Last week cyclist and musician David Byrne was on “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” . He rode onto the stage on a bike, and said that he rides his bike as his “main mode of transportation.” When Fallon appeared confused about why anyone would do that, Byrne’s tone clarified that it’s not crazy to want to bicycle in an American city – in fact, it’s crazy that the entire system has been designed to make it easier to drive a car. The problem is that we’ve all been gaslighted by auto makers and anti-transit politicians to see car-choked streets as “normal.” The segment is worth watching.
“Traveling at high speeds causes you to miss things, or to assign things more or less importance in your mental model of a place than they may really have. One of the best ways to deeply understand the place you live is, thus, to slow down. Way down.”
Take a walk or a leisurely bike ride for no particular reason, for exercise or for an errand. It’s a fantastic way to get to know people and neighborhoods in your city. Asbury Park is easily walkable in terms of distance to any destination, at only 1.4 m square.
Asbury Park Complete Streets Coalition hosts regular Community Bike Rides – slow ambles through various parts of the city, sometimes picking other riders up along the way. It’s a great way to get to know new people and other neighborhoods, to see things all around town that we may not have known about. We’ve talked to The Asbury Park Historical Assoc. about walking tours too. Our streets are becoming safer and more accommodating to people walking and people on bikes, so take a walk or a ride and explore a part of the city you may not have known!
See Your City Differently by Slowing Down
by Daniel Herriges
“One of the simplest ways to engage with your community is to physically get out in it. When you walk or bike, the slower pace allows you to notice details you’ve never seen before. Not only that, you will hear, smell and feel the environment in a way that’s impossible to experience from inside an automobile.
I’m always amazed how many total strangers speak to me when I’m walking or biking. They ask for directions, make surprising observations, or just say howdy. Cars create barriers between people. Active transportation eliminates them. When we’re not surrounded by glass and steel, people can see our faces and we become recognizably human. Sharing a smile, which happens a lot more often when you’re on foot or bike, reminds us of this fact.”
Walking tours in Montreal.
A group of friends from all over Asbury Park on a Community Ride in Spring 2018. Bikes, and even pedal surreys are all lit up!
Do you drive and feel like people who walk and ride bikes are taking over your city – and you’re losing your privilege? How do you feel about walking in your city? Are you riding a bike for recreation or daily for transportation? Maybe you drive a car when you need to, but also walk and ride a bike whenever you can? Let’s take a look at it…
The Pedestrian Strikes Back
Officials in several countries are getting the message: Cities are about people, not cars. Read about it:
By Richard Conniff Contributing Opinion Writer Dec. 15, 2018
In many of the major cities of the world, it has begun to dawn even on public officials that walking is a highly efficient means of transit, as well as one of the great underrated pleasures in life. A few major cities have even tentatively begun to take back their streets for pedestrians.
Denver, for instance, is proposing a plan to invest $1.2 billion in sidewalks, and, at far greater cost, bring frequent public transit within a quarter-mile of most of its residents. In Europe, where clean, safe, punctual public transit is already widely available, Oslo plans to ban all cars from its city center beginning next year. Madrid is banning cars owned by nonresidents, and is also redesigning 24 major downtown avenues to take them back for pedestrians. Paris has banned vehicles from a road along the Seine, and plans to rebuild it for bicycle and pedestrian use.
Yes, car owners are furious. That’s because they have mistaken their century-long domination over pedestrians for a right rather than a privilege. The truth is that cities are not doing nearly enough to restore streets for pedestrian use, and it’s the pedestrians who should be furious.
We may tend to feel like we own the roads when we’re driving cars. This is called windshield bias. When we’re walking or on bikes we feel vulnerable. This can be a huge deterrent to walking and biking, and it’s killing us. Asbury Park is working on making streets safe for people walking and on bicycles, and calming traffic with infrastructure to #slowthecars, and help make us healthier and build a healthier city.
The road to good health is paved with walking, biking, and transit
By Ethan Goffman –
Driving is often a miserable experience that leaves people isolated and physically deprived
Yet, on average, Americans commute 50 minutes daily and 90 percent of the time by car, says writer Kirsten Dirksen in the Huffington Post.
Much of this suffering is due to the ways we built up our places during a time in our history when bicycling and walking became afterthoughts.
We forgot that bicycling and walking are great for your health. Transit, in turn, encourages walking and biking. And properly designed neighborhoods encourage walking, biking, and transit.
The shape of cities and transit networks thus shapes our health. So say a plethora of studies and real-life examples from around the world, which collectively constitute overwhelming evidence for the public-health benefits of smart planning and transportation options.
Asbury Park is in good company with many European Cities including Barcelona-” the percentage of people who cycle “remains low in all European cities, except in countries like the Netherlands and Denmark, which means that there is plenty of room to increase bicycle use.”
Cycling Is the Urban Transport Mode Associated With the Greatest Health Benefits
13 August 2018
A study carried out in seven European cities highlights the role of active transport in good mental health and self-perceived health
“Mark Nieuwenhuijsen, coordinator of the study and director of the Urban Planning, Environment and Health Initiative at ISGlobal, commented: “Transport is not just a matter of mobility; it also has to do with public health and the well-being of the population.” The study’s findings, he noted, show yet again that “an integrated approach to urban planning, transport planning and public health is needed in order to develop policies that promote active transport, such as adding more segregated cycle lanes in Barcelona, which are transforming the city into a better environment for cyclists.” Physical Activity Through Sustainable Transport Approaches
