Cycling And Recycling

Whenever I can, I volunteer with, donate to and buy from Recycle-A-Bicycle.  They, like similar programs in other places, re-use old bikes and parts that might otherwise have ended up in landfills. 

In my mind, bicycles and recycling are always linked.  Perhaps that's because the time when I first became a dedicated cyclist--the 1970s Bike Boom--also witnessed the first attempts to make recycling a mainstream idea. The first Earth Day several years earlier got people (some, anyway) to thinking about the environment.   People started using words like "ecology" and "pollution" in everyday conversations and started to see the value of things like emissions standards.

The problem was that both cycling and recycling became popular mainly among the young, the highly-educated and the upper-middle-class (or what someone I used to know called "The Volvo Set").  Blue-collar families and communities almost never included cyclists who were old enough to have drivers' licenses.  Also, they, like many whose lives were day-to-day struggles to survive, saw recycling and environmentalism as trifles of the elite. So, when the oil-price shocks of the mid and late '70s sent gas prices to levels Americans had never before imagined, instead of cycling or walking to work or for errands, working-class people clung ever more tightly to their automobiles, and saw environmentalism and recycling as threats to their ever-more-precarious job security.

Ronald Reagan and his conservative allies played on those fears and overlaid them with the notion that conservation was inherently un-Christian. Also, during that time, the price of petroleum and other commodities dropped or remained the same (so that they essentially became less expensive to those whose incomes were rising).  That further eroded whatever incentive people might have had to conserve and re-use.  In fact, because the cost of finding new petroleum and other natural resources had declined, it was actually much cheaper to manufacture new plastic, glass and other materials than it was to recycle them.  

It was also during that time that the number of adult cyclists, and the bike market, stagnated or even declined.  Sure, some of us were still riding for fun and transportation.  But, for years, we rarely saw new faces among those who were pedaling to work or the park.

During the past decade or so, the number of people choosing bikes instead of cars or even mass transportation has increased, at least in large urban areas.  Paris and other cities began their bike share programs, and new bike shops opened with a (and some established bike shops shifted their) focus on "city" bikes and other utilitarian bicycles.  At the same time, people started to take environmental concerns seriously in the wake of unusual weather and natural (as well as manmade) disasters.  Cities and towns began mandatory recycling programs, and increasing numbers of people have begun to make (or try to make) more environmentally-conscious choices in the ways they live, work, shop and get around.

It will be interesting to see whether the current interest in cycling and recycling continues if prices of petrol or other commodities continue to fall, or if we manage to halt or reverse environmental degradation.

Santa Claus Is Coming To Town--Without Dasher, Danner, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Dunder and Vixem--Or Rudolph

Nearly two years ago, Bill de Blasio became the Mayor of New York City.  Practically from the moment he assumed the office (or so it seems), he promised to ban horse carriages like the ones that carry tourists through and around Central Park.

He's faced a lot of opposition.  About two weeks ago it was revealed that he's backing down and seeking only a partial ban, whatever that may mean.

As you can imagine, animal rights activists aren't happy.  I can't blame them:  After all, horses simply weren't meant to walk on asphalt or concrete or to breathe smog.  (The streets around Central Park have some of the heaviest vehicular traffic in New York.)  They are used to help perpetuate a romantic fantasy about New York:  In the days when people rode carriages because there weren't other means of transportation (except, perhaps, for the horses themselves), this city was a darker, more dangerous and more squalid than it is now--unless you were very, very wealthy.

I have to wonder, though, how the animal rights activists (with whom I am in sympathy most of the time) would react to Santa and his reindeer.  Now, because Donner, Blitzen, et al, fly through the air, their hooves aren't subjected to the impact that horses experience on Gotham streets.  On the other hand, they are flying (I assume) at high altitudes. That means there would be less oxygen for them to breathe.  Also, the effects of pollutants are magnified--which, in turn, could initiate or magnify respiratory conditions.

I think I might have found a solution for Santa--and Bill de Blasio--that just might make the animal rights activists happy:

From Bing images.

Imagine!

Who said this?:

 "As a kid I had a dream – I wanted to own my own bicycle. When I got the bike I must have been the happiest boy in Liverpool, maybe the world. I lived for that bike. Most kids left their bike in the backyard at night. Not me. I insisted on taking mine indoors and the first night I even kept it in my bed."

One clue might be "Liverpool".  I mean the one in England, not the one in upstate New York (where the locals joke that their town is so named because it has the same kind of weather as the British port city).  When you think of people from Liverpool, who comes to mind first?

