It’s Time for Universal Transportation in the U.S.

Here in the U.S. there’s been a lot of chatter over the past decade about the declining gas tax revenue and finding alternatives. Now that chatter is getting rather shrill, touting alternatives limited by cultural quirks like an inherent terror of raising general taxes, an adoration of anything techno-complex, and a belief that each travel mode is used by an entirely different species from the others. Drivers never walk. Bicyclists never drive. And who are those bizarre bus riders anyway? These sci-fi assumptions force discussions of gas tax alternatives into far flung realms focused entirely on car drivers.

No need to recognize that taxing only drivers was wrong from the start and led to all other modes being shortchanged. Each alternative requires years of meetings, legions of consultants, and a battery of harassing surveys to even explain the concept let alone how each would actually work.

Here’s an article about one recent proposal—taxing car drivers per mile they drive. Any school kid could come up with the obvious problem with that one. And sure enough, as you’ll read in the article, decades of surveys have shown that few people like the idea of big brother tracking them. Duh.

What infuriates me is that nobody, at least here in the U.S., seems to realize that everyone should have the right to use every mode of transport. This strikes the same fury each time I fail to avoid a “debate” over universal health care for our country. Why are we still discussing this? The United States is the only developed country without universal health care. Many undeveloped countries provide it, too.

Basic rights. The basic right to health care. The basic right to move around as we choose. These rights should not be questioned or debated or skirted with preposterous techno wizardry alternatives that focus on one travel mode and only deflect the obvious solutions.

To me, the obvious solution for replacing the archaic gas tax is to raise general taxes for everyone and require that tax money to provide universal transportation choices for everyone. We’d pay no more, and likely less, than what we’d pay through that big-brother driving fee because all those administrative and consultant costs would vanish.

This would mean that every transportation dollar spent would have to ensure that all modes are provided for—drivers, bicyclists, wheelchair users, other pedestrians, even delivery trucks. Lots of compromising would have to occur. For instance, trucks would no longer be able to enter busy downtowns, but these fabulous cargo bikes would take their place. Car speeds would have to be reduced, but better intersection designs that accommodate non-motorized travelers would actually allow for better traffic flow and shorter travel times even for cars. Public transit such as busses and trains would move from the fringe to central in every transportation system. And all travelers, no matter their income level, would have equal provisions for the mode of travel they choose.

Here’s just one site showing street transformations that accommodate all users now. Imagine how many more streets could be changed (or built from the start) like those if all transportation funds had to be spent this way.

So let’s stop bickering about the latest techno-wiz-bang gadget for spying on car mileage and refocus all those ill-spent survey dollars on an across-the-board tax increase that pays for universal transportation for everyone. Then we can honestly call our country the “land of the free” – free to choose how we travel without big brother watching.

What are your thoughts on this universal transportation idea? Please offer them in the comments section.

Sue

Philadelphia Youth Learn Leadership through Bicycles

Here is a special guest post from Taylor Kuyk-White, Youth Bike Education and Empowerment Program Coordinator at Neighborhood Bike Works in Philadelphia:

Philadelphia is a city that loves bicycles--to commute, to exercise, to recreate, to socialize--the list is about as diverse as the population that uses them. Among the myriad bike shops in the city, Neighborhood Bike Works is a favorite of Philadelphia's youth. That's because Neighborhood Bike Works is no ordinary bike shop. Neighborhood Bike Works (NBW) is a place where youth become self-sufficient mechanics, traffic savvy riders, and young leaders.

A nonprofit community organization, NBW uses bikes as the hook to engage young people in building skills and developing healthy habits that support them in and outside of their passion for all things two wheels. We do this work with young people in a multi-tiered layer of programs we call our Youth Bike Education and Empowerment Program. Youth ages 8-18 can join any one of our entry level programs (Earn A Bike, Ride Club, and more) to than have access to many graduate and advanced level programs that revolve around activities like racing, kinetic sculpture building, weekend open wrenching, and many, many more.

One of these advanced tier programs is our Leadership and Advance Mechanics Course. In this class, youth ages 14-18 crystallize professional mechanic skills, practice public speaking, build networks with bicycle industry professionals, learn valuable teaching methods, and get some real life job interview experience all over the course of eight weeks. During the 2016 graduation of this course that took place in early March, youth reflected on how many job opportunities had opened to them in the bicycle world that they never would have dreamed existed.

Nasir shared, "When I came to Neighborhood Bike Works I wanted to train to become a bicycle mechanic. I thought that was all you could do as a job with bikes. Now I realize there is a lot more out there—engineers, city planners, bicycle coaches—and I know the people in those fields that could help me build a career in that direction."

