Phase 4: Weeks 13-16
Define, Test and Prepare
More Iteration and review
More further development, peer review of a draft report and writing final report or business plan
Weekly learning objectives
Draft Critical Review
Look back and develop
To do:
Dig deeper into these different cultural beliefs about cycling and talk about how they came about
pull together some really extreme “headlines” about cycling from around the world, showing really opposing views and extreme scenarios
how design represents cycling differently in different cultures?
analyse how clubs, bike manufacturers etc promote themselves in different cultures and how this leans into the stereotypes you’re talking about.
the power to instigate political change, improve wellbeing/health and empower communities
some analysis around the role of design in the cycling world
are cycling adverts (in Iran) totally aimed at men?
analysis on the representation of cycling/cyclists and how design has contributed to the stereotypes that have formed
explain how your project might break down the stereotypes/myths around cycling and tell a more gritty, but real story
demonstrate that cycling is more than the common cliches. You should argue this point and shatter perception
It has the power to instigate political change, improve wellbeing/health and empower communities
explore, in particular, view cycling through a global and social context.
The focus will be on change. The change the bicycle brought/brings.
The stories will be about the people involved.
Research Progress
I’m starting to collage more information on the interesting stories – not all of them have been so far but these have stood out. Others contacted have kind of faded away but I think the project has got more direction now so the faded ones shouldn’t matter.
So far, we have:
Bikes not Bombs
Area: USA, Latin America, Africa
Bikes Not Bombs uses the bicycle as a vehicle for social change to achieve economic mobility for Black and other marginalized people in Boston and the Global South.
From their ‘About Us’ Page:
Each year we collect roughly 5,000 used bicycles and tons of used parts from our supporters around Greater Boston and New England.
We ship most of these bikes overseas to economic development projects through our International Partners in Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean.
Some of the bikes are repurposed in our Youth Programs where teens learn bicycle safety and mechanics skills in the process of earning bikes to keep for themselves.
Our retail Bike Shop also reconditions and sells some of the donated bikes that we receive, while employing many graduates of our programs. The Shop’s profit from the bicycle sales, parts sales, and repairs goes towards funding our youth and international work.
“The morality police”
Female cycling, Iraq
A strange find. An organisation in Iraq dubbed ‘The Morality Police’ go around looking for women who aren’t following absolutely the laws of Islam. They’re not actual laws; they’re not illegal, they’re a set of rules placed by the religious leaders to Police peoples Morals (hence the name).
A quick Google Search brings
https://www.mystealthyfreedom.org/cycling-unveiled-against-patriarchy-in-iran/
As you’d expect there are quite a lot of activists against this one…
Stop de Kindermoord
A movement against the number of children’s deaths caused by motor vehicles, Amsterdam
In The Netherlands, by 1971 deaths by motor vehicles were 3,300, of which 500 were children. A campaign in favour of pedestrians and bicycles started in different locations. It was called “stop children’s murders”.
Found again by our friends at Google, an archive called the Environmental Justice Atlas
Dutch National Archives
Looking through the National Archives for details on the ‘Kindermoord’ I found a lot of references. Newspaper clippings from 1973 through to the late ’80s, press photographs (out of copyright) and some examples of poster campaigns from the time (copyright here is a grey area, as far as the archive knows there isn’t any, but they say there might be…)
Stop de Kindermoort is a conflict on the use of urban space and on the means of urban transport, a conflict in favour of pedestrians and cyclists with a successful outcome. In The Netherlands, the predominant transport mode was the bicycle before world war II but with the increased popularity of the car during 1950 and 1960 cycle paths were being removed to give space for the cars. In the post war era “urban policymakers came to view the car as the travel mode of the future”. Neighbourhoods were destroyed to construct the roads for motorized traffic [4] and city squares replaced by car parking spaces [10]. But the 1970s will change this paradigm for the Dutch. In this period people start realizing about the disadvantages of the mass use of motorized vehicles. One crucial influence for this change of mind, was the citizen’s group ‘Stop de Kindermoord’.
In 1971, the deaths by motor vehicles reached 3,300, 500 of them were children. In 1972, many protests related to such children murders occurred in different locations in the Netherlands. But the most memorable was ‘Stop de Kindermoord’
“they were an answer to how a lot of people felt about (child) traffic deaths at that time in the Netherlands”
Our World Documentary – BBC
Searching for information from another source; iPlayer! Looking for documentaries which could give some extra insight into definite changes due to the bicycle I found an episode of Our World from 2013 which documented a campaign in the Netherlands that led to the changes in town planning prioritise cycling as the main way to travel, making town and cities safer, cleaner and less congested.
Also via BBC Sounds: “In 1973, the campaign group Stop de Kindermoord or Stop the Child Murder launched in the Netherlands. It would change the face of the nation’s infrastructure. Witness speaks to the group’s chair, Maartje van Putten. Interviewed on the BBC 27 Nov 2013.”
[Their] Project details
The movement against deaths by cars started with the death of a child’s journalist in a road accident. He [Vic Langenhoff] was the first person to use the term “Stop de Kindermoord” (stop the child murder). After his child’s death, he published an article with this headline. This slogan was a powerful message. The original idea of Langenhoff was to protect the kids from cars by sending them in bus to the school, but soon after more experienced campaigners contacted him to redirect the campaign to reduce the danger in the roads. From this starting point, the group focused their efforts in increasing the roads safety, especially for children.
There were several demonstrations from the group: occupying accidents blackspots, organizing special days were streets were closed to allow children to play safely, they cycled with an organ in front of the house of the prime minister Joop den Uyl, to sing songs asking for safer streets. A characteristic is that the protests involved both the parents and children. One of the most remarkable protest, and is still use today, took place outside Amsterdam’s Rijksmuseum in the mid-1970s, were the participants laid down with their bicycles pretending to be dead .
In 1973, the oil crisis also gave momentum to the movement, and the government started the “Sunday free car” which reminded citizens how it was before the introduction of the car. The crisis increased the mass protest to improve road conditions, putting pressure on government to take measurements.
Two years after the creation of this group, the Dutch Cyclists’ Union was created, to demand more space for bicycles. They made mass noisy demonstrations, painted illegal lanes in streets, among others. Both groups continue in the fight. “The battle goes on.. the propensity of urban planners to give priority to cars is still persistent”.
The 1960s had also witnessed in Amsterdam the movements of Provos (and later the Kabouters) – the Provos painted bycicles [sic] white that were left freely in the streets for public use. Their ideology was already anarchist-environmentalism. Opposition to the Dutch monarchy, the war in Vietnam and air pollution from automobiles became the major issues for the movement.
Reflection
The main aim for this week was to find a central theme for the project, this is always one thing I think I already have until it’s pointed out that maybe I don’t…
What I have found looking through the material I’ve found so far is that the bicycle is always introduced as a means to change something; reduce traffic and therefore increase road safety, to change peoples’ viewpoint and self-belief, getting people to change direction, ie, to change their path into the future and possibly get back onto the ‘straight and narrow’, to change their outlook on life.
I’m hoping ‘change’ will fill the gap of a theme for the project – it feels right but, even though it’s my project, it doesn’t feel right until that part is agreed upon. Despite it being my project, it’s got to be assessed and then there’s a hole in there then it’s not going to help.
The ‘to do’ list at the top of the post is taken from the suggestions to introduce into the Critical Report, I think it’s got some useful points to include into the plan for the project. I’m still looking for the stories but showing the opposing views is something I’d not considered at this point and so I can be looking for these at the same time and therefore show a more impartial viewpoint as the project owner.
The list will be carried on into the next few weeks.
