On The Road
by: Bill Oetinger 7/1/2009
Us vs. Them...again
You may recall a column I wrote several months ago about a stretch of bike path where the homeowner's accociation was trying to prohibit cyclists. It was the usual conflict between cyclists and non-cyclists, with the latter group complaining about how the bikers go too fast and scare everyone else.
Now we see the same situation again, on another stretch of path. It may seem like a broken record to be rehashing the same topic once again, so soon after the last one, but this case presents a couple of points that seem to throw it all into a sharper focus, so I thought I'd revisit the issue.
Whereas the first trail went through a private development and involved questions of easements for public use, this trail is entirely on public land and the problems arise elsewhere. This 2.1-mile trail runs atop the flood levee on the north bank of Santa Rosa Creek. It is the last link in the long trail that begins in downtown Santa Rosa (as the Prince Memorial Greenway) and follows the creek all the way through the city and out into country, west of town. It ends up at Willowside Road. It has been a part of a long-range master plan since at least 1989, with federal funding secured many years ago to pay for the project.
It has jumped through all its hoops: has been studied half to death by various committees; has passed its Environmental Impact Review; has its funding in hand; and so forth. It's a done deal. In 2006, work on the trail began with the installation of three very attractive bridges across tributary creeks. A rather expensive underpass beneath a busy road was built to seamlessly connect this outlying section of trail with the existing section closer to town. The bed of the trail was graded and compacted to a firm, flat, relatively smooth surface in readiness for paving. The job was scheduled to be completed in months. And then a wrench got thrown in the works...
A local woman objected. She didn't want a paved trail anywhere near her backyard, which is somewhere near the trail. She tried to pose it as an environmental issue: that all the little critters along the trail would be affected by an 8'-wide band of asphalt (as opposed to an 8'-wide band of graded and compacted gravel). She made enough of a fuss that the project was put on hold for another round of studies and hearings, and she rallied round a troop of NIMBY's from the neighborhood, all ready to man the barricades to prevent such a catastrophe as a paved multi-use trail along a creek.
I can tell you right off that the alleged environmental impact argument was a non-starter. The EIR is clear on the point: no significant impact. So the opponents to the paving were essentially forced to show their true colors: what is it that you really object to here? And their answer is the reason I'm writing this column.
As it stands now, the trail can be ridden on just about any kind of bike. It's a little rough for skinny-tired road bikes, but I ride it anyway, about once a month, when I'm out that way. I can put up with the rough ride because the scenery along the trail is so nice and because it connects to roads in a way that is often useful for me, for riding between Santa Rosa and my town of Sebastopol. But it would be--will be--better when it's nicely paved. Yes, will be: this week, the County Board of Supervisors, after one last round of hearings, voted unanimously to go ahead with the long-delayed paving, and it is now scheduled for September.
There were far more persuasive arguments in favor of paving than not. The funding had been allocated for this project and no other; it could not be diverted to some other item in the budget. It was a use-it-or-lose-it grant. Had our county not spent the money on this project, it would have been withdrawn, back into the great federal funding machine. To have not used this grant would have been to subtract nearly a million dollars from our local economy: lost revenues for the paving contractor and all the employees working on that job; lost trickle-down revenues locally for whatever those workers might have spent their wages on. Think of it as a small chunk of the federal stimulus plan, providing work and wages in these tough times.
Furthermore, projects of this sort are required to be wheelchair accessible. Once the county used federal money to install those three bridges, they were legally obligated to follow through with the paving so that the trail would be available to all.
Further furthermore, there will still be an unpaved path along the south bank of the creek, for those who favor the no-asphalt environment. It's not as if that unpaved world is going away everywhere, forever.
Of course, none of that cut any ice with the folks who opposed the paving. At the hearing, one lady made this statement: "We appreciate having a little bit of untouched country left." Paving "will turn a natural setting into an asphalt jungle." Yikes! An asphalt jungle! Listening to these folks going all environmentally correct is especially galling to me, as I like to think of myself as a staunch advocate for the environment. I have spent my entire adult life fighting the good fight for environmental protection. I was working with David Brower at Friends of the Earth back in the early 70's, back when 90% of the population had never heard the word "ecology" and didn't know what it meant. So for me, to see the environment card played by these selfish NIMBY's really fries my bacon.
Paving opponents contend that, as it is now, almost all bicyclists can use the trail, including "mountain bikes, children's bikes, and beach bikes." "It's only the thin tires that can't make this right now" said Dave Robb of Santa Rosa (as quoted in our local paper). That statement is incorrect in a couple of ways. First of all, many "thin tires" are rolling along that gravel path every day, right now, including mine. It will be better paved, but it can be ridden now. Second, while it may be true to say that children's bikes can be ridden on the trail, the fact is that it's not an easy nor a safe thing to do, especially not for the tots who are just learning to ride...who are out there, wobbling along, trying to come to grips with the whole balance deal. For better or worse these days, many parents won't let their kids ride on public streets anymore, at least not the little kids. They bring them to trails such as this to learn to ride in a safe, car-free setting. For that first learning curve, a smooth, flat, paved path is worlds better than gravel.
