WEBVTT - The Future of the Bicycle 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:07.240 Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:14.800 Forward Thinking. Hey there, and welcome to Forward Thinking, the 0:00:15.000 --> 0:00:17.680 podcast that looks at the future and says, hey man, 0:00:18.040 --> 0:00:20.919 John's was never my scene. I don't like Star Wars. 0:00:21.320 --> 0:00:25.200 I'm Jonathan Strickland, I'm Lauren, and I'm Joe McCormick and Jonathan. 0:00:25.280 --> 0:00:28.880 I thought today we'd definitely or almost definitely be hearing 0:00:28.920 --> 0:00:32.360 about how you want to ride your bicycle. But yeah, 0:00:32.560 --> 0:00:34.680 if you followed that lyric long enough, you would have 0:00:34.760 --> 0:00:36.839 heard about how I went to ride my bicycle on 0:00:38.000 --> 0:00:40.960 That's that's that's actually from Bicycle Race by Queen. What 0:00:41.159 --> 0:00:43.800 a Way? Yeah, Jones will was never my scene and 0:00:43.920 --> 0:00:47.120 adult like Star Okay, then I just don't know my 0:00:47.159 --> 0:00:49.519 stuff at all, and I can't sing like Freddy Mercury song. 0:00:49.560 --> 0:00:51.159 I know why I tried. I don't even know what 0:00:51.240 --> 0:00:54.720 song book. You guys are talking about what Queen arena 0:00:54.840 --> 0:00:59.040 rock band Queen, I know the band, im my gosh, 0:00:59.440 --> 0:01:02.080 So day we're gonna be talking about the future of 0:01:02.160 --> 0:01:05.880 operatic rock music, and you know, I wish, but we're 0:01:05.880 --> 0:01:09.520 actually going to talk about something that a listener has requests. 0:01:09.520 --> 0:01:11.680 A couple of listeners have requested, Yeah, I don't say 0:01:11.720 --> 0:01:14.080 I wish like this isn't a cool topic. I think 0:01:14.120 --> 0:01:20.920 this is okay. This is from our listener Richard, who 0:01:20.959 --> 0:01:24.360 wrote to us and said, I really enjoy your podcast. 0:01:24.400 --> 0:01:27.240 Would you consider doing a podcast on the bicycle as 0:01:27.280 --> 0:01:30.760 a future form of transportation? I think it would be fascinating. 0:01:30.880 --> 0:01:34.880 For example, how about the electrical assist bicycles becoming more 0:01:34.920 --> 0:01:38.360 popular with aging population. Well, the cities of the future 0:01:38.440 --> 0:01:43.160 look more like Amsterdam in Holland with well developed bicycle infrastructure, 0:01:43.319 --> 0:01:46.679 for more like Los Angeles or Atlanta, Georgia, extremes in 0:01:46.720 --> 0:01:51.440 the opposite direction where the car remains king. Well, thank 0:01:51.480 --> 0:01:54.200 you for that question, Richard. We decided we'd take you 0:01:54.320 --> 0:01:57.080 up and talk about the future of the bicycle. And 0:01:57.320 --> 0:02:00.960 we can speak to that last point from personal experience, 0:02:00.960 --> 0:02:03.600 because the three of us live in Atlanta, Georgia. Yes, 0:02:03.840 --> 0:02:08.359 and it's true this city could definitely be more bike friendly. Yeah. Yeah, 0:02:08.400 --> 0:02:11.160 some parts of it are getting better. About that the 0:02:11.240 --> 0:02:15.280 kind of small towns within Atlanta, But lots of places 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:18.720 I okay, Well, I find driving terrifying around Atlanta, but 0:02:18.760 --> 0:02:21.320 I find the very idea of being on a bicycle 0:02:21.760 --> 0:02:25.200 in the same places just completely out of the question. 0:02:25.360 --> 0:02:28.240 It's yeah, it seems really scary. There are actually a 0:02:28.280 --> 0:02:30.720 ton of issues at stake here, and it's one of 0:02:30.720 --> 0:02:33.760 those things that I hear is actually an issue throughout 0:02:34.320 --> 0:02:36.359 the world, not just in Atlanta. It's one of the 0:02:36.400 --> 0:02:39.920 things we noticed. But uh, there's the issue of the 0:02:40.040 --> 0:02:44.440 driving culture in Atlanta, which is definitely king uh if 0:02:44.680 --> 0:02:46.720 Atlanta's got a lot of sprawl, it's kind of like 0:02:46.840 --> 0:02:48.600 l A in that sense, and that everything is spread 0:02:48.639 --> 0:02:51.800 out and it's not easy to get to various areas 0:02:51.800 --> 0:02:55.359 of Atlanta without having a car. Um, the public transportation 0:02:55.400 --> 0:02:58.480 system is not is not a world class. It's not 0:02:58.560 --> 0:03:00.720 all bust. It's not what you would kind of like 0:03:00.840 --> 0:03:03.399 Los Angeles. You can get to some places pretty well 0:03:03.440 --> 0:03:06.480 on Marta, but it's sort of in a plus shape. 