Tactical urbanism, bicycle rebellion, Right to the City.

What Scares Bicyclists More, Cars or Drivers’ Attitudes?

So often bicyclists shame each others’ riding behavior, not because it’s dangerous, but because it somehow presents people on bikes in a negative light. To accept this line of logic, we must assume that as riders we’re all committing a political act of obedience, asking for approval and safe passage from the dominant drivers of metal Priuses and SUVs.

I’ve always loathed this rationale, as well as the one that says cycling should be as bland and boring as possible, shunning eccentricities for fear of making our world seem inaccessible. Guys who customize hotrods for auto conventions don’t deter soccer moms from driving mini-vans. Nobody polled as to why they don’t ride cites an abundance of freaks as their reason for steering clear from the bike life.

Never more self-righteous than when policing our own.

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Documenting the Art of Street Rebellion

The historical tactics of domestic and international street uprising is one usually condemned in the moment and glorified decades later. I’ve never ceased to be amazed by those who support mass demonstrations in Egypt while criticizing civil disobedience here in the states. They recognize the value the Boston Tea Party but abhor the notion of burning cop cars.

As a graduate of the NW Film Center, I was taught essential theories of documentary ethics. The importance of recognizing the camera as a weapon for social justice was stressed in most courses. Used as a tool to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted, cameras are a powerful weapon indeed. So much so that globally, journalists have recently suffered a massive increase of attacks and murders while on the job.

Few spectacles draw more journalistic interest than the riot. While obviously portrayed disingenuously by corporate media, such uprisings are not mindless acts of aggression. What begins as a peaceful demonstration against injustice often escalates into more severe methods. This happens most commonly for one reason: police escalation.

tumblr_nc19523Tt71qexjbwo1_1280Courtesy: America Wakie Wakie

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Night Terrors from the Industrial Revolution

Shorpy.com is without a doubt the finest high resolution photo archive available online. Their collection holds thousands of 8×10 plate glass negatives, all meticulously scanned and retouched, revealing an enthralling portrait of America from the Civil war through WWII unlike any you’ve seen before.

As was common for the era, most images are group portraits or carefully positioned city-scapes crafted to show the very best of prosperity and industrialization. Highlighting some of this style, a previous collection featured here on Rebel Metropolis titled ‘Examining Street Life Before the Automobile‘ revealed vibrant metropolitan thoroughfares prior to the domination of the car.

When perusing Shorpy’s archive, what stands out overall, inevitably, are the blatant class divides of the period, the abject racism, the sub-human status placed on women – far more so than today. Just as alarming are the frank depictions of rabid and unrelenting environmental destruction. The wood and steel infrastructure destined for booming metropolises is shown ripped from the earth, burned into the air, forged into capital while anything unprofitable gets poured back into the ground, smothering soil with toxic heavy metals.

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A New Way to Measure Cycling’s Success

While bikes are on the rise in many cities across the US and Europe, there’s a bit of alarming news lately. Thought of as the most bike-loving city in the country, Portland, OR has stagnated at only a 6% mode share for years. Even worse, a new quasi-scientific poll found that students at Portland State University, the city’s largest academic institution, were actually ditching their bikes in favor of driving more.

Such news typically sends the educated cycling masses into fits of over-analysis and explanation: either the data is inaccurate, the change is temporary, the numbers will improve once projects XYZ are finished, or they simply accept the cause is lost due to lack of political will or failure to frame the cause sufficiently. It’s a little like watching the 5 stages of accepting death, but all at the same time.

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Are Celebrities the Best Cycling Advocates?

The world of celebrity has rarely interested me. Too much emphasis on superficiality, style over substance, and an endless obsession of fame and money. Gross. No thanks.

Yet one inarguably positive aspect of celebrity is the ability to steer media attention towards causes of social justice. If you’re reading this blog, it’s likely you already appreciate how cycling connects several important larger issues, for good or ill. If you don’t, please keep reading.

As I’ve written before, the burning of fossil fuels for energy and transportation is increasing the levels of carbon and methane in Earth’s atmosphere and oceans. This accumulation is causing the planet to heat, ice caps to melt, desertification of farmland, and ocean acidification, which in turn kills phytoplankton, the very basis of the entire food chain. Considering this crisis, riding a bike becomes truly a significant act indeed.

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Labor Day of Rage: Portland Streets Shut Down for Ferguson

Answering a national call-out by Ferguson organizers to fill the streets with marchers similar to solidarity actions carried out in Washington DC this weekend, Portland organizers were quick to set up their own action Monday. On Saturday, reports coming out of Ferguson via the New York Times and other sources cited a call to shut down freeways on Labor Day in protest of the killing of Michael Brown by officer Darren Wilson.

A previous Ferguson solidarity march in Portland saw hundreds of protestors amass outside a police precinct, then take over Martin Luther King Jr Blvd. During that march, police stayed well out of sight. Quoted after the fact, Portland’s North Precinct commander Mike Leloff stated, “There’s no good that can come from engagement over a street. No good was to come from saying ‘You all need to leave the street now.’”

A Labor Day of Rage press statement addressed Commander Leloff’s sentiment, “Last month the police decided to ignore the protestors. The organizers are hoping for the same response, which at least speaks to recognition of responsibility. There is no reason for the traditional heavy-handed responses to a peaceful protest. In solidarity with the people of Ferguson and victims of police brutality everywhere, including Portland, a diverse coalition of community members will be taking to the streets as an act of civil disobedience.”

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