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The world's 280 million electric bikes and mopeds are cutting demand for oil far more than electric cars
(theconversation.com)
this post was submitted on 17 Nov 2023
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Fuck Cars
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Not much good if you've got to take the kids shopping though.
What? Why? I biked since I was like 5 with my parents to wherever including supermarket. Not sure what you mean honestly.
People be growing up knowing nothing but absolute car dependency and the infrastructure that comes with it. They cannot fathom any other way of existing.
People be privileged and not realising that their way of life is not suitable for everyone. Bikes are not the answer to every question.
I should have been more verbose. We as a society (in North America especially but also elsewhere) have suffered through decades of redlining that has resulted in racial and economic divides.
The wealthiest suburbs are being subsidized by the poorest neighbourhoods with all the money being funneled into infrastructure that directly supports car dependency.
In order to participate in society, you are now required to own, maintain and insure your own vehicle(s).
I am suggesting that we've been robbed of a way of life where cars are not necessary to survive. Where your kids can hop on their own bikes and safely take themselves to where they need to go without worrying about if they'll be struck by a car.
I'm talking about active transport not as a hobby for the privileged, but as a normality for all.
Where I am there are hills everywhere. You know that old joke about walking five miles uphill to school in the snow, and ten miles uphill to get home? That's here. Plus, it's the UK, so when it snows, the roads and pavements are lethal.
Plus, some people have kids under 5 😉
More seriously though, because of the amount of hills, and the fact that most people work all day, bikes are not the best option here. The nearest supermarket is several miles away with a lot of hills in between. If you've got plenty of free time, riding to the shops with the kids could be fun, but for most people public transport is the answer. It's just a shame that it's terrible here .
Well I live in Sweden and we have snow here too buddy. Lousy public transport sucks though, but that's what you get in a carcentric society, no options...
Exactly, you live in a country that doesn't shut down because of half a millimetre of snow. We genuinely get public transport shutting down if there's snow, and we've infamously had trains stop running because of the wrong type of leaves on the line. For a country that mostly has adverse weather conditions, we're absolutely useless if the weather's anything but dry and sunny.
I honestly don't know what we can do here to get better public transport and encourage people away from cars. Once you're further down the valley, there's enough room to build other transport methods alongside the roads to allow a transition, but further up, there's barely enough room for cars to pass each other in some places, which means that buses would struggle too, and there's no room to make a one way loop to free up space either.
Yup, that's us. We walk, use transit, or the kid rides on her bike child seat.
E-bikes exist if you don't have the legs to tackle those hills yet.
I'd love to get an ebike, but at the moment the price is too high, from what I've seen. The cheapest ones seem to be over £1,000, unless you get the little fold up bikes, but they don't look like they'd be comfortable for a long ride where you're pedaling lots.
A gravel bike style would be better here too, simply because we're in the valleys, and lots of the trails are a bit rough.
Back to the point though, getting to the shops and carrying a week's worth of shopping on a bike with young kids is impractical here. It would be great if it was practical, but other than the hills, we don't have the infrastructure for the most part. The roads have to be shared, even if it's just for now, and there are lots of stretches here where there's not the room for bikes with motor vehicles, and especially not on the pavements. This time of year is even worse - it's dark in the morning and night, and the weather is usually crap. All of it increases the risk of accidents, and that's the last thing any of us want.