0:03:06.639 --> 0:03:09.080 So anything right along that plus shape is good and 0:03:09.120 --> 0:03:11.079 then you can you know, on the train, you can 0:03:11.080 --> 0:03:13.680 take a bus to get somewhere else. But yeah, they're 0:03:13.720 --> 0:03:18.200 definitely much better public transportation systems around. And also another 0:03:18.240 --> 0:03:22.080 element um is just the the bicycle culture and how 0:03:22.840 --> 0:03:28.040 uh not all bicyclists are say, you know, adhering to 0:03:28.080 --> 0:03:31.880 the rules of the road. But I mean, so one 0:03:31.880 --> 0:03:33.760 of the issues we want to really talk about, though, 0:03:33.919 --> 0:03:36.280 is what can we do on the other side, right, 0:03:36.320 --> 0:03:39.160 not just bicyclists need to make sure that they obey 0:03:39.240 --> 0:03:41.160 the rules, because part of the problem is that the 0:03:41.200 --> 0:03:44.160 deck is stacked against them here. Yeah, the rules are 0:03:44.160 --> 0:03:48.240 certainly not set up for for them to work. Well, yeah, 0:03:48.320 --> 0:03:52.040 it's they are trying to fit within an infrastructure that 0:03:52.120 --> 0:03:54.760 was designed for a completely different mode of transportation. So 0:03:54.800 --> 0:03:57.200 we want to really look at what are ways that 0:03:57.240 --> 0:03:59.880 we could change things. What what's the future of the 0:04:00.160 --> 0:04:03.360 mode of transportation in places like the United States? How 0:04:03.400 --> 0:04:05.640 could it be more like other places in the world 0:04:05.720 --> 0:04:10.560 where we see bicycles being used by growing populations of 0:04:10.800 --> 0:04:14.040 commuters and uh, and you know what's the How can 0:04:14.080 --> 0:04:16.800 we set ourselves up for success? Is really what we're 0:04:16.800 --> 0:04:20.000 looking at here. Yeah, so let's look back first to 0:04:20.680 --> 0:04:25.200 the olden bicycles, all right and figure out where these 0:04:25.240 --> 0:04:27.560 came from. I was actually curious because I didn't know 0:04:27.720 --> 0:04:30.400 when the bicycle was invented. I was looking it up 0:04:30.440 --> 0:04:33.800 and there's actually a cool article on Live Science about 0:04:33.839 --> 0:04:37.240 this called who invented the bicycle? And according to them, 0:04:37.320 --> 0:04:41.000 it was a German inventor named Carl Drace or Carl 0:04:41.080 --> 0:04:43.880 von Dre d r A I s. I guess there'd 0:04:43.880 --> 0:04:46.839 be sort of a French pronunciation dre. Well, if it's Vaughn, 0:04:47.080 --> 0:04:51.599 then it would be Germanic would be dra unless he 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:55.400 pronounced it weird. Yeah, so uh, I'll get on the phone. 0:04:56.000 --> 0:04:58.560 You keep going, okay, yeah, you go find out. But anyway, 0:04:58.640 --> 0:05:01.280 the the idea here is that he probably made the 0:05:01.360 --> 0:05:05.760 first two wheeled bicycle in eighteen seventeen, and his own 0:05:05.960 --> 0:05:09.080 term for it was the Louth machine, which is German 0:05:09.200 --> 0:05:12.880 for running machine, which is great. It's a machine that runs, 0:05:12.960 --> 0:05:16.120 except it doesn't run. It uses wheels, and it was 0:05:16.160 --> 0:05:20.520 actually a modification of an earlier four wheeled human powered vehicle, 0:05:20.560 --> 0:05:23.560 which I think actually predates the bicycle. I think the 0:05:23.560 --> 0:05:25.720 reason it was called a running machine was not because 0:05:25.800 --> 0:05:28.960 the machine itself ran, but because in order to operate it, 0:05:29.040 --> 0:05:31.560 you had to push yourself along the ground with your 0:05:31.560 --> 0:05:34.640 feet no pedals, right right. It was a little bit 0:05:34.680 --> 0:05:37.080 like a two wheeled flintstones car, yeah, or like a 0:05:37.360 --> 0:05:41.440 like a really big skateboard. It's just you'd straddle this 0:05:41.560 --> 0:05:44.640 thing and use your feet to push yourself along, or 0:05:44.960 --> 0:05:48.240 like have you seen those balance bikes that kids have today? 