OK, you can be forgiven for saying "William Gladstone" or "Clive Barker"--or, for that matter, Kate Sheppard or Peter Shaffer.  But if you're of my generation and know even less than I do about British or women's history, there is only one answer you can give.

That answer is, of course, The Beatles.  And who was the most literate and articulate of the "Fab Four".  You guessed it:  John Lennon.

 

Somehow it's not a surprise that he had such a dream, or was so happy that it was realized.  He had his flaws, but in the end, I think he really meant what he wrote in "Imagine". 



Ironically and tragically, a deranged man with a gun ended his life, thirty-five years ago today.  

The ensuing years have not lessened the shock of his murder.  I often find myself playing his songs in my mind--or even humming or singing them--as I ride and do other things.  It's appropriate, I think:  If more people, especially in developed countries, rode bikes to work, school, shop, or simply for fun, we might come closer to having the sort of world he envisioned. 

The Attack That Deflated Balloon Tires

Seventy-four years ago today, the Japanese Imperial Navy launched a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.  Well, it was a surprise to most people, but some who were "in the know" saw the United States and Japan edging toward war for months before the attack.

Winston Churchill could barely conceal his glee:  At last the Americans would join his fight against Japan's nominal allies, Germany and Italy.  Never before, and never since, have Americans been so willing to go to war against another country.

It's almost a cliché to say that the attack, and US involvement in the World War, would change almost everything about American society and culture.  As an example, it could be argued that the War had as much of a role as any other event in bringing about the Civil Rights movements of the 1950s and 1960s.  Black American soldiers could sit at any café or pub table in Europe, but were separated from fellow citizens lighter than themselves within their own armed forces, not to mention in schools and other public places in their home towns, cities and states. 

Also, the war turned the wave of blacks migrating from the south to the north into a tidal wave, changing the face of numerous communities all over the United States. Having large numbers of African Americans concentrated in urban neighborhoods would make it easier for leaders to organize marches and other kinds of protests than it had been when the same people were dispersed over miles of southern countryside.  (Remember, this was decades before the Internet and Facebook!)

Now, since this is a bike blog, I have to tell you how the attack on Pearl Harbor--and the War--changed cycling, at least in this country.  At the time, the average adult bicyle weighed 57 pounds (about 26 kilos).  The government decreed that those bikes would be made ten pounds lighter, and that production of children's bicycles would cease altogether for the duration.

The reason for this change was that bicycles were being used in the military, and a lighter bike is easier to transport and maneuver.  Also, it used less of the materials that were rationed during wartime.   Those restrictions, of course, made fewer bicycles available for civilians to buy, but those who were able to get them discovered that they liked the lighter bikes.  Manufacturers took notice and started to make bikes lighter still.

Further accelerating the change in American bicycles were the machines service members saw--and sometimes brought back from--the places in which they fought.  The majority of the bikes to come to our shores came from England, but a few others came from Continental European countries.  Those bikes--yes, even the English three-speed and French "ballon" bikes--were lighter than the "lightweight" models American manufacturers were making during the war.

Could it be that if Pearl Harbor hadn't been attacked, we might still be riding on those balloon-tired Schwinns, Columbias and Huffys?  Hmm....

(Note:  I mean no offense to any of you who still remember--or experienced--the tragedies of that day that "will live on in infamy"!)

 

I Should Feel Guilty About This, But...

I know I should be worried about climate change. After all, so much of the world's economy, agricultural and otherwise, as well as much in our cultures, depends on the weather patterns we've had during the past few milennia.  If we in Western countries think we're having a "refugee crisis" now, to paraphrase Al Jolson, "We ain't seen nothin' yet."  We're just another drought or monsoon away from a veritable tidal wave of people with nothing. And, to quote the immortal Bob Dylan, "When you ain't got nothing, you've got nothing to lose".

But it's hard not to enjoy some things about climate change.  As an example, this fall has been warmer than normal in this part of the world. It seems that, for the past couple of decades or so, just about every season has been significantly warmer or colder or wetter or drier than normal.  This fall, so far, has been warmer and, I think, drier.  If I didn't see the wreaths and lights and decorations people have hung in their windows and doors and from lampposts during the past week or so, I would have a hard time telling that we're less than three weeks from Christmas.

Maybe it has to do with the way the leaves, which cover everything but the trees they fell from, flicker in the sun. Or with the fact that even the coldest night we've had so far didn't even give a hint of impending winter storms.  

It was another nice day to ride.  And I did. How could I not?  I tried to worry more about climate change.  Really, I did.