Beyond networking and professional development, one of our keystone programs was one dreamt up and implemented by the youth of NBW themselves: the Youth Council. This core group of young leaders prides themselves as the youth voice of the organization, collaborating with the wider graduate network to ensure that NBW's values, goals, and decisions are consistently aligned with those of the NBW youth body. The inspiration for the council was gained by four NBW teens in 2014 when they attended the annual Youth Bike Summit (YBS) in NYC. Unsurprisingly, participating in the YBS has become an important annual tradition for this group. This year they are gearing up to lead a presentation at the YBS walking their audience through their process for setting up a successful youth council!

As the Youth Council Advisor, I have often found myself pulling upon the insights I gained from my work with One Street in 2010 and 2011. In both years I had the privilege to attend an international advocacy conference called Velo-city. The value and pure magic of participating in those summits lends great motivation to my work with the youth council as they prepare themselves for the Youth Bike Summit year after year. Further to the benefit of supporting the Youth Council, I was able to attend the Velo-city conferences only through my efforts on two years of creative fundraising and sponsorship drives. As you might imagine, these youth now have also gained important skills as fundraisers and event coordinators in service of their own goals!

In the end, NBW is not about one-way teaching of youth. Instead, we guide these incredible young people into the skills they need to become teachers and leaders no matter where they go from here. Neighborhood Bike Works aims to outgrow the all too common youth service model and step into a generation of Youth Led work. The outstanding members of our Youth Council are helping us take one more step in this direction!

Kampala Bicyclists Gaining Recognition

A recent news story from Kampala, Uganda shows how city officials are making the important shift from trying to ignore cyclists to recognizing that most of their citizens want to bike.

This video of the story starts with the worn-out assumption that only poor people ride bicycles. But as readers of this blog know, a bicycle is often a rider’s ticket straight out of poverty. The video gets right into that with an owner of a bicycle transport business. This business man shows that not only has his bicycle business given him comfortable income and paid for his children’s education costs, he is healthy and fit because of it.

We also get to meet Amanda Ngabirano, a One Street Advisor currently serving as Secretary on our board of directors. She emphasizes that people shouldn’t have to pay bus and taxi fares just to move around. She shows that by investing in bicycle infrastructure so that anyone feels comfortable riding, cities will be providing a free transportation choice for their citizens. Bicycling will also keep them healthy, lowering health costs.

The story ends with an uplifting interview with a city official who is genuinely enthusiastic about their new bicycle investments, which include major bicycle provision pilot projects in downtown Kampala.

I recommend taking the four minutes to watch this uplifting story of a city that will soon become a model for bicycle transportation provisions.

Sue

Solving Social Equity for the Bicycle Movement

Over the past few years, some U.S. bicycle advocacy organizations have been grappling with concerns over social equity in our movement. Just recognizing that there is a problem with equity in bicycle programs is an enormous and admirable step, especially for national and bike industry organizations who have always been detached from the local level.

It’s easy to get caught up in our own program goals and not recognize that we may be leaving whole sectors of communities out because of location, age, income level, culture, or ability. That’s why One Street included social equity in our mission at our very start, so we could never forget. We’ve also gathered a few worthy resources on our Social Equity page, but it remains quite sparse.

Unfortunately, most of the recent attempts at the national level miss the mark that will actually solve the problem. Their detachment shows through their platitudes and jargon. Bicycle organizations are not alone in doing a poor job with this. Here’s an example, written by a national center that claims to be an expert on social inclusion as they attempt to teach a national bicycle organization what they know: Five Things the Bike Movement Can Do Now to Move Toward Racial Equity. Here are my concerns about each:

• #1 Interrogate Root Cause of Disparities – They tell us to ask “why” five times. To whom? When we find five different pet peeves, do we go racing after solutions for each?

• #2 Lift up Leadership of Color in Your Movement – Why would you choose a leader based on their skin color? Isn’t that the very thing that the civil rights movement has always combatted?

• #3 Reframe the Message – Good idea, but their approach leads to jargon that I don’t even understand, let alone someone not yet interested in bicycling.

• #4 Engage with Communities – I thought I’d agree with this one because, as you’ll read below, the solution centers on knowing your community (neighborhood, town, or city), but again it drifts into meaningless jargon muddying the definition of community.

• #5 Share Power and Resources – It claims “plenty of ways” but opts again for a paragraph of jargon rather than helpful solutions.