0:05:49.240 --> 0:05:51.280 If you got on the belt line in Atlanta, you'll 0:05:51.320 --> 0:05:53.200 see a lot of kids who are out with their 0:05:53.240 --> 0:05:55.320 parents and they've got their bicycles. And it's a little 0:05:55.320 --> 0:05:58.920 tiny bicycle without pedals on it, and it's short enough 0:05:58.960 --> 0:06:01.719 that the kid's leg can reach the ground while they're 0:06:01.720 --> 0:06:04.000 sitting on the seat. It's essentially a modern version of 0:06:04.040 --> 0:06:06.880 what we're talking about here. Yeah, they were also called 0:06:06.880 --> 0:06:11.479 hobby horses. They were made from wood. The wheels were 0:06:11.760 --> 0:06:14.520 solid wheel, so it was not the softest ride you 0:06:14.520 --> 0:06:17.360 can imagine. I read that one. I bet they were 0:06:17.480 --> 0:06:20.760 so comfortable. I read that they used a leather saddle 0:06:21.000 --> 0:06:27.920 nailed to a wooden frame. Nothing luxury. But my favorite 0:06:27.960 --> 0:06:31.120 example from that article did they come with a monocle holder? 0:06:31.320 --> 0:06:34.440 I'm sure they did. My favorite example from the the 0:06:34.560 --> 0:06:37.240 article there was a there was a list of illustrations 0:06:37.400 --> 0:06:41.920 dated from the late nineteenth century. Was the auto bicycle 0:06:42.040 --> 0:06:45.839 auto as an O T T O. And it looked 0:06:45.880 --> 0:06:48.320 like a Victorian woman who had wheels attached to her. 0:06:49.040 --> 0:06:52.400 It's just just like two big wheels and to either 0:06:52.480 --> 0:06:55.320 side and two smaller wheels in front. So it was 0:06:55.360 --> 0:06:59.279 just ah for your wheeled Victorian lady the auto bicycle. Um, 0:06:59.839 --> 0:07:02.720 I guess you're if you're like whale bone undergarments are 0:07:02.720 --> 0:07:08.359 strong enough, and I you know, the wheel and axle 0:07:08.520 --> 0:07:12.960 was quickly followed by the bone corsets. So, um, yeah, 0:07:13.000 --> 0:07:14.800 I know it was. It was one of those those 0:07:14.960 --> 0:07:17.480 illustrations that just I know what it was. It was 0:07:17.720 --> 0:07:21.160 the obviously the platform that she would be sitting on 0:07:21.280 --> 0:07:24.200 or standing against or whatever was obscured by her large 0:07:24.280 --> 0:07:27.440 Victorian dress, but it just made it look like a 0:07:27.440 --> 0:07:31.080 wheeled Victorian lady. Um. So I wondered, what's the difference 0:07:31.120 --> 0:07:33.840 between a bicycle and a velocity? I will tell you 0:07:33.880 --> 0:07:36.880 that difference. So by the teen sixties, that's when we 0:07:36.920 --> 0:07:40.200 see the entry of the velocipede. And this was the 0:07:40.280 --> 0:07:44.559 first type of bicycle or or two wheeled human powered 0:07:44.640 --> 0:07:48.840 vehicle to actually have pedals and a fixed gear system. Uh. 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:51.880 There's controversy about who was the first person to actually 0:07:51.880 --> 0:07:57.040 suggest this. A German inventor named Carl Kech claimed he 0:07:57.080 --> 0:08:00.600 was the first to modify a hobby horse by pedals, 0:08:01.080 --> 0:08:04.679 but a French inventor, Pierre la Lament, said that he 0:08:05.120 --> 0:08:07.280 was well, he patented it He was the first one 0:08:07.320 --> 0:08:10.000 to a secure patent in eighteen sixty six, and a 0:08:10.000 --> 0:08:12.080 lot of other people immediately got in on it. In fact, 0:08:12.160 --> 0:08:15.800 I don't know that that patent offered any protection whatsoever, 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:18.760 because from what I could tell, everybody immediately started trying 0:08:18.800 --> 0:08:23.400 to make these things. Um. Now, these had steel wheels 0:08:24.120 --> 0:08:28.560 and uh no suspension, so very bumpy ride if you're 0:08:28.560 --> 0:08:30.400 on one of these things. They were often referred to 0:08:30.440 --> 0:08:35.880 as bone shakers because they were not terribly gentle. Now, 0:08:36.120 --> 0:08:39.600 the main difference between that and the modern bicycle two things. 