In the late 1940s, my pre-teen years, I would ride my bike after school, in the dark using battery lights, with no fear for my safety from my parents. This era is now referred to as the “Golden Age of Cycling.” On the Continent of Europe, cycle racing was the number one sport.

Looking back, it was a great time to ride a bike. Many of the cars on the road were pre-war from the 1920s and 1930s. New cars produced were like the Morris Minor and the Ford Anglia, (Below.) had a tiny engines around one liter. (1,000cc.) About the size of many motorcycles today.

During the 1950s, most of the people driving cars had grown up riding bicycles, their parents probably still rode a bicycle as their personal transport. They didn’t get upset with cyclists on the road, and they were content to cruise along at 30mph, occasionally reaching 50 or 60 on a straight road that ran downhill. At least they were in they were protected from the rain and cold.

Gradually all that changed, and now you have a generation who never rode a bike as a kid. Owning and driving a car becomes ever increasingly expensive, and with the spending of all that money comes an attitude of entitlement. 

read more: Dave Moulton’s blog, 28.05.13.

the title led me to think those cars were able to fit a bike in the trunk, or there were designed-in bike racks or something of the sort. but still, an interesting personal/historical account.

The Combe Down Tunnel is a key section of the Two Tunnels Greenway, a four-mile stretch of disused railway between Bath and the village of Midford in Somerset. It forms part of a longer cycling loop that takes in other striking engineering accomplishments, including the already reopened but shorter Devonshire Tunnel, the Dundas Aqueduct and Tucking Mill Viaduct…

The launch date marks 50 years since the Beeching report condemned thousand of miles of UK railway to dereliction. To date, Sustrans claim they have resurrected 1,500 miles of disused lines as cycle and pedestrian paths around the country.

To celebrate the tunnel’s opening on 6 April there will be a festival at Bloomfield Road Open Space. From 12.30-4pm there will be a 13-mile family bike ride on the loop through the Combe Down and Devonshire tunnels, and along the Tucking Mill Viaduct and Dundas Aqueduct. Sustrans will be taking donations of £5 from individuals and £10 from families.

bikeradar, 25.03.13

Social unrest is always a corollary of increasing disparities in a society and a slow erosion of benefits to the poor.

I do fear the London riots are merely a precursor to the shape of things to come. In the US, even the word “poor” is banished from political dialogue, and there’s no discussion on about how to deal with poverty.

Everyone talks about “middle class” which is also ravaged by stagnating incomes, whose fringes are falling into poverty. The rich are called “job creators” who are seen to be in dire need of more tax breaks, tax shelters and havens, while employee rights are curtailed and there are repeated calls for the elimination of minimum wage and reduction in Medicare and SS.

US got out of the Great Depression by having massive programs for the poor and the highest marginal taxes to become the most prosperous nation in history. There was a time when US had marginal income tax rates above 70% AND a strong economy with job growth. 

There’s a lesson in that.

—mauren (reader comment)
nytimes, 10.08.11.