Other national bicycle organizations or bike companies twist the concept of social equity to sell their programs such as protected bike lanes (which should be assumed to provide equal benefits to anyone) or bike share programs (which will never serve low-income riders).

I find the jargon and platitudes to be worse than the thinly veiled sales pitches because the reports and articles that result from these detached efforts are heavily funded and then promoted as “groundbreaking.” Anyone frustrated by seeing only one sector of their community riding bikes would be thrilled to find such a report. Instead, we find notes from endless discussions and surveys that always end with a fixation on skin color or assumed gender.

These useless attempts have only heightened the frustration at the local level. A recent article I posted about late last year reveals the level of frustration, not just from local bike advocates, but those who have had the misfortune to have worked on these reports.

To even start on a solution for our own communities (meaning neighborhood, town, or city), we first have to understand that any discussion of social equity derails as soon as we attempt to categorize people we see as different from ourselves and thus not equal. Such categorizing is different from recognizing unique qualities. For instance, young individuals could bring welcome energy. Old individuals are sure to have important experiences to share. Individuals from various cultures can offer new ideas. Individuals with disabilities can show able-bodied people what they struggle with.

The categorization I’m warning against is just a short misstep away from recognizing the value of individuals. Instead, it leaps to the assumption that all people with that trait will bring that particular value or, even worse, that particular complaint about bicycling. If you do take the time to read some of those misguided reports you’ll find far too many assumptions about “women,” “black people,” and “Latinos.”

To clarify, there are some excellent local bicycle organizations who focus on specific ages, cultures, abilities, or even gender identities. They are specialists who serve communities of traits rather than boundaries. They are helping to make the shift toward social equity by lifting those specific, marginalized communities, but none would claim that their organizations are inclusive or socially equal. They can’t be.

My concern is about bicycle organizations who should serve everyone, but present “social equity” as serving skin colors or genders. This confusion is not unique to bicycle organizations. Why is President Obama more black than white when he had one of each for parents? If a white baby is born to black parents he or she would be black by birth, but would be treated as and considered white by people who write social equity reports. If a woman is as assertive and athletic as male bicyclists, why is she grouped in with women who fear traffic in these reports?

The whole conversation needs to shift to a totally different mindset that all people have equal rights to bicycle. Bicycle advocacy is about breaking down barriers, about ensuring that everyone can choose to bicycle. If anyone in a certain community (neighborhood, town, or city) has the ability to ride a bike, but cannot, there is a problem that needs to be solved.

A neighborhood surrounded by freeways might have a predominance of black people. Advocates could look for gang violence and police brutality as possible barriers as these are frequently called out as barriers to bicycling in black neighborhoods. Here’s a classic example: People in Your Hood Ride Bikes to Shoot People. Just as likely, though, are those darn freeways. A tunnel or overpass that reconnects that neighborhood to the rest of the community could be all it takes to open the flood gates of bicycling.

The solution for social equity in the bicycle movement starts with knowing your community. No one at the national level can do this for you. Stop wasting time on all those jargon-filled reports. As I describe in Defying Poverty with Bicycles, take a long careful look at all the people in the community your organization serves. If it’s a retirement community, the vast majority should be over 60. You don’t have to worry if there aren’t that many kids riding. The neighborhood you serve may be mostly Latino with some white and Asian residents. Then don’t worry that black people aren’t bicycling there. Social equity for bicycling in your community will mean that the people who ride represent a cross section of that community.

Look past skin color and gender to see what obstacles these particular people face. Do they live in a neighborhood shunned by the city? Then their neighbors of all skin colors are also burdened by that problem. Are women not riding because they can’t ride with their children? Then single fathers and men who spend quality time with their children are also burdened by that problem.

If you find certain ages, cultures, income levels, and/or abilities missing from the people bicycling, only then should you begin your investigation into the problem – why they aren’t riding. If people with certain traits aren’t attending your events and engaging as volunteers or leaders, something needs to change in your bicycle programs to make them valuable and interesting to people like that. If the problem is external, define it and then launch a customized campaign to solve that particular problem. Read our Campaign Planning page for specific steps or email me at sue{at}onestreet.org for help. That’s what I’m here for.

If we expect the bicycle movement to equally serve all people, we have to shift our focus from skin color and assumed genders to honoring the expertise of local leaders of bicycle organizations who are the only ones who can truly assess the inequality of their particular communities. By dropping the national bravado and supporting these local leaders toward their unique solutions, the entire bicycle movement will eventually shift toward social equity.