0:08:39.679 --> 0:08:43.040 One is that we don't have solid steel wheels anymore, 0:08:43.240 --> 0:08:48.960 or we have the rubber wheels that allow us usually aluminum, 0:08:48.960 --> 0:08:52.240 I would imagine, Yeah, usually you don't want. You don't 0:08:52.240 --> 0:08:55.480 want something that's going to make the bike super heavy. Um. 0:08:55.559 --> 0:08:59.280 And also we don't have we tend to have some 0:08:59.679 --> 0:09:02.720 sort of tension absorbing system so that it's not as 0:09:02.920 --> 0:09:05.520 as rough on us. But to smooth out the ride 0:09:05.600 --> 0:09:07.920 when we have these velocities come out on the scene, 0:09:08.320 --> 0:09:11.120 one of the things they would do, the manufacturers would 0:09:11.120 --> 0:09:14.680 do was make larger and larger front wheels. That's where 0:09:14.720 --> 0:09:17.200 that image comes from. Yeah. Yeah, well also you you 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:20.040 don't have to work as hard. Um, it's just one 0:09:20.160 --> 0:09:23.400 rotation of the pedal in order to push the bicycle 0:09:23.480 --> 0:09:26.280 a lot further. That's true. Yeah, because you're you're pushing 0:09:26.480 --> 0:09:28.679 your your rotation of the petals is at the center 0:09:28.720 --> 0:09:30.920 of the wheel, and of course the circumference of the 0:09:30.920 --> 0:09:34.640 wheels much larger. So one little rotation of the petals 0:09:34.800 --> 0:09:38.360 is one big rotation along the wheels outside. So you 0:09:38.400 --> 0:09:41.520 do go a lot further for a for a simple 0:09:41.600 --> 0:09:45.760 crank of the petals. Uh. But it also smoothed out 0:09:45.760 --> 0:09:49.000 the ride significantly. Those were the two big reasons. Apparently 0:09:49.040 --> 0:09:51.520 young men took to racing them in the streets of Europe. 0:09:52.200 --> 0:09:56.600 Um became something of a menace, and really wasn't that practical. 0:09:56.640 --> 0:09:59.640 They were the common term for these were the penny 0:09:59.679 --> 0:10:04.520 fig things. Uh and uh they got so ridiculously big 0:10:04.559 --> 0:10:08.400 and setting that high up is not really conducive to safety. Yeah, no, 0:10:08.720 --> 0:10:11.640 it's I can't even imagine what it was like getting 0:10:11.679 --> 0:10:13.760 on one of these things. I mean, once you're in motion, 0:10:14.200 --> 0:10:17.400 that that some tripical force really helps, that gyroscopic effect 0:10:17.440 --> 0:10:21.080 really helps you stay upright. But coming to a stop 0:10:21.200 --> 0:10:24.400 or or getting started, I can't imagine how challenging that 0:10:24.480 --> 0:10:26.719 was without falling over. I mean, this is coming from 0:10:26.720 --> 0:10:28.680 a guy who hasn't ridden a bicycle since he was 0:10:28.720 --> 0:10:30.760 a kid, and I remember it took me a while 0:10:30.800 --> 0:10:33.000 to get the hang of that particular part of the 0:10:33.120 --> 0:10:36.800 riding a bike myself. That's when John Kempt Stanley came along. 0:10:36.840 --> 0:10:39.240 He's the one who created the tension absorbing front wheel 0:10:40.120 --> 0:10:43.720 that allowed actual bicycles the way we consider them today 0:10:43.760 --> 0:10:46.199 to begin to be manufactured. Now, this was still very 0:10:46.280 --> 0:10:48.200 much in the early days, but a lot of people 0:10:48.240 --> 0:10:51.520 credit him as the father of the modern bicycle for 0:10:51.559 --> 0:10:54.360 that invention that made it actually possible to have normal 0:10:54.480 --> 0:10:58.480 sized wheels and not a bone shaking experience, and that 0:10:58.559 --> 0:11:02.440 still wasn't quite gentle at this point. Probably not, I'm 0:11:02.480 --> 0:11:05.439 sure that that kind of thing, and then probably also 0:11:05.520 --> 0:11:08.640 the introduction of like variable gear bikes and things like 0:11:08.679 --> 0:11:12.160 that is what made bicycles as popular as they have 0:11:12.320 --> 0:11:14.480 been in you know, the past century, as we've known 0:11:14.520 --> 0:11:18.720 them today. Sure, I mean that in the freewheel invention, 0:11:18.800 --> 0:11:22.959 that's the invention that allows you to coast where you know, 0:11:23.000 --> 0:11:24.760 you pedal and pedal and pedal, then you just stop 0:11:24.800 --> 0:11:28.319 peddling and your wheels can keep ongoing. That's different from 0:11:28.320 --> 0:11:30.280 fixed gear, which we'll talk about a little bit later. 