{"id":4450,"date":"2013-12-18T21:20:48","date_gmt":"2013-12-18T21:20:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blogs\/are-we-overthinking-cycling-2\/"},"modified":"2017-07-25T10:22:09","modified_gmt":"2017-07-25T14:22:09","slug":"are-we-overthinking-cycling-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/are-we-overthinking-cycling-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Are we overthinking cycling?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Image: copyright ArchTam by David Lloyd.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>On his blog \u2018Cycling in a broad church,\u2019 @GregVann recently wrote, \u201cDanes don\u2019t consider themselves cyclists &#8211; just as they use vacuum cleaners, but don\u2019t consider themselves \u2018vacuum cleanerers\u2019!\u2019<\/p>\n<p>This got me thinking. Are we overthinking cycling in Australian cities?<\/p>\n<p>I think we are.\u00a0 There are four trends allowing overthinking:<\/p>\n<p><b>1. \u00a0Choices<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n<p>We have so many choices available to us today. We can choose where to live, where to work, where to send our kids to school, and even where to spend Christmas.<\/p>\n<p>When I was growing up there was one state school and everyone went to it. Almost all the Dads worked at the chipboard factory and the mums got whatever job was available close to home. As for Christmas, no one dreamed of a beach vacation. You went to Granny\u2019s; that\u2019s just what happened.<\/p>\n<p>We now overthink everything while popular media tells us to value being ever richer and more successful.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s the same with cycling. Aussie cities want to be like Copenhagen and Amsterdam. We want leaders like Boris Johnson and Janette-Sadik-Khan. We want our public bike shares to be as successful as those in Paris and Dublin. We desperately seek advice from \u2018successful\u2019 cities\u00a0in Europe, but then we get confused with all the conflicting ideas and we end up ignoring our \u2018cultural literacy\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>Choice has made us overthink everything and as a result we\u2019ve ended up doing very little.<\/p>\n<p><b>2.\u00a0 Entitlements<\/b><\/p>\n<p>We have developed an extraordinary sense of entitlement.<\/p>\n<p>Most Aussies feel entitled to have lots of money, to drive to work, and to have their opinions listened to.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\" align=\"center\">When these expectations are not fulfilled, as they often are not, we refuse to accept it and begin overthinking why we are not getting what we deserve.<\/p>\n<p>In the world of cycling it\u2019s the same:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Motorists think cyclists should pay registration;<\/li>\n<li>Sport cyclists think slow riders should move out of the way when they yell \u201cbike back\u201d;<\/li>\n<li>Cyclists think pedestrians should walk in single file on shared paths.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Admittedly these are slight exaggerations, but you get the gist!<\/p>\n<p>The entitlement obsession has led to too much overthinking. Too much time is focused on arguing, being angry and trying to get what we think we deserve while too little time is spent on dealing effectively with the real problems in our cities.<\/p>\n<p><b>3. \u00a0Instant fixes<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n<p>We have developed a compulsive need for \u2018instant fixes\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>Sometimes the \u2018quick fixes\u2019 are the right choices, but if they are done out of dissatisfaction, they tend to accumulate into a string of failures.<\/p>\n<p>My friend John likes to tell Council exactly what he thinks,\u00a0but his well-intentioned actions mean people who are trying to make change are instead diverted into solving his endless dissatisfactions.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\" align=\"center\">It\u2019s as though his overthinking of current issues makes them bigger than they actually are.<\/p>\n<p>If we really want our cities to be cycling cities, we have to do the slow and difficult work to identify the real problems and then design long-term solutions to alleviate them.<\/p>\n<p><b>4. \u00a0Navel gazing<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n<p>We have developed a \u2018belly button\u2019 culture, chronically analysing every twist and turn in life.<\/p>\n<p>We hyper-analyse everything: the two extra people who cycled last week and the predicted mode shares for 2050.<\/p>\n<p>In cycling we seldom consider simpler explanations:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Perhaps people don\u2019t cycle because they prefer the bus;<\/li>\n<li>Possibly it\u2019s just the fact that the majority of everyday Australians have never been to Copenhagen and so have no idea what all the fuss about bicycles is all about!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>If we really want cycling to be mainstream and normal, we need to stop being hyper-vigilant and start finding out what people really want their cities to be like.<\/p>\n<p>Maybe then Aussies might just use their bicycles like they use their vacuum cleaners, at least once a week!<\/p>\n<p><b>What do you think?\u00a0 Are we overthinking cycling? \u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n<p><b>Should we just stop thinking,\u00a0stop looking for change, and accept what we have?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><b>Please do create a\u00a0debate. Can&#8217;t wait to hear from you!<\/b><\/p>\n<p>I acknowledge the amazing work of Dr. Susan Nolen-Hoeksema, whose work on thinking at universities across the U.S. has inspired the content of this blog. Thank you, Susan.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blogs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/Rachel_Smith_89x100-13.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-528\" src=\"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blogs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/07\/Rachel_Smith_89x100-13.jpg\" alt=\"Rachel_Smith_89x100\" width=\"89\" height=\"100\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em>Rachel Smith is an internationally-recognised urban planner and commentator, and principal transport planner with ArchTam\u2019s Brisbane office. Connect with her on <a href=\"http:\/\/au.linkedin.com\/pub\/rachel-smith\/32\/349\/b68\">LinkedIn<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CyclingRSmith\/\">Twitter<\/a>, or follow her blog <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cyclingrachelsmith.com\/\">here.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Image: copyright ArchTam by David Lloyd. On his blog \u2018Cycling in a broad church,\u2019 @GregVann recently wrote, \u201cDanes don\u2019t consider themselves cyclists &#8211; just as they use vacuum cleaners, but don\u2019t consider themselves \u2018vacuum cleanerers\u2019!\u2019 This got me thinking. Are we overthinking cycling in Australian cities? I think we are.\u00a0 There are four trends allowing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":226,"featured_media":4451,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[255],"tags":[191,238],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-4450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-infrastructure","tag-connected-cities","tag-cycling"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/226"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4450\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4450"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.archtam.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=4450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}