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'Sociopaths'
19th November 2009 | Eddie Allen
More: Daily Commuting Tips Archive
Our car filled roads are anti-social places. We sit behind glass and metal in air conditioned, soundproofed spaces. We're divorced from the world around us. We barely give each other eye contact. We say things to each other that we'd never utter if our automotive swear boxes were stripped away. Our gestures are replaced with a blare of the horn, a flash of the headlights or the irritated rev of the engine.
Compare and contrast...
Yesterday I went for an early morning ride on my motorway - AKA - my nearest Sustrans traffic free path. The sun was shining, the sky was blue and the air was still. Perfect cycling weather. It could have been raining stair rods and it wouldn't have made any difference.
The Liverpool Loopline was alive with walkers, dog owners and other cyclists, some on their way to work, others snatching some ‘me' time before the onslaught of another day. Others on their way to the supermarket. Others just enjoying the break in the bad weather and taking in the tranquil tree lined avenue with its birdlife and other fauna.
Whenever I ride along the Loopline, I make it my business to say ‘hello' to everyone I pass. 90% of the time I get a smile and a hello back. At the very least I get a nod, sometimes bemused at first - after all a ‘stranger' acknowledging you without any provocation can take some getting used to.
In this way, these special, human sized places are a world apart from the roads and their entrenched set of social rules. Even the pavements which line our roads have fallen under the same anti-social spell. Try saying ‘Good Morning' to the next stranger you walk past on the pavement and note their reaction.
So what's going on here? A century of car-centric living has given us a heady cocktail of power, mobility, pollution and alienation. We step into our cars and turn from social beings to (at best) aliens in our own environment. At worst we explore angry, asocial alter egos. We become conditioned by the machines we've created.
Compare this Orwellian nightmare to the (some would say) pastoral and romanticised world of the cycle path. On the path, we're equals. We've got no 2 tonne status symbols to hide behind. We're moving at speeds that our minds and bodies were designed for. We've got space and time to engage with the people and the world around us. We can see the whites of each others eyes as we pass. We're acutely (sometimes too acutely!) aware of the elements. We're in tune. We stop and help each other out if our bikes break down (I've given away more spare tubes to other cyclists than I've used my self and I'm sure that in time my favours will be returned).
Think on that last point. When was the last time you stopped to help a motorist stranded at the side of the road with their hazard lights flashing? Last time I saw the tell tale orange flashing at the roadside, I just drove on by.
When we change the way we move we're not only presented with a chance to slow climate change and congestion. We're offered an opportunity to change the way we relate to one another. Now that's powerful.
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