0:11:30.360 --> 0:11:34.520 It's kind of interesting, but it's really kind of I'd 0:11:34.600 --> 0:11:36.920 say that was a big advance as well. It was 0:11:36.960 --> 0:11:40.640 one of those things that allowed people to use these 0:11:40.640 --> 0:11:43.080 in recreational ways here in the United States, and in fact, 0:11:43.120 --> 0:11:46.240 I would think that here in the US, recreation was 0:11:46.320 --> 0:11:51.360 the largest use of bicycles, not as a vehicle for 0:11:51.400 --> 0:11:55.040 commuting for most communities. It's not true everywhere. Some cities 0:11:55.080 --> 0:11:59.319 are very bicycle friendly. Portland, I think it's the law 0:11:59.360 --> 0:12:01.040 that you have to own a bicycle and then talk 0:12:01.080 --> 0:12:03.760 about it at length. That might be based upon my 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:08.760 viewing of Portlandia all weekend long. However, how if we 0:12:08.760 --> 0:12:14.200 were to look at it's popularity worldwide, that's pretty complicated stuff, because, 0:12:14.280 --> 0:12:16.480 as it turns out, there are not a lot of 0:12:16.520 --> 0:12:21.280 authorities that collect and curate statistics of bicycles. We're gonna 0:12:21.360 --> 0:12:23.520 come back to this a couple of times in this podcast, 0:12:23.600 --> 0:12:27.079 but there are some inescapable facts. One of those is 0:12:27.120 --> 0:12:30.679 that bicycles are an incredibly popular means of getting around 0:12:30.720 --> 0:12:33.800 in various parts of the world, like in China, where 0:12:33.960 --> 0:12:38.000 four thirty million people own bicycles, So you know, it's 0:12:38.080 --> 0:12:40.920 larger than the entire population of the United States. Four 0:12:41.160 --> 0:12:44.199 thirty million bicycle owners in China. It's like if everybody 0:12:44.240 --> 0:12:47.600 in the United States owned one point three bicycles. Yeah, 0:12:47.840 --> 0:12:50.680 something like that. And according to the two thousand ten 0:12:50.760 --> 0:12:53.720 Earth Policy Institute, they had a report that said that 0:12:53.760 --> 0:12:57.040 bicycles are the quote biggest means of individual mobility for 0:12:57.120 --> 0:12:59.960 hundreds of millions of Chinese end quote. Not to suggest 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:04.679 us that it's the primary method of transportation or mobility 0:13:04.800 --> 0:13:07.520 for all of China, but for hundreds of millions, it 0:13:07.679 --> 0:13:11.360 is the primary one. Uh. Now, going back to that 0:13:11.400 --> 0:13:13.920 fixed gear, this is the kind of bike that this 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:15.680 is the first type of bike I had as a kid, 0:13:16.120 --> 0:13:18.360 a fixed gear bike, which is the kind where actually 0:13:18.360 --> 0:13:20.200 it wasn't technically fixed gear because it didn't have a 0:13:20.200 --> 0:13:22.600 break stop to it, but you use the you know, 0:13:22.720 --> 0:13:25.400 as you move the pedals, the wheels move, and as 0:13:25.400 --> 0:13:28.240 the wheels move, the pedals moved, so you can't coast. 0:13:28.720 --> 0:13:33.040 You can't just you know, stop pedaling and keep moving. Um. 0:13:33.080 --> 0:13:35.400 But it does mean that when you apply pressure to 0:13:35.640 --> 0:13:39.120 the pedals, then it stops the wheels from turning, and 0:13:39.160 --> 0:13:42.000 that's how you can break. And in a true fixed 0:13:42.000 --> 0:13:45.560 gear bike or fix ee, you could even pedal backwards 0:13:45.640 --> 0:13:48.160 and have the bike move backwards, although that is not 0:13:48.200 --> 0:13:54.640 recommended by people by people who want to live, it's 0:13:54.679 --> 0:13:58.200 apparently very difficult to learn um or at least tricky. Okay, 0:13:58.240 --> 0:14:01.960 but here we are today, and there are very obvious 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:05.679 advantages to bicycles. I mean, there's some disadvantages to I mean, 0:14:05.720 --> 0:14:08.240 we all know that you can't