Cyclists' Safety: It Became Personal For Her

Yesterday, I wrote about how a beloved member of his cycling community is being commemorated:  The University of Texas at San Antonio opened the Tito Bradshaw Bicycle Repair Shop in a former information booth.

The reason why he's being commemorated is, unfortunately, terrible:  He was killed by an intoxicated driver while riding his bike.

Sometimes, it seems, it takes the death of a cyclist or pedestrian to bring the issue home and spur people into action--that is, when someone isn't trying to blame the cyclist, or cyclists in general, even if the driver was drunk, high, distracted or driving with a suspended license (or no license at all).  

For Chesley Ann Epley Cobbs (Does that sound like a Southern name, or what?), the issue of safety came home, literally, when her brother was killed while riding his bicycle in Oklahoma City.  


As personal as the issue is for her, she made the point that cyclists' safety is vital to the redevelopment of her city.  "Having safe and protected bike lanes connecting our downtown communities secures the safety of getting to and from those places of well-being and entertainment that you are working so hard to build and elevate our great state," she said in a hearing at City Hall.

She found a receptive audience in at least two City Council members.  One, Jo Beth Hamon, described rides that "should take minutes" but take much longer because "going through the neighborhoods, there was no connection" between bike lanes.  As a result, she had to cross major thoroughfares, including a highway, to take what is a typical days' ride for her.

Another Council Member, James Cooper, connected the safety of cyclists and pedestrians to the overall livability of the city.  In addition to a lack of cycling infrastructure, he said that sidewalks are unsafe "in even our most walkable neighborhood, award-winning neighborhood."  He wondered how "a child" could "get safely to school, to a park" in the conditions he described.

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The Council members and Ms. Epley Cobbs spoke at a public proposal meeting on how to spend public funding earmarked for public facilities.  I hope that others in the decision-making process--in other places as well as Oklahoma City--understand what Ms. Epley Cobbs, Ms. Hamon and Mr. Cooper are trying to say:  Ensuring the safety of people who get around without motor vehicles is a vital part of a modern city's development, or redevelopment.  

Tito Bradshaw: Keeping Up His Memory, And Work

Every community needs to memorialize its heroes, advocates, champions and friends.  In that way, we in the cycling community are no different.

We're not (at least here in the US) yet at the point of having monuments, buildings, streets, plazas or even corners named after bicycling advocates.  But we may be moving in that direction, if in small ways and a few locations.

One of those locales is San Antonio--specifically, the University of Texas campus in that city.  There, an old information booth has been turned into the Tito Bradshaw Bicycle Repair Shop.

Tito Bradshaw/. Photo by Scott Ball.

Now, the fact that a campus structure has been re-purposed as a bicycle repair shop shows us that the bicycling community has some sort of presence at the school.  Just as important, the fact that it's been named after Tito Bradshaw means that at least some people within that community--and at least a few outside it--know about his work as an activist and the owner of Bottom Bracket Bicycle Shop.

Plans to convert the booth into a repair shop were already in the works when, in May, he was struck and killed by an intoxicated  driver while riding his bicycle.  He was only 35 years old.  Now, we can hope, his work and community spirit will continue--and expand.

Cyclists on bridge memorialize Tito Bradshaw. Photo by Bonnie Arbitter.

She's 14. And She's Black. That Can Only Mean....

Mary Barton found herself lying on the ground, her hands cuffed behind her.

She rode her bike on someone's property. Or so the owner of said property said.  Said property owner called the police.  Two officers showed up.  One of them told her she could leave, but the second officer told her to stop.

Officer #2 claimed the bike was stolen and demanded identification.  She said she didn't have to produce it  (Apparently, she was paying attention in her civics class!) and, furthermore, the bike is hers and she's had it since December.  Then the cop pulled out his pepper spray and told her to call her mom. 

Mary Burton is 14 years old.  If you haven't already watched the video, you might have guessed that she's black.  Oh, and she's in North Little Rock, Arkansas.

Her brother, a year older, rushes to her aid and both are up against the police car.  Mary fell to the ground, her hands cuffed behind her.

Well, I guess those cops at least believe in gender equality:  Usually, it's the guys who get stopped for riding a bicycle (or driving) while black.