Former
lead singer of the legendary 222s,
arguably Montreal's first punk rock band, Chris is now a
freelance writer based in Montreal. You can check out his
writing at looselips.ca
where he combines the sardonic humour of David Foster Wallace
and the deliciously contrived irreverence of Anthony
Bourdain.
If
you’ve ever set foot in Amsterdam you’ll already
know that the city has embraced the bicycle as a form of transportation
to an extent that is unparalleled anywhere on Earth. The ubiquity
of bicycles in this, the land of giants, can be a lot to take
in for many Canadians visiting the Netherlands, and for some
of us is not without its dangers either.
Don’t
believe me? Try stepping on to an Amsterdam bike path without
looking both ways sometime and see how long you last before
being plowed under by a swarm of oncoming bike traffic. Trust
me, you might last five seconds, and this only assuming there’s
actually been a rare break in traffic lasting long enough for
you to mistake one of these unassuming little paths for something
other than what it is, a bicycle super-highway!
And
yes, since you bring it up, I have made such a mistake before,
and yeah, I suppose I could be considered lucky to have emerged
from the adventure with only a series of major scrapes, bruises
and my dignity compromised. I guess I should also consider myself
somewhat fortuitous for being the only person minimally injured
as a result of my denseness. When the cyclist I collided with
frantically rang her warning bell while yelling something at
me in English [she obviously pegged me a foreigner as no self-respecting
Dutchman would ever be so stupid as to step into a bike path
blindly] I was swift enough to jump out of the way in time so
she only nudged me, knocking me off balance enough to see me
crash down upon the curb, but not so hard that she would fall
off her bike and risk real injury.
It
might come as a bit of a surprise, but Holland and/or the city
of Amsterdam hasn’t always been as bike-friendly as it
is today. In fact, while at the turn of the 20th century bicycles
were common and considered a respectable means of transportation,
by the time the Dutch economy took off post-WW2 and people were
buying cars en masse, urban policy makers had already long abandoned
cycling as a viable option for getting around.
Consequently,
Amsterdam, like most other European cities, tore down entire
neighbourhoods to accommodate the relatively sudden, and massive,
influx of motorized vehicles operating in the country. By 1950
bicycle use in Holland was declining by a minimum six per cent
every year with the vehicles considered well on their way to
obsolescence.
By
the early 1960s, the popularity of bicycles had deteriorated
so much that the remaining cyclists found themselves under threat
of being expelled from Dutch cities altogether. It wasn’t
until the 1970s before circumstance forced the city of Amsterdam
to reconsider its relationship with the bicycle.
Not
surprisingly, all that auto traffic in centuries-old cities
had not been without its drawbacks, the most painful of them
being the absolutely insane number of casualties brought about
by automobile accidents. In 1971 alone, the Dutch lost 3,300
citizens to auto accidents, with over 400 of those deaths being
children. The almost incomprehensible death toll spawned several
activist groups, the two most influential being the Stop de
Kindermoord (“stop the child murder”) campaign led
by former Dutch MEP, Maartje van Putten, and the First Only
Real Dutch Cyclists’ Union.
The
Stop de Kindermoord movement was quickly embraced by
the public and eventually led to the creation and implementation
of something called woonerf’s, essentially a
new kind of people-friendly street incorporating speed bumps
and bends to force cars to drive very slowly. But the real catalyst
leading Amsterdam towards becoming the bicycle capital of the
world was the 1973 oil crisis, which saw the price of gas quadruple
essentially overnight.
The
oil crisis, along with a growing awareness of the ecological
hazards attributable to automobiles, prompted Dutch prime minister
Den Uyl to give a televised speech urging citizens to adopt
more energy efficient lifestyles, while simultaneously announcing
new initiatives, such as Car-Free Sundays, designed to remind
people of what life was like before the hegemony of cars had
taken root. Gradually the Dutch grew increasingly aware of the
advantages of cycling, and by the mid-80s most towns in the
country had created new bike paths and introduced popular measures
designed to encourage bicycle use over cars.
Today,
as the bicycle capital of the world, 38 per cent of all trips
taken in Amsterdam are on bicycle, while the relatively tiny
nation can boast of having no fewer than 22,000 miles of cycle
paths. Which is fantastic when you think about it. You just
need to pay attention stepping across them.
