Cycling Cultures blog

I’m currently writing two presentations and related papers (well, there’s more in the immediate pipeline, but there’s two that I am particularly working on right now).

These are on injury and gender (“ A transport system safe for men and other vulnerable groups “, with James Woodcock) and on cycling advocacy and activism ( two talks based on research I’ve been doing with Maria Bühner). Working on the LCC Big Ride survey spreadsheet, I was thinking of these presentations alongside work (mine and other people’s) on gender , cycling and identity .

Our survey asked people attending the LCC Big Ride to describe themselves as a cyclist; we had nearly 200 responses of which around 2/3 were from men and 1/3 from women. (Most respondents have been cycling for more than a couple of years, and cycle regularly.) Examining the responses, I looked for positive descriptions of skill, as I have argued elsewhere (in the paper that’s forthcoming in Mobilities ) that cyclists are under particular pressure to demonstrate that they are competent. As well as ‘competent’ itself, I looked for the words confident, assertive, experienced, expert, capable, and proficient, which I would see as part of a group of terms used to construct the ‘competent cyclist’. I looked for them used positively (i.e. not, for example, ‘I am not competent’!) within people’s self-descriptions.

Just over half of the men described themselves using these terms while just over a third of the women did so. But perhaps more interesting is the way people use qualifying terms (either reducing the impact of the ‘competency’ terms, or adapting them by association with other attributes or identities). Less than a quarter of the men qualified their positive description of their own skills in this way, but more than half the women did so. Some the qualifiers suggested a perceived failure to live up to dominant norms of ‘competence’ (as per the Mobilities paper), while others seemed to embody a struggle with those definitions and norms and a desire to adapt them to create different kinds of ‘competent’ cycling identities.

Examples of qualified descriptions:

Women:

Confident but still learning
Fairly confident slow urban cyclist
Unfit, slow, but quietly competent .
Experienced , cautious and fairly assertive
Slow (I ride a Dutch granny bike), fairly confident (I’ve had some of that free training from my council) and a rule-follower.

Men:

Fairly experienced ; calm
Experienced and assertive . Occasionally stupid.
Proficient , hates motor traffic.
Slow, competent and defensive
Experienced and tolerant

And some examples of self-descriptions that don’t have positive or qualified ‘competency references’:

A late-comer – to riding a tandem with my husband which I much enjoy & which is great for my fitness (I am disabled).
A non-aggressive cyclist, using the bicycle as an everyday form of transport around town
Pootle along non-lycra person on a bike
Law abiding and considerate with a mellow mojo but still faster than you!!
Slightly above average
I like cycling but I wouldn’t call myself a cyclist
Losing my nerve as I get older

The analysis continues…
(and yes, I’m sure you are faster than me )

Last week we held our mobile mobilities workshop – Performing the city: mobility, space and subjectivity . It was a bright-ish 10c wintery day which provided a good foundation for 8 hours of wandering around the city. We were concerned that planning an outdoor event in early December in London could have been icy, or snowy or otherwise pretty uncomfortable. As it was, it required significant stamina and we want to convey again our thanks to everyone involved for their participation, engagement and enthusiasm for the idea. Following is an overview of the day.

The day started at 10.30 at the bike cafe and workshop ‘Look Mum No Hands’ for coffee, cake and introductions. Their bike-oriented Christmas decorations were highly appreciated.

Justin and I ran through the schedule. We did health and safety talk which ostensibly asked everyone to stick together and avoid getting run over. Eschewing name badges as were going to be out in public all day, speakers and participants instead introduced themselves to the group.

We then set off for the first talk by Damien Ó Tuama – Dublin cycling (in London!) . It was located at a Bike Hire docking station a few blocks from the cafe. As Damien talked about the bike hire scheme in Dublin, cars and pedestrians passed by and someone even docked their bike. Questions and discussion about Dublin and London cycling schemes continued in the walk to another docking station where Damien concluded his talk.

We walked on, tracing a bike path to kings Cross where Thomas Birtchnel l talked about Mobility Scooters and Electromobilities .