travel as far as 0:14:08.320 --> 0:14:10.240 quickly in a bicycle as you can in a car. 0:14:10.960 --> 0:14:14.000 Uh Well, I mean maybe in some condition conditions, depending 0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:16.520 on traffic or something like that, you could, but if 0:14:16.559 --> 0:14:18.880 you're talking about moving at high speed, that's sort of 0:14:18.920 --> 0:14:22.360 a setback. You probably can't haul as much cargo or 0:14:22.400 --> 0:14:25.200 as many people and things like that. But on the 0:14:25.240 --> 0:14:28.920 other hand, there are tons of advantages to bicycles. Uh. 0:14:28.960 --> 0:14:31.240 There are a much greener option than cars. I mean 0:14:31.240 --> 0:14:34.800 that pretty much goes without saying. There are zero emission 0:14:34.880 --> 0:14:38.560 in in the everyday use. For furthermore, they're they're very 0:14:38.680 --> 0:14:41.920 much smaller and more lightweight, so right, you can fit 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:44.920 more of them on a road, you know, Like they're 0:14:44.960 --> 0:14:47.800 lower traffic density, So you can get the same number 0:14:47.840 --> 0:14:52.440 of people through a thoroughfare on bicycles much faster than 0:14:52.480 --> 0:14:55.120 you could in cars, just because they're not surrounded by 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:58.040 a huge bulk of metal that takes up space. Same 0:14:58.040 --> 0:15:01.040 thing for a storage and parking they take up less 0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:04.960 space there too. These are all important considerations. They also 0:15:05.200 --> 0:15:09.800 promote healthfulness, right, that's true fitness activity, Like if you're 0:15:09.800 --> 0:15:11.960 you're traveling back and forth place as well, are you 0:15:12.000 --> 0:15:15.040 going to be basically passively sitting the whole time or 0:15:15.160 --> 0:15:17.320 you're going to be moving getting your heart rate up? 0:15:17.840 --> 0:15:21.520 I lift weights while I'm driving. Now, is that why 0:15:21.560 --> 0:15:27.000 you've had so many accidents? Are you talking workout accidents? 0:15:27.000 --> 0:15:29.200 Are you talking like car accidents? I'm talking about all 0:15:29.200 --> 0:15:31.480 those times we heard about when she threw a dumbbell 0:15:31.520 --> 0:15:33.480 out the window of her car at another driver and 0:15:33.600 --> 0:15:40.920 road race accidents, um, but accident anyway. So there are 0:15:40.920 --> 0:15:46.000 obviously lots of advantages to a bicycle based transportation infrastructure. 0:15:46.280 --> 0:15:49.440 It just makes for a much nicer place to live 0:15:49.480 --> 0:15:51.640 in a lot of ways, and it makes for you know, 0:15:51.680 --> 0:15:55.680 a healthier body, greener environment. It's also one one other 0:15:55.720 --> 0:15:57.920 thing to point out before we move on one. Other 0:15:58.120 --> 0:16:02.560 consideration is that it's less expensive toning and maintaining a car. 0:16:02.680 --> 0:16:06.080 I mean, certainly once you factor in gasoline and insurance 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:10.480 all that stuff. Yeah, yeah, I mean huge advantage there. 0:16:10.520 --> 0:16:13.400 It's not even close. And if your bike breaks down, 0:16:13.440 --> 0:16:17.000 it's a little bit cheaper than right. But if you 0:16:17.040 --> 0:16:21.360 look at most American cities today, they're not really geared 0:16:21.400 --> 0:16:24.760 towards bikes. Are they geared? That was like a pun 0:16:24.840 --> 0:16:26.640 Oh I didn't even do that on purpose. I almost 0:16:26.680 --> 0:16:28.600 pointed out too, I'm so probably Lauren, you got it 0:16:28.640 --> 0:16:33.240 before I did. They don't really cater to the cyclist 0:16:33.280 --> 0:16:36.920 in the way that they cater to motor vehicles. Some 0:16:36.960 --> 0:16:39.720 places in the world, like the Netherlands, or like probably 0:16:39.800 --> 0:16:44.920 places in Asia too, are designed to cater particularly two cyclists. 