Originally Posted by
Papa Tom
In case any of you were hoping this thread would dry up and go away, my apology in advance for reviving it.
I've posted in this thread before, but as my thoughts evolve, I'm finding myself more and more in agreement with the basic premise of the article cited above. While I haven't come to a definitive conclusion, I've been thinking a lot about why we feel so strongly about more people bike-commuting to work (the one place we need to arrive on-time, clean, and well-dressed every day, in every type of weather) rather than biking to the store, to dinner, to the mall, etc.
Perhaps it would be a more realistic goal to make these activities more bike friendly than to expect employers (who have the right not to want sweaty, smelly people working in their offices and retail stores) to modify their policies for those of us who want to bike to work?
Just a thought.
I can see your point. But for me, the article's reasoning hinges on this key statement "With commuting we’re trying to get a lot of people to do something that they really don’t want to do instead of getting people to do something that they will want to do." And I take issue with it.
On the face of it, it seems self-evident. So few people are bike commuters, therefore they really don't want to do it. But do all of these people have enough knowledge and experience to rationally evaluate bike commuting? And is it really true "something that they will want to do" excludes bike commuting after they've gained that knowledge and experience? I disagree on both points. From my own conversations, from opinions I've read, from the perspectives I've seen in news stories and features, people simply don't believe that it's really possible other than for extreme sorts of individuals. They think it is unsafe. Inconvenient. Too much work, too uncomfortable. Too far for them personally, or some other feature of their route which they believe is somehow unique or a deal-breaker. All of these may be sometimes true, but more often wrong. I don't think that they really
know enough about it for us to say that "really don’t want to do" it.
As for the second part, some stick with it and some don't. There is something I've gleaned from my conversations with the head of Clean Air Foundation, now a joint program with Georgia DOT and regional transportation manager to promote alternative commuting. That is, bicycle commuters do tend to stick with it. They enjoy it, need the exercise, whatever of a myriad reasons but the end result is that they do, more so than car-poolers, van programs and public transportation users. It is explicitly why they provide
less incentives for bicycle commuters, because they simply aren't needed as much! Other alternatives, people need at least three months habit for it to become a long term practice for them, so the program provides monetary incentives. It's just not as necessary for cyclists, who tend to stick with it or not for their own reasons, regardless of monetary incentives. My takeaway from that is that the second part is wrong - cycling IS "getting people to do something that they will want to do", much more so than the other alternatives.