Thomas enfolded the location of the talk into his talk. He talked about how some pedestrian spaces are inaccessible to some forms of pedestrian mobility and discussed the idea of in-between/ liminal qualities of the mobility scooters. We were passed by people on foot and on bike. We could hear birds and the tree branches move in the wind. Thomas illustrated his talk with photos on his kindle which involved walking around the group.

We walked to St Pancras station for Silvia Gullino to talk about Train stations, everyday life and mobility: the fluidity of social sustainability . Although this was a static talk, we were part of a mobile space, an atmosphere of people moving around which brought to life elements of Silvia’s presentation. At one point we were approached by a woman in a uniform. I initially thought she was security wanting to move us along but she was a Eurostar employee enquiring if we were travelling today.

It was time for our first bus journey. We luckily spotted the Number 17 arriving as we walked up Caledonian Road and jumped on. The driver gave us a smile as 26 of us boarded and headed to the top floor. With everyone safely seated, we took the opportunity to distribute some snacks (muesli bars, sweets, biscuits) and I talked about my 73urban journeys bus research project. Although I had prepared written notes, it turns out that presenting to a group of people while standing in the aisle of a moving bus requires the use of both hands. I talked about material iterations of a particular part of the project that gathered 73, 73 words stories about the 73 bus and handed out copies of my bus boxes.

We departed the bus at Mansion House and walked to the Royal Exchange for Amy Thomas to talk about Making Markets: Walking between fact and fiction in the alleyways of Cornhill . Amy gave us a guided tour of the alleys of Cornhill stopping at various points to discuss contemporary, historic and fictional characteristics of these spaces. The narrow and blind alleys, passing inhabitants and sonic landscape brought the storytelling to life.

We walked to the Barbican and met with Harriet Bell who presented What’s so special about that? . She talked about the special characteristics of this Grade II heritage listed building and also the special ways in which she materially and physically encounters it as a result of having multiple sclerosis.

We walked back to LMNH for a hearty lunch of pies and salad. Justin and I did some quick recallibrations of the schedule to accommodate a slippage in timing. The morning had become the afternoon and we still had five talks to go before 6pm. We appreciated how several speakers adapted their talks/tours/locations on the fly.

We all caught the Number 63 bus from Farringdon Road to Ludgate for Morag Rose to talk to us about the Loiterer’s Resistance Movement . She chose a spot under the gaze of security cameras in an alleyway off a main road. Although static in nature, it was enlivened by Morag’s dynamic story telling and the fading light; the city felt like it closed in and became less visible.

We walked passed the Tate towards the MIllennium Bridge for Robin Kim to present From St Paul’s Cathedral to Tate Modern: Socio-spatial Integration of Central London ST Paul’s to the Tate . He chose a spot between these iconic landmarks to talk about how the joining up of parts of London is achieved. Being able to see all the way down the bridge helped to materialise that idea of drawing/ stitching the city together.

Richard Hornsey was next with his talk and tour on A Brief History of Crossing the Road, 1925-1939 . It was now fully dark and Richard made use of multiple spaces at St Pauls and Westminster. His talk was split between places and distributed by a journey on the tube. His talk was enlivened by being able to see, hear the traffic and touch the traffic signals. He also handed out images drawing the past into the present and engaged us in role play.

We walked to Trafalgar Square for the final two talks. We met Alan Rice and Lubaina Himid at the fourth plinth for Historic Absences & Ghostly Presences: An African Atlantic Trafalgar Square . Alan and Lubaina talked about the plinth and what it meant and in doing so moved the past into the present via the contested materiality of the monument. They had to compete with a Christmas choir on one side and cleaners using a jet powered hose on the other.

Vincent Chen was our final speaker on Horse cabs in Victorian London . Vincent conjured up London as a space of horse drawn mobility and immobility. He told stories about the everyday life, conflicts and interactions of 10,000 horse cabs in central London.

It was close to 6pm, we were all quite cold and with tired legs we headed to a nearby pub to warm up and celebrate the end of the adventure filled workshop. Although we had planned the schedule, twice walked/bused/tubed through the plan, Justin and I were not entirely sure what might happen on the day. When you invite the city to be part of your event, you can never what know might transpire. Thankyou again to everyone for adapting and energising the event.