DIY Gifts from Bicycle Parts

Many of the Social Bike Business programs we work with are looking for new ways to increase their income. This time of year, as people are looking for creative gifts for the cyclists in their lives, offers inspiration through do-it-yourself, handmade bicycle gifts. Bike programs with a retail storefront have lots of opportunity for increasing the number of products they sell. What better way to do so than with products made from bicycle parts? Here are some fun examples to spark your creativity:

JEWELRY:

• Jewelry from bike parts - images

PANNIERS:

• DIY bike panniers from recycled materials

TOOL ROLL:

• Tool roll from old jeans

You might also find ideas from the links in my similar post from a few years ago including Bike Hacks and DIY bike projects.

Many of these gifts could become regular products to sell at your social bike shop. So try making some for your favorite bicyclists and see if you’d like to make and sell more. Have fun!

Sue

Divisive Article on Working-Class Cyclists Only Worsens Issue

When I first saw this article posted on Governing, a repost from The Kinder Institute for Urban Research in Houston, I hoped to read about an inspiring and intimate discovery. The headline, “Most Cyclists Are Working-Class Immigrants, Not Hipsters,” shows a clear lack of awareness, which I hoped meant that the author had made a personal breakthrough.

Through my work at One Street, especially our Social Bike Business program, I often meet people with narrow ideas of what a bicyclist is. Some have never seen an impoverished person riding a bike. Rather, they may have seen them, but never noticed them. Many have only noticed sports cyclists in bright colors riding space-age bikes. Others believe that cycling is only for poor people and have somehow missed all the flashy cyclists, families on bikes, kids riding with friends, commuter cyclists, self-employed people riding for fun, and those groovy hipsters. And I certainly wouldn’t expect any of these happy cyclists to care much about other sorts of cyclists as they are too busy having fun riding in their own way.

All of us humans have a residual tendency to judge and categorize other humans. This is left over from our primitive beginning when survival depended on quickly and correctly judging a friend or foe. We often don’t even notice those who offer no friendship or threat. Our survival no longer depends on these inappropriate quick judgments, yet they dominate our lives and articles like this.

This tendency is a major barrier to overcome for all of our Social Bike Business partners. In order to attract their own partners and media attention to grow their program, they must get past the very basic first step of convincing them that low-income people ride bikes. Then, not only do they ride bikes, many enjoy riding bikes. Then comes the concept that bicycles and careers with bikes can help them out of poverty. It can be a long road.

I had hoped to read in this article a story of the author’s inspirational discovery of working-class cyclists. Unfortunately, the direction the author chose was all but inspirational. He sought out anyone with a grudge about cyclists who were different from themselves. While he includes interesting data from Houston’s modal choices, the bulk of the article jumps from grudge to grudge, even finding space to bash all bicycle advocates in general. Here’s a list of the grudges I found:

• Against building bikeways in low-income neighborhoods;
• Against all European bikeway and bike advocacy models;
• Against young, hip cyclists;
• Against the cycle chic movement;
• Against middle-class and wealthy cyclists;
• Against competitive cyclists;
• Even a hint of distain against child cyclists;
• And the sweeping grudge against all bicycle advocates in general.

Quite a feat for one article.

I think the only inspiration to take from this misguided article is for all of us to never segregate any sort of cyclist in our messaging and promotions. Such segregation only encourages articles like this and the setting of one group against another. Even as we work toward revealing the high number of low-income and impoverished cyclists all over the world, we must present them simply as bicyclists who have the same right to respect, to quality bikeways, to learning from Europeans and others, to being hip and chic, and to laughing like a kid again as they pedal.

Give the article a read and let me know in the comments section if I’m being too harsh. Also, note any grudges I may have missed.

Sue

Defying Poverty with Housing

I’ve been on a bit of a tangent lately, exploring various models of effective housing and the creation of interactive, human-scale communities. I suspect some selfish motivation since I’ve passed my fiftieth year and should be wondering where my feeble body is going to prop itself toward the latter part of my next fifty (being a slow learner, I figure I’ll need another fifty to make any sense of all of this).

The other, and far more prominent motivation has come from seeing my friends and acquaintances shut themselves away in isolated houses, alone after work or simply alone. The most ambitious of them schedule activities, which they leave their house to attend in other parts of town, but between those activities the seclusion presses in.

Defying Poverty with Bicycles, is all about providing the freedom and dignity of personal mobility to people in the greatest need. It also delves into career development and inspiring social entrepreneurs to start their own bicycle businesses. It covers transportation, education, income generation, even social interaction during the day, but it does not address the places where people go when all the action is finished for the day.