0:16:45.280 --> 0:16:49.760 They've got infrastructure designed that protects cyclists and encourages people 0:16:49.840 --> 0:16:53.560 to ride bicycles. Other places not so much, like the 0:16:53.600 --> 0:16:56.720 places Richard pointed out, maybe Los Angeles or Atlanta, even 0:16:56.760 --> 0:16:59.080 if they're getting better than they used to be, they're 0:16:59.080 --> 0:17:03.120 not exactly the Netherlands. So I was wondering how it 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:06.240 got like this, and I found an interesting story that 0:17:06.280 --> 0:17:09.680 was in a November article for Wired, written by the 0:17:10.240 --> 0:17:13.760 writer Adam Man, and he made an interesting point about 0:17:13.800 --> 0:17:16.960 how roads in the United States are engineered and how 0:17:17.080 --> 0:17:20.480 this affects the kind of traffic they cater to. So 0:17:20.720 --> 0:17:23.960 Man claims that in America, a bunch of social and 0:17:24.040 --> 0:17:27.800 economic trends after World War Two, like and he gives 0:17:27.840 --> 0:17:32.920 the examples of suburban planning, interstate highway development, and movement 0:17:32.960 --> 0:17:37.080 of the middle class out of cities, caused cities to 0:17:37.200 --> 0:17:40.280 change the way they designed roads, specifically changing them to 0:17:40.320 --> 0:17:44.040 be more focused on accommodating cars and trucks. And now 0:17:44.040 --> 0:17:46.800 in the United States, most states use a standard for 0:17:46.840 --> 0:17:51.520 evaluating roads that's called level of service, which essentially means 0:17:51.520 --> 0:17:54.560 how many cars can I cram through this intersection in 0:17:54.600 --> 0:17:58.440 a given period of time. Now that's good if you're 0:17:58.440 --> 0:18:00.639 a driver, I guess, because it means you and less 0:18:00.680 --> 0:18:03.400 time clogged up in traffic trying to get where you're going. 0:18:03.840 --> 0:18:07.159 But obviously, relying mostly or entirely on a metric like 0:18:07.240 --> 0:18:10.480 this is going to come at the expense of other considerations, 0:18:10.520 --> 0:18:14.960 like how the road serves foot traffic or cyclists or 0:18:15.040 --> 0:18:19.760 public transportation. And Man points out that optimizing roads to 0:18:19.840 --> 0:18:24.080 make auto travel easier creates a situation known in economics 0:18:24.119 --> 0:18:28.320 as induced demand. So as we constantly work on making 0:18:28.400 --> 0:18:32.240 roads easier and easier to drive, it simply encourages more 0:18:32.320 --> 0:18:35.480 people to drive cars because it's easy to do so, 0:18:36.080 --> 0:18:38.879 and that creates a positive feedback loop that requires us 0:18:38.920 --> 0:18:41.879 to optimize roads for even more cars because more people 0:18:41.880 --> 0:18:44.720 are driving them. Yeah, here in Atlanta, you know, we'll 0:18:44.760 --> 0:18:46.840 we'll probably be referring to our city quite a bit 0:18:46.880 --> 0:18:49.639 in this because we've seen this in the city. You know, 0:18:49.680 --> 0:18:53.960 we've seen uh, big projects where you're you're looking at 0:18:54.000 --> 0:18:56.880 budgets for transportation and a lot of it gets earmarked 0:18:56.880 --> 0:19:00.520 for things like widening roads or highways. Highways and particular 0:19:00.640 --> 0:19:04.280 the Atlanta highway system is ridiculous, but uh, you know 0:19:04.320 --> 0:19:07.840 it's it's what you really need, these twelve lanes and 0:19:08.000 --> 0:19:10.720 uh and also the things that each driver needs about 0:19:10.800 --> 0:19:13.480 four lanes to themselves, right, you know, because because you know, 0:19:13.600 --> 0:19:16.040 it's important that you be at least five lanes over 0:19:16.119 --> 0:19:18.240 from your exit when you realize you need to get 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:20.280 all the way across and then you've got to cut 0:19:20.280 --> 0:19:23.920 across all those other lanes. So uh, yeah, that's ridiculous 0:19:24.040 --> 0:19:26.480 and obviously there are plenty of studies that show that 0:19:26.600 --> 0:19:29.480 if you add more capacity to roads, that capacity gets filled. 