Cycling, style and blog guru

Here I am - I can't believe it - with Mikael Colville Andersen, the blogger who has created the phenomenon of Copenhagen cycle chic. I heard him speak twice this week - and as is often the case with speakers - he was even better once he had left his slides behind and was speaking freely.

He takes a culturally inspired approach to the bicycle [rather than a transportation or mobility driven approach]

Some of the points he made were :

• just make riding a bike the easiest way to get from A to B
• use happy, pleasant, positive imagery to stimulate urban bike riding
• lowered speeds enable bicyling to flourish - Barcelona and Dublin both now have 30 kms on local roads 
• reclaiming space for bikes rather than cars is a process of re-democratisation, re-humanising, re-creating liveability 
• its not about the bicycle - its about the broader urban context 

Some great quotes from Mikael:

• 'follow their [bike riders] desire lines - make it easy
• he likes 'being elbow to elbow with fellow citizens'
• he finds 'the upright bicycle the 'most anthropologically pleasing' and the 'most suitable for citizen cyclists'
• 'plant the bicycle on the urban landscape' or more expansively 'planting seeds of a meadow cycling' 
• inner urban areas should be 'saturated with bicycles' 
• In Copenhagen, bikes are like 'a fifth limb'

Hill 'n' Dale BMX Park

BMX park in Boroondara

I was told that it has been formalised from an informal BMX track. It makes good use of the fall of the land. There is separate provision for pedestrians seen at the left hand side of the photo.

Innovating the Cities: Design, Planning and Architectural Solutions in the Urban Environment

David Owen: Greening the Metropolis

Owen's central proposition is that densifying the city is the most effective intervention in reducing environmental impact and carbon footprint.

There was no argument about this proposition from the Panel, rather the discussion centred on solutions and obstacles to achieving it.

Tim Flannery, curator of the Deakin lectures, appeared least persuaded about the arguments, speaking almost in parables. He reminded us of the acute vulnerability of cities from any threat to water or food supply. He concluded that 'the interest of the individual has to be confluent with the interest of the city/civilization.'


Here are some quotes I liked or key points I wanted to remember:

David Owen:

'when you move to the country, you move into your car'

'move people and their daily destinations closer together'

'density is the main tool to reduce environmental impact and carbon footprint'

'the car dragged a whole infrastructure behind it'

'there is no such thing as a sustainable house, a sustainable building or a sustainable car. Sustainability is the context, the relationship between things: it is not a gadget or a technology.'

'its not about signing up to solutions that you can buy'

Panel

'our houses are oversized and underoccupied' [Melinda Dodson]

'smaller houses, closer together and drive less' [Melinda Dodson]

'How to get people to want to live differently' [Sue Holliday]

density is easier when there is 'a high quality public realm that people feel comfortable in' [Rob Adams]

'enough not more' [Rob Adams]

Bruce Taper:

'Greenhouse gas emissions reduction has to be the most basic kpi of all metropolitan strategies'

we've got to do 'simple things agressively'

'we've got to put some hope into it.'

5 stars is 'a loose and sloppy metric'

we've got to examine 'the lives we really live rather than how we imagine we live' in answer to a question along the lines of 'where will the children play in the denser city' [David Owen]

Seating places

I am very fond of these benches on the St Kilda Promenade. I like the way the tetragonia and pigface cascade over and between the lava rock walls like a blanket over the back of a couch. The rock walls on their own are black and harsh, but when softened by these plants I like them.

Roundabouts can be beautiful

I love this roundabout at the corner of Esplanade East and Bridge St, Port Melbourne. The trunks of the trees pick up a pinkish tinge at sunset.

Serious about signs

photo Rachel Powning

I have come to see that this whole blog could be devoted to signs: especially signs about dogs. How about this example from Hong Kong!

Faith in signs

photo Bruce Parnell

One of the most frequent solutions proposed by residents to a problematic issue is to 'put up a sign'. People have great faith in signs to resolve problems. Here is an example of that misplaced optimism.