There’s something terribly wrong with the direction our communities are going in the developed world. Only a hundred years ago everyone expected to interact with their neighbors. Housing was clustered either in downtowns or in rural villages and mixed with businesses and community activities. I understand the long-gone motivation to move away from toxic downtowns into housing-only neighborhoods and suburbs. Unfortunately, that fix and the cleanup of downtowns led to segregated, single use zoning that not only keeps people from choosing to bicycle, it keeps people from other people who seem different from them.

So I started this new learning adventure by researching cohousing. I had been inspired by a cohousing community in Denmark highlighted in the fabulous movie Happy. This Danish cohousing community is a group of a dozen or so families living in houses clustered around a common building where they cook, meet, and play together. Unfortunately, cohousing seems to be something for the well-off.

So I looked into community development that includes the most disadvantage people and found an excellent book called Tent City Urbanism: From Self-Organized Camps to Tiny House Villages. With empathy and a good understanding of the struggles homeless people face, the book shows readers how to create places where homeless people are allowed to sleep. It goes into great depth on case studies of successful camps and even tiny-house enclaves that are sanctioned by cities in order to house “the homeless.”

My problem with this book, the case studies, and all the similar projects I’ve found is that they are following the exact pattern of the segregated zoning that has divided our towns and cities. Every project has a mission of serving “the homeless.” They all seek funding and charity donations because they are serving “the homeless.” There’s no recognition that “the homeless” are anything like the people leading or funding these projects. Even the projects that boast of leadership roles for their residents, still talk about serving “the homeless.”

I get that the best way to raise funds and donations, such as land and building materials, for such a project is to talk endlessly about “the homeless.” I’m afraid I can’t stomach it.

I faced a similar problem when developing One Street’s Social Bike Business program as well as capturing our recommendations in our book Defying Poverty with Bicycles. Leaders of organizations that are providing bicycles to impoverished people often see no harm in appeasing funders. If funders want to give charity to a segregated group of people who they believe are entirely different from them, what’s the harm? I say such one-way, charity thinking is at the very core of the problem and is in fact the most harmful thing we can possibly do. You’ll find in that book as well as Cures for Ailing Organizations a loud and clear message to avoid such charity mindsets.

I’m afraid that the tent city and tiny house movements are suffering from this same temptation. While I was thoroughly inspired by the details of the book such as allowing campers to develop their own camp site and inspiring them to help one another, I missed any mention of integrating such camps into a total community.

My hunt continues for model communities that are truly reinventing what we, in the developed world, lost over this past century – neighborhoods and villages that are designed specifically to welcome the most disadvantage people and thus welcome people, and their animals, from all income levels, abilities, and ages. Places where all-ages means that seniors and young people work and play together; where all-abilities means that even the most disabled people can contribute, perhaps overseeing a playground, running deliveries by electric wheelchair, or welcoming visitors. I’ve found this in developing countries and tribal communities, but these have existed since before records were kept. What I can’t find are models of such communities started from scratch.

I have this vision of a gated, cohousing community (don’t gag yet) that is gated only because dogs run free. Cars enter through the double gates that ensure the dogs cannot get out and park immediately in the single parking lot. From there the pathways lead to the mixed housing, businesses and workshops run by residents as well as the common areas and parks.

Yes, there is a tent area that ensures that the temporarily destitute have a place. There are also tiny houses – love these. But anyone can choose a tent or tiny house whether they have ever been homeless or not. The largest houses would be reasonable, perhaps 1,000 square feet max. A community garden would include gardening classes and result in a surplus sold at the community’s grocery store. The dog park would welcome nonresidents and mark dogs and other pets needing a home. The businesses, parks and ball courts would attract nonresidents to learn about the village and interact. The very design of the village and its homeowners’ association (HOA) charter would ensure that residents and visitors alike pitch in to help everything run smoothly and improve.

The biggest difference from this vision and the cohousing and tent city projects I’ve found so far is that it would follow conventional new development steps. It would be presented as a mixed-use development. Period. Home buyers would purchase their homes in various ways – most often through mortgage loans, sometime full cash, and others through a mix of labor and loan. Owners could rent their properties within the HOA guidelines. From the tents to the largest houses, every resident would be treated the same.

Why have I not found a project like this yet? Are there any out there that I have missed?

Bicycles remain my primary fixation for improving communities, but lately housing keeps creeping into my thoughts. I’d so appreciate any ideas and experience you can offer to help streamline my search. Please write them into the comments section. I’m looking forward to reaching that point in this learning adventure where integrated bicycle and housing programs converge. That will be cool!

Sue