We were lucky to have, in Ken Livingstone, a true champion of two wheels for eight years. I'm still gutted Ken's super-highways are now unlikely to see the light of day, choked at birth by the worst kind of dumb blond.
More recently, we've had a bit of sunshine - that always helps a few more hop on their bikes. Nothing beats the feeling of wind in your helmet.
And then there's the tube. The tube in summer was the trigger for my switch to the saddle in 2006. I couldn’t bear it any longer.
Nowadays I have a sneaking admiration for those who still take the Escalator of Doom down to the bowels of the city every day for a sweat-soaked hour of hell. And then do it again on the way home.
It always surprises me when transport bosses boast about squeezing more people onto the tube than ever before. Apparently it already carries more passengers than the entire national rail network. Does it really need any more?
But all this is good news for the capital’s 'cycling community'. The worse the trains, the more appealing the pedals. And the more people who bike, the less likely they are to die. Figures show London’s cycling boom was accompanied by a 31% fall in the number of cyclists killed or seriously injured. It’s safety in numbers.
What happens next? Will the approaching cold, dark autumn and the inevitable English rain snuff out this foetal cycling revolution?
Or will the movement continue to grow, inching towards some kind of unstoppable tipping point? I do hope it's the latter.
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Wednesday 30 July 2008
Tuesday 29 July 2008
A little sugar coating
My younger brother has gone off to Paris for a couple of weeks to hang about in cafes and discover the beating hearts of the French, eat croissants.
To prepare for his trip he watched a couple of films to get him in an appropriately French frame of mind. His choices? Amelie and Paris, Je T’aime.
I know, it’s a bit like watching Mary Poppins and Notting Hill to get a feel for London. But perhaps there’s no harm in a little sugar coating from time to time*. Don’t most of us, as visitors, try to project on to a place whatever it is we are looking to find there anyway? It's not as if coming back from a trip with brutal memories and dashed hopes is going to fix a city's social problems.
Before I went to New York, Woody Allen's wonderful cinematic tributes had led me to suspect that most, if not all, New Yorkers were neurotic intellectuals with a penchant for complicated relationships. Sadly, that turned out not to be the case - and whatever happened to the jazz soundtrack? Still, I'm pretty sure it was the Woodster’s efforts, particularly Annie Hall and Manhattan, that ensured I was too busy focusing on the magic of his home city, like those amazing skyscrapers, to notice much of the grimmer, grimier reality on the ground.
So if people want to imagine London as a warm-hearted town full of books and stained glass and well-meaning children who aren't capable of stabbing anyone, or Paris as a dreamy stage for fairytales, romance and Carla Bruni, then good luck to them.
After all, I shouldn’t think sitting through La Haine or Irreversible would have made my brother’s croissants taste any nicer.
*Within reason. Too much sugar can rot the brain. Stay away from Love Actually.
Some good films set in London (in descending order of quality):
Withnail and I
Shaun of the Dead
Children of Men
Notes on a Scandal
Closer
This Year’s Love
Scenes of a Sexual Nature
Face
Match Point
Read more!
To prepare for his trip he watched a couple of films to get him in an appropriately French frame of mind. His choices? Amelie and Paris, Je T’aime.
I know, it’s a bit like watching Mary Poppins and Notting Hill to get a feel for London. But perhaps there’s no harm in a little sugar coating from time to time*. Don’t most of us, as visitors, try to project on to a place whatever it is we are looking to find there anyway? It's not as if coming back from a trip with brutal memories and dashed hopes is going to fix a city's social problems.
Before I went to New York, Woody Allen's wonderful cinematic tributes had led me to suspect that most, if not all, New Yorkers were neurotic intellectuals with a penchant for complicated relationships. Sadly, that turned out not to be the case - and whatever happened to the jazz soundtrack? Still, I'm pretty sure it was the Woodster’s efforts, particularly Annie Hall and Manhattan, that ensured I was too busy focusing on the magic of his home city, like those amazing skyscrapers, to notice much of the grimmer, grimier reality on the ground.
So if people want to imagine London as a warm-hearted town full of books and stained glass and well-meaning children who aren't capable of stabbing anyone, or Paris as a dreamy stage for fairytales, romance and Carla Bruni, then good luck to them.
After all, I shouldn’t think sitting through La Haine or Irreversible would have made my brother’s croissants taste any nicer.
