Something Simple and Efficient: A Bicycle

Sometimes I become angry because of the prices of the energy, not because it is expensive but cause I think there many interests into play. However, every time I ride the bicycle along the city and see the way in which we use our cars and air conditioning in homes and shops I said to myself: We don't pay enough for energy, it is cheap till...

Now the thing is: How to make people to understand that our life style of excess and waste should be over? Every day I'm more convinced that many people don't really care about environment and the state of the planet. They just think about themselves or simply, as a human way of scape, they assume that environmental problems are not such a big deal. In other words: human resistance to accept CHANGE.

I don't know what readers will think about what I'm going to say. It's obvious that an environmental education is necessary at schools and centres of education but, most important, for all those ones who "don't care", controlling their expenditure is the key. High prices for energy is the way to understand that we humans can't continue wasting around and eating up natural resources. I could give two examples of how people would behave in front of increasing prices of fuel:

1. There are surveys which point out that 20% of the mileage is unnecessary. Have you realized how many energy could be saved at a planetary scale?


2. More than one would stop speeding. They would keep tyres pumped up (so they would last longer and would also save more money), they wouldn't accelerate hard and driving would be a bit slower (which would save human and wildlife lifes on the roads).

Once more the key is: Everyone should accept that CHANGE is necessary. Fuel efficient cars (including hybrid and electric) are not the solution but part of it. And now, as always, speaking about cars... Who speaks about something or reminds that there is something really efficient and cheap as a bicycle? Mssers. Politiciens... Who bears the cars in the cities? Mssers. Politiciens... Who bells the cat?

On Freedom, Licentiousness and Dictatorship

I am 35 and I don't have to make an effort to remember some elderly people speaking about the times when cars were less numerous or even an exception in the streets. Above all, having a car in a village in those times was an expression of being wealthy. cars began to become something more normal about the end of the 60s and the beginning of the 70s. Up to that moment, a car was something accepted by the rest of the means of transport: pedestrians, bicycles, buses, trolleybuses, trams, coaches, etc, etc. And I say it was accepted because the car just was one more element in the streets.

Times have changed and, for better or for worse, the car has become a model or symbol of progress (badly understood from my point of view), and what's more, I would dare to say it has become a plague. Such an incredible drive was given to the car by population and political circles that it converted democratic mobility into a tyrannical one. We passed from sharing the streets with our bicycles and the rest of vehicles to be expelled in straightforward terms in favor of a mobility based on four wheels and an inefficient engine which poisons the air we breathe.

Today, organizations of city bikers and in favour of a sustainable mobility, feel, or at least I feel, like being in a crusade. But I would like to point out that I do not want the car to die out, I want an affable crusade, I do not want to do with it what it did with us. The only thing I want is to recover the space that once belonged to our ancestors and makepeople understand that we, “the no cars”, are not a nuisanc,e but one more part of “the urban ecosystem”, where all of us, in one or other way, had and have our place. One of the problems we face is how to make addicted car drivers understand this point. It is necessary they understand their cars eat up a great quantity of natural resources which are compromising the recycling capacity of our planet. It is necessary they understand their selfish and comfortable position, we even could add that driving a car is something inactive in cultural and antinatural terms. Obviously, a great quantity of excuses are spread everywhere. Excuses like “everybody does it”, “if I do not do it others will”, etc, etc. The point is tthat we shouldn’t deceive ourselves, change has to come from inside each one of us; we do not have to wait for others, politicians included, to change things, because nobody will do it. Don't be so passive because that way we will not get to any worthy place.

So I think there are reasons to wonder about the title of this writing. I am not telling anybody not to buy a car, for the love of God, but I think that with a consumist eagerness or without it, the vehicle of four wheels has always been sold as a symbol of freedom. Can we understand freedom being slaves of a monthly bill to pay the vehicle, fuel, breakdowns and maintenance ? Thanks to the spread and imposition of the car, we have been deprived of good buses and trains networks, which are far more efficient than cars and which would also allow us to get to many places. Are we to understand progress as a highway arriving at every village in our country? Regarding buses, some people can plead that there have been some attempts that have failed, at least in our province, such as the case in Onda. But humans are conservative and creatures of habit, we do only understand of physical barriers, there is no way and time is out. A lot of money has been spent on campaigns making people aware of the wrong use of the car, so the moment of making people fed up with their cars has arrived: speed limits strictly controlled, obstacles such as level changes in the asphalt, reducing suddenly the width of the road with little gardens, shared lines for buses and bicycles s which would reduce the space to private cars, etc, etc... So taking measures like these, the private car would stop being the main character in our streets.

It is nice, really nice to be free and feel the freedom, being free to get everywhere by one's car but, when that one makes of the use an abuse, freedom becomes licentiousness and that should not be allowed, or at least I understand that this is the way.

P.S. Place where I found the picture.

Wretch II

Once more I've been able to check that a daily use of the bicycle is a question of culture and education. Despite winters are harsh in Finland, it exists a daily use of the bicycles as a mean of transport. Obviously, bicycles are more used in summer (or at least I think so).

Here where I live, potential bicycle users put forward any thing: there is a lot of traffic and it is dangerous, it is very hot, it is very hard, I sweat, it is cold... ¡Cold!¡Cold! It makes me laugh at them. Last time I was in Finland we got -17ºC... The best thing was that I saw people cycling ¡Even elderly people!

Maybe in Spain somebody can think that who uses the bycicle in Finland is because they don't have any other resource. Maybe there's somebody, but from my point of view, if something characterizes Finland, is its way of life, a low index of political corruption (at least if we compare with Spain) and above all, if I haven't been misinformed, ostentation is not well regarded. What do we find here (in general)? Cyclists are sadly a minority. The car has become the totem of our society, in the reference of what you are or you try to be... ¡Get out of my road wretch!

Wretch

I am part of that group of people which every day get to work/school/university and so on by bycicle. In another words, I am part of a group known as: wretch, immigrant or fucking ecologist.

I think the people who think about us in that manner, have never asked themselves about how would be our cities without our bloody cars, it is, our cities without fumes, without noise, summarising, having cities with much more quality of life. They are blind but I think the worst is that they don't want to open their eyes, they prefer staying in the supposed comfort of their consumer life.

I suppose I'm in the position of saying that I'm happier from I'm using the bycicle. Since 2004 I park where I want, I don't emit fumes and noises, I don't get stuck in traffic jams and that means not to waist my precious time. Summarising, to get to everywhere by bycicle in the city only means two things: to be healthy and save money, two great reasons for me, don't you think so?


Have a nice day.