But reading between the lines of that "thin tire" quote is where we get to the heart of the matter here: the assumption that leaving the path as is will keep out the racer bikes. In case you were in any doubt about that implicit goal of the opponents, Michael Gray of Santa Rosa put it in terms anyone can understand: "...pavement would bring hardcore cyclists who would disrupt the area's quiet energy. I just don't want to share the road with people who only want to go fast."
So there you go: "I just don't want to share..."
Okay, okay...I'm taking his words out of context. He doesn't mind sharing with some people. He just doesn't want to share with people "who only want to go fast." So let's look at that assertion that the skinny-tire crowd are all tarred with that same brush: we all "only want to go fast." Well okay, I admit it, as shameful as it may be: I do like to go fast. For the record, I have gone 60 mph on my bike. It's a rush. So is going 30 mph in a tight paceline, as I was doing last weekend. But no, I do not only want to go fast. There is a place for fast, but it's not on a bike path with other multi-use trail sharers. When I'm on a bike path, I am Mr Nice Guy; I am channeling Miss Manners. I slow down and interact politely with my fellow trail users, even if some of them appear to be utterly clueless about what's going on around them. I too am a walker and a birder and a lover of nature. I don't want to speed through it on my bike, at least not on a dedicated nature trail.
I question--no, I repudiate--the notion that all skinny-tired bike riders only want to go fast on multi-use trails. Yes, there are probably some riders who do go fast on trails and who do terrorize the walkers and birders and families. I have seen them myself. I have even, on one or two occasions, yelled at these raceroids to slow the bleep down! If I may drift off into the world of stereotypes again, I would guess many, if not most, of the speeders on paths are young males in that first full flush of banty rooster behavior. They represent the same demographic as young male drivers...the ones who have to pay hefty insurance premiums because of their tendency to jackass antics behind the wheel. When it comes to bikes, for the most part, gaining a little maturity and learning a bit about the subculture of cycling will soon scrub several miles per hour off the bike-path speeds of most of these hot shots.
But in any event, just how large a percentage of the whole skinny-tire population falls into this subset of testosterone-crazed hammerheads? Could it be as much as 25% of all road bikers? I doubt it's that many. When I look around the county at all the riders I see, or when I look at the folks showing up for our club rides, or when I look at the other riders I see on the local multi-use trails, I don't see all that much of that cock-o-the-walk boorishness on display. Of course the fastest riders will go fast on group rides. They'll hammer each other half to death. But not on a bike path. However, just for the sake of argument, let's say this bad boy subset does total 25% of all road bikers. What then?
Let's turn that around for a parallel in the car culture. It has been estimated that up to one in four drivers at any given time is drunk. There's your 25% of bad drivers. If you think that number is too high, let's include all those young males driving under the influence of immaturity and machismo. Now, surely we can account for 25% of the motor vehicle operators being in some way or another loose cannons out there on the roads. That's very bad! On the other hand though, that means that the other 75% are driving in ways that are generally considered responsible and law-abiding and prudent. I would hope that most fair-minded observers would agree that a similar chunk of the road bike population also operates their vehicles in ways that are generally considered responsible and law-abiding and prudent...and who, in this context, do not go too fast on multi-use trails.
We deplore those bad or impaired or reckless drivers. We do what we can to punish and stigmatize them. But do we also punish--and stigmatize and ostracize--the other 75% of the drivers who are more-or-less blameless? We do not.
So why is it that non-cyclists continue to stigmatize and ostracize the entire population of road bike riders, based on the sins of a small fraction of the group?
This particular example is easy to work with because the paving opponents--who in fact turn out to be nothing more than bike haters--set themselves up as such easy targets with their pathetic logic-chopping. But we see it over and over again: this tendency to condemn all road bike riders for the alleged crimes of a few. I'm sick of it. I've been sick of it for years, and every time this prejudice rears its ugly head, I am sick of it all over again. For that's exactly what it is: prejudice. I am being pre-judged, based on something some other cyclist may or may not have done on some other day in some other place. I am made out to be an untermensch, a second-class citizen...someone who can and should be segregated against; shunted off into some other-zone, without all the same rights as the rest of the population. We're no longer allowed to do this with respect to the color of people's skin; we're not supposed to do it concerning their religious beliefs or affiliations; we cannot do it based on gender...
So why is it still acceptable to trot out such a bald-faced prejudice in a County Supervisors' hearing and expect folks to take it seriously, without a challenge? I don't get it. It's time for it to stop.
I applaud the Supervisors for seeing through this thin tissue of intolerance and for unanimously endorsing a good project. But at the same time, I bemoan the very apparent fact that a lot of people out there still feel comfortable with the notion of bicycle apartheid.
Bill can be reached at srccride@sonic.net