(The following is my repeated personal experience, I’m sharing it here in case other people who get around by foot, bicycle, public transport, or other method besides private automobile are dealing with the same phenomenon.)
Sidenote for people who have known me for years and still always ask me when they see me out & about or at events etc, “HOW DID YOU GET HERE?” I have, on more occasions than i can count, had people bellow it out across a crowded room. Yikes.
The answer will be the same no matter how long you know me, no matter how many times you ask — so you can stop asking the question. Please. I’m not here to be the center of attention or focus.
Anyone feeling called out, please don’t feel called out, there are so many many many many people who do this. For years and years, I think mainly in Florida, I don’t remember it happening in DC or Tokyo or California or New Mexico or other places where I lived, with bicycle and foot as my primary mode of transport for most of my 60+ years.
It’s really exhausting and I sometimes feels like people are trying to indirectly emphasize that I’m making a weird choice that’s not really proper. And that I’m subtly an imposition on people, because then people are burdened with having to worry about my frail elderly self refusing to own a car and stay put in it lol
Or acting like it’s some great feat of strength and athleticism like doing the Ironman triathlon upside down on a pogo stick. Stahhhhppppp!!!
How I got here was either on foot, or bicycle, or occasionally bus, Or very occasionally rideshare (if it was not out of the person’s way and if I felt confident that they respected my transportation choices).
I don’t ask you that question. I take as a given that you are a grown person who is capable of arranging your own transportation.
Me too!
I am an activist, I am trying to make the streets and communities safer for ALL AGES and ABILITIES/CONDITIONS, including the nondriving public.
My personal choice is also related to factors such as health (mental as well as physical), and preferring to spend more money on stuff such as books & classes.
But I am not seeking attention for my personal choice, and in fact the attention can be really problematic.
Also don’t ask me if I’m OK getting home, as if my transportation is inferior to yours. I could always ask if you’re OK getting home in your car, because cars and roads are very dangerous particularly at night. But I prefer not to put out that kind of negative energy. And if I feel concerned for someone I say a prayer or send positive energy. I trust that if you have your license, you know how to drive. I tell you though the roads really are dangerous, and cars can break down anytime. But it’s no use us sitting there obsessively worrying about each other’s transportation choices. Let’s instead push for better infrastructure so that everybody can get their needs met.
Also, on a related note: For the umpteenth time, I wish that the we the Boomer environmentalists had channeled our considerable social capital, monetary wealth and other resources into pushing hard for safe sidewalks and public transportation as the norm everywhere. Instead we became shills for cars and suburbs.
This post was originally prompted by a local organization’s survey of use of its recreational cycling paths: “Please fill out survey re. cycling path. The Loop runs right through South Daytona and Daytona Beach and all along the East Coast from NSB to St Augustine. We need more support on the East side.”
My comments:
Unfortunately I was not able to conplete the survey, because I literally never use any parts of the loop except the little bit that runs along the Halifax river in Daytona Beach. Between Beville and ISB or Main. And it won’t submit without the ranked answers completed. [The Loop is a series of recreational trails, they might be able to be used by people getting from point a to point b but I think it’s mainly used by people driving and parking and getting on their bikes for recreation.]
Probably no one who lives in Daytona Beach and cycles for transportation will be able to complete the survey. Is there a way to change it so we don’t have to rank each of the five parts of the loop? Or just have an N/A answer?
I ride for transportation, and find that people treat this transportation like it’s some stupid eccentric hobby that I stubbornly persist in doing. As opposed to a practical and less-expensive, less cognitively draining alternative to car ownership. I understand that it’s hard to get along without a car, and I don’t blame people for having cars; I just want more respect and infrastructure for other modes of transport.
I am also done with people telling us to “be careful” on foot or on bicycle. Please, we know all too well that we have a target on our back at all times 24 seven. And that we are not welcome in most places, on some roads there aren’t even sidewalks or shoulders at all. And maybe never will be. Please instead tell your motorist friends to BE CAREFUL while insulated behind the windows of their very dangerous multi-thousand-pound metal boxes that can kill them OR us in a heartbeat.
Owning a car is something I have felt I had to do in the past but never wish to do so again. I’m in my 60s aspiring never again to have to drive, so i really won’t be aspiring to drive in my 70s, 80s, etc. I wish no seniors were forced to drive just to get their daily errands done.
I also want better infrastructure and more support for people who don’t have the option to drive. Many do not have the option to drive, at all, as you well know. But there’s so little acknowledgment and support for that reality.
Along with helping to change the prevailing attitude toward cycling for transport, I want to find ways to promote more support & understanding for getting around by walking and bus. So far I have been wretchedly unsuccessful.
Those are what i would have written as my answers to the survey. Anyway, Thanks for all you do to get people outdoors and moving around by human power.
PS. Sorry to sound negative, but.
Either we get a lot more actual TRANSPORTATION INFRASTRUCTURE for something other than cars, or I need to leave.
I cannot and will not live and try to grow old in a place that does not respect the validity of people who don’t have cars. And, it’s not just about me; I am an activist FIRST and FOREMOST for the public good, not just trying to navigate & find kludgy patches for my own immediate stuff.
This is not a threat, this is a promise.
I don’t say this lightly, because there’s not really any place where I would be wanted (or the one or two places where I might be wanted, I could not afford to live), and it wouldn’t be easy starting over at my age.
But I’ve started from zero before and I will absolutely do it again — even if all I do for the rest of my life is roam the country on foot helping different people with community prepping etc til im ready to crawl in a ditch and compost myself.
(To be absolutely clear, it would take a lot to make me leave Daytona Beach! I am basically taking the current humanpowered-transportation-hostile social & political climate as a gauntlet to step up my transportation activism.)