*Within reason. Too much sugar can rot the brain. Stay away from Love Actually.
Some good films set in London (in descending order of quality):
Withnail and I
Shaun of the Dead
Children of Men
Notes on a Scandal
Closer
This Year’s Love
Scenes of a Sexual Nature
Face
Match Point
Read more!
Monday 28 July 2008
Difficult second post (Batman)
I quite enjoy ludicrous analogies between politics and pop culture. They make even the most tedious of subjects seem so new, so “now”! So you can imagine how pleased I was to come across an interpretation of the new Batman film as “a paean of praise to the fortitude and moral courage” of George W. Bush.
According to Andrew Klavan in the Wall Street Journal, President Bush is the real-life embodiment of the Dark Knight because, like Batman, he is “vilified and despised for confronting terrorists in the only terms they understand”.
There's more. You know that beam of light they project into the night sky to rouse our cinematic superhero? That’s not a bat – it’s a “W”.
Disturbingly, rather than dismiss this love letter out of hand as a laughable attempt to salvage some admiration for a politically bankrupt leader, I fear Klavan may have a point. The “terms” of confrontation adopted by Bush and Batman do seem comparable in some respects, although perhaps not in the way he intended.
[Enter the spoilers…]
Batman kidnaps (extraordinarily renders, if you like) a dodgy businessman from Hong Kong and dumps him outside a Gotham police station, no doubt flagrantly breaching all kinds of diplomatic niceties. He listens in on the phone calls of the entire city without authorisation, and he beats up the bad guy to extract information.
Bush, as if we need reminding, is content to stretch a few rules too, initiating a secret programme of wiretapping without warrants, detaining suspects indefinitely without charge and torturing those who fail to co-operate.
That said, and without seeking in any way to undermine what is in many ways a wonderfully crafted edifice of bollocks, Klavan’s analogy falls down when it comes to the respective characters’ willingness to follow through.
While Batman resiles from killing the nasty Joker when he has the chance on more than one occasion, instead handing him over to the authorities to be dealt with under the rule of law, Bush pursues his enemies violently and ruthlessly as he struggles to secure world domination at any cost.
Bush's indelible link to human suffering, combined with a special talent for leaving chaos and instability in his wake, recall an entirely different character from the movie. He may be vilified and despised, but he’s no superhero.
Read more!
According to Andrew Klavan in the Wall Street Journal, President Bush is the real-life embodiment of the Dark Knight because, like Batman, he is “vilified and despised for confronting terrorists in the only terms they understand”.
There's more. You know that beam of light they project into the night sky to rouse our cinematic superhero? That’s not a bat – it’s a “W”.
Disturbingly, rather than dismiss this love letter out of hand as a laughable attempt to salvage some admiration for a politically bankrupt leader, I fear Klavan may have a point. The “terms” of confrontation adopted by Bush and Batman do seem comparable in some respects, although perhaps not in the way he intended.
[Enter the spoilers…]
Batman kidnaps (extraordinarily renders, if you like) a dodgy businessman from Hong Kong and dumps him outside a Gotham police station, no doubt flagrantly breaching all kinds of diplomatic niceties. He listens in on the phone calls of the entire city without authorisation, and he beats up the bad guy to extract information.
Bush, as if we need reminding, is content to stretch a few rules too, initiating a secret programme of wiretapping without warrants, detaining suspects indefinitely without charge and torturing those who fail to co-operate.
That said, and without seeking in any way to undermine what is in many ways a wonderfully crafted edifice of bollocks, Klavan’s analogy falls down when it comes to the respective characters’ willingness to follow through.
While Batman resiles from killing the nasty Joker when he has the chance on more than one occasion, instead handing him over to the authorities to be dealt with under the rule of law, Bush pursues his enemies violently and ruthlessly as he struggles to secure world domination at any cost.
Bush's indelible link to human suffering, combined with a special talent for leaving chaos and instability in his wake, recall an entirely different character from the movie. He may be vilified and despised, but he’s no superhero.
Read more!
I am a Blogger
If you'd told me ten years ago that one day I'd become a blogger, I'd have said "wha?". But here I am. Apparently if I write it they will read it. So welcome bloggees. Welcome to my Thought Shed. In the coming decades you'll be able to hear and enjoy my views on everything from politics to culture, via media, food, science and space exploration. All the big issues, plus some of the fringier ones too. Buckle your seatbelts.
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