The Life-Sized City Blog

When I was invited to speak in New York recently, one of the lectures was about behaviour and the challenges of changing it. I figured I'd slap the lecture onto the blog. Behaviour is a tricky subject and getting groups of people to change their behaviour is never easy. Lately, behaviour is a hot topic in Emerging Bicycle Cultures. Many people who ride bicycles are generating bad press because of the way they're cycling and many other cyclists are getting branded negatively by association. Generally, bad behaviour is a sign that cyclists don't have adequate infrastructure. Increasing cycling's infrastructure and profile is a good way to calm the traffic in more ways than one. We're at an interesting point in the reestablishment of urban cycling as a norm. Bicycles have been a fad, a trend, for almost two years now. There is every indication that we are finally returning to a place where the bicycle is regarded as a respected, accepted and feasible transport f...

This essay by Ivan Illich was first published in 1973, in Le Monde. In the previous guest essay The Social Ideology of the Motorcar by André Gorz , a number of references were made to Illich. This is the essay he was referring to. Thanks to our reader, John, for the link. Read the whole thing but I'm going to just jump right to the last sentence. It's quite brilliant. "Participatory democracy demands low-energy technology, and free people must travel the road to productive social relations at the speed of a bicycle." Energy Crisis by Ivan Illich First Chapter of Energy and Equity, first published in Le Monde in early 1973. It has recently become fashionable to insist on an impending energy crisis. This euphemistic term conceals a contradiction and consecrates an illusion. It masks the contradiction implicit in the joint pursuit of equity and industrial growth. It safeguards the illusion that machine power can indefinitely take the place of manpower. To resolve this co...

This essay by André Gorz, the French philosopher who pioneered ideas of political ecology, was first published in 1973 in Le Sauvage . Much of it is still applicable today and well worth a read. The Social Ideology of the Motorcar by André Gorz The worst thing about cars is that they are like castles or villas by the sea: luxury goods invented for the exclusive pleasure of a very rich minority, and which in conception and nature were never intended for the people. Unlike the vacuum cleaner, the radio, or the bicycle, which retain their use value when everyone has one, the car, like a villa by the sea, is only desirable and useful insofar as the masses don't have one. That is how in both conception and original purpose the car is a luxury good. And the essence of luxury is that it cannot be democratised. If everyone can have luxury, no one gets any advantages from it. On the contrary, everyone diddles, cheats, and frustrates everyone else, and is diddled, cheated, and frustrated i...

Fourth installment by sociologist Dave Horton , from Lancaster University, as a guest writer. Dave has written a brilliant assessment of Fear of Cycling in an essay and we're well pleased that he fancies the idea of a collaboration. We'll be presenting Dave's essay in five parts. We might suppose that fear of cycling has become locked into a downward spiral from which it seems almost impossible to break, unless the practice of cycling can be spatially relocated, and performed under ‘new’, ‘safe’ conditions. This section examines recent attempts to create such new, safe cycling spaces. For most of the twentieth century, the great majority of cycling in the UK took place on roads. The dominant, widely shared assumption was that (declining numbers of) cyclists shared space with (increasing numbers of) cars, trucks, buses and taxis. Riding in an environment dominated by potentially lethal motorised modes of mobility was a taken-for-granted, normal part of cyclists’ ordinary exp...

Third installment by sociologist Dave Horton, from Lancaster University, as a guest writer. Dave has written a brilliant assessment of Fear of Cycling in an essay and we're well pleased that he fancies the idea of a collaboration. We'll be presenting Dave's essay in five parts. Fear of Cycling - Helmet Promotion Campaigns - by Dave Horton - Part 03 of 05 Like road safety education, campaigns to promote the wearing of cycle helmets effectively construct cycling as a dangerous practice about which to be fearful. Such campaigns, and calls for legislation to make cycle helmets compulsory, have increased over the last decade. In 2004, a Private Members’ Bill was tabled in the UK Parliament, to make it an offence for adults to allow children under the age of 16 to cycle unless wearing a helmet. Also in 2004, the influential British Medical Association, in a policy turnaround , voted to campaign for helmets to be made compulsory for all cyclists (for comprehensive detail on these ...

Something new here on Copenhagenize.com. We've enlisted the help of sociologist Dave Horton, from Lancaster University, as a guest writer. Dave has written a brilliant assessment of Fear of Cycling in an essay and we're well pleased that he fancies the idea of a collaboration. We'll be presenting Dave's essay in five parts. Dave Horton is a sociologist and lover of all things cycling. He is part of the Cycling and Society Research Group, which has pioneered a ‘cultural turn’ in cycling studies and which holds an annual symposium in the UK. Dave works at Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster University, on the project ‘Understanding Walking and Cycling’. He tries to do, to write about, and to promote all kinds of cycling, because cycling is essentially good. Fear of Cycling - by Dave Horton - Part 01 of 05 Most people seem finally to have realised that cycling is ‘a good thing’, but many still don’t cycle. So what stops them getting on their bikes? Explanations typic...