Justin and I are very excited by the enthusiastic response to the call for contributions to our upcoming Mobilities Workshop – Performing the city: mobility, space and subjectivity .

Thankyou to everyone who registered their interest to be a participant or submitted abstracts/positioning statements for talks. The quality was high and it was difficult to make the final selection of speakers. We were impressed by how many people rose to the challenge set in the brief. We had banned powerpoint and the conventional idea of a single/static workshop location and instead asked speakers to talk/walk through themes central to their work. We encouraged people to think about incorporating places, movement, forms of mobility and/or materials in their presentations.

We have selected ten fascinating talks/tours that cover topics such as the History of Crossing the Road , Horse Cabs in Victorian London and M obility Scooters and Electromobilities . Each talk will take place in, around or on the way to specific locations which means that speakers will tell stories about moving things on the move. In total 25 of us will take to the streets in early December. Justin and I have our fingers crossed that it works!

It has been a challenge to piece together a schedule that accommodates the range of talks and attends to the logistics of a mobile workshop. Currently the event takes place in two main journeys; in the morning (north/central London) and afternoon (south-ish London). We will make out way between places on various forms of mobility, with some of these journeys providing the space/subject matter for talks. We will stop for sustenance and a well earned beverage at the end. Everyone will enjoy themselves and no one will get lost or run over. That is the plan at least. There are many variables, notwithstanding the weather in early December and the reality of trying to present research to 25 people while walking or travelling on a moving vehicle….. Overall though, people seem excited and open to the idea of the experimental nature of the event.

The program will be made available shortly.

Having completed four days cycle instructor training I am now NSIP, or National Standards Instructor, Provisional – to give it its full title. One interesting aspect of doing cycle instructor training is the way that you become more aware of cycling tactics: your own and other people’s. On the final day we did a bit of ethnographic observation which showed us the sometimes unorthodox ways in which people made use of infrastructure in quite a difficult environment for cycling (a 1960s built large roundabout with flyover). We must have also looked like the Advanced Stop Line police – a group of 11 people most in high-vis and helmets with bikes, hanging over the railings and staring! (This seemed to affect car driver behaviour somewhat).

Also today I went down to Brighton University to speak at the School of Applied Social Sciences seminar series; my talk was entitled ‘Of Bike Nuts and Plodders’. Slides from the talk are here. It was based partly on the ‘Proper Cyclists’ stuff; with additional material comparing Hull and Hackney. An interesting discussion and good to meet up with Michael and Lesley from the Brighton Sustainable Mobilities Group .

Slides are here:

The conference featured 22 speakers from local council, engineering and transport planning groups, consultancies, academia, not-for-profit organisations and specialised cycle practitioners over two days and was held in a central city hotel. I took a lot of notes and met some very interesting people. Here I attempt a brief review of key talks and insights:

The Australian Cycling Conference was opened by the Stephen Yarwood, the Mayor of Adelaide who set the context for the event. He listed an exciting array of cycling investment in the city that has resulted in 33km of new cycle lanes, 140 new bike parking rails (8 of which have replaced conventional on-road car parking), 180 hire bikes (up from 80) and 9 hire places (up from 4) which has resulted in a 30% annual increase in use (16000 hires/yr). He acknowledged he was talking ‘to the converted’ by telling us these facts and challenged us to ‘talk to strangers’ about cycling. One of his biggest challenges in promoting cycling in the city has been with small businesses who are not always open to the idea of offsetting immediate car parking with bike paths and racks. He was also concerned that being pro-bike does not mean being anti-car. He advocates what he calls a ‘spectrum of transport’ that simply gets people into the city. I was already aware of Adelaide’s network of cycle paths that cut through the parklands, along the river and encircled the city. On this trip, I noticed a series of new connections that made cycling through and around the city even easier.

Several core themes emerged during the conference that I found interesting from a UK perspective:

- Shared paths: re-scripting relationships between walkers and cyclists
- Signage: new ways of communicating cycle ways and shared paths
- Lighting: environmental and economical designs that enable safe off-road cycling
- Tackling behaviour change: examining