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:32.320 It doesn't it doesn't alleviate traffic. It just means that 0:19:32.359 --> 0:19:35.960 you have more cars in that same space demands. Yeah, 0:19:36.240 --> 0:19:39.359 so it's you know, we we've seen this many times 0:19:39.400 --> 0:19:44.000 here in our city. Um, and the important thing to 0:19:44.040 --> 0:19:47.240 remember is that there are alternatives. Right. We've actually seen 0:19:47.440 --> 0:19:52.360 other cities kind of incorporate new strategies that have had 0:19:52.480 --> 0:19:58.720 measurable and quantifiable results, and not just improvements for for cyclists, right, No, No, 0:19:58.920 --> 0:20:03.600 these improved months for cyclists. I would argue our improvements 0:20:03.640 --> 0:20:07.639 for everybody. So I want to look at one No, really, 0:20:07.840 --> 0:20:09.879 I want to look at one particular example. And I 0:20:09.920 --> 0:20:12.200 say this as somebody who's not a cyclist. I mean 0:20:12.280 --> 0:20:16.280 I could be interested in becoming a cyclist, but I don't. 0:20:16.280 --> 0:20:20.120 I'm not personally staked in this right now, me neither. 0:20:20.160 --> 0:20:22.000 Actually I don't even own a bike. I own a 0:20:22.000 --> 0:20:24.639 bike helmet. I'm not sure. Well I don't bike, but 0:20:24.720 --> 0:20:29.879 no helmet. So yes, we have one person who can 0:20:29.960 --> 0:20:33.840 legally ride a bicycle in our city. Well, I own 0:20:33.880 --> 0:20:38.960 a unicycle. So you you, Maverick, But you were about 0:20:39.000 --> 0:20:41.560 to say, I'm just kidding. I don't own a unicycle, 0:20:41.640 --> 0:20:45.360 but I do have some facts about what's been going 0:20:45.359 --> 0:20:47.840 on in New York City. So a big thing that 0:20:47.880 --> 0:20:50.160 I think is going to be crucial in the development 0:20:50.200 --> 0:20:54.400 of bike friendly cities in the future is the addition 0:20:54.440 --> 0:20:58.879 of protected bike lanes. So you've been out driving before, 0:20:58.920 --> 0:21:01.560 while not you, John, but you've probably been out riding 0:21:03.000 --> 0:21:05.879 once or twice, and even in road A lot of 0:21:05.920 --> 0:21:08.239 roads around here don't have bike lanes at all, right, 0:21:08.680 --> 0:21:11.600 A lot of them that do have bike lanes essentially 0:21:11.680 --> 0:21:13.840 have what what I would look at and say, that's 0:21:13.880 --> 0:21:17.639 just insulting because it's just like a you know, foot 0:21:17.720 --> 0:21:21.480 wide stripe that's sort of painted along the edge of 0:21:21.520 --> 0:21:24.400 the road in the rightmost lane that's kind of partially 0:21:24.400 --> 0:21:28.040 in the gutter sometimes and and may or may not involve, 0:21:28.560 --> 0:21:31.399 you know, getting your elbows lopped off by someone going 0:21:31.760 --> 0:21:34.080 even the normal speed for that roadway A lot of 0:21:34.119 --> 0:21:38.280 times to riding over storm drains like like it doesn't 0:21:38.280 --> 0:21:40.840 even clear the storm drains sometimes A lot of times 0:21:40.880 --> 0:21:42.760 to me, it doesn't look any different than if there 0:21:42.800 --> 0:21:45.239 were just a cyclist riding as far as he or 0:21:45.280 --> 0:21:49.480 she could to the right in the right lane, so 0:21:49.520 --> 0:21:52.200 that I don't really see another lane. That line is 0:21:52.200 --> 0:21:55.040 a force field that protects the bicyclist from any cars 0:21:55.080 --> 0:21:58.000 that could end up swerving into that traffic. Right, that's no, 0:21:58.680 --> 0:22:01.840 but there could be such a force field, not so 0:22:01.920 --> 0:22:06.359 much a force field, but maybe say in physical matter. 0:22:06.840 --> 0:22:09.640 So in two thousand seven, the City of New York 0:22:09.720 --> 0:22:15.040 started adding protected bike lanes on some roads. And contrasted 0:22:15.040 --> 0:22:16.800 to the type of lanes we were just talking about, 0:22:16.840 --> 0:22:19.280 these are lanes for bikes that are set apart from 0:22:19.320 --> 0:22:24.439 motor traffic by barriers or parking spaces, like parallel parking 0:22:24.440 --> 0:22:29.119 spaces between the bike lane and the driving lanes, painted buffers, 0:22:29.200 --> 0:22:33.280 street lamps, planners, and trees, and other non driving zones 0:22:33.600 --> 0:22:35.879 like it might be just a raised curb, almost like 0:22:35.880 --> 0:22:38.879 a median, but just a very thin one that separates 0:22:38.880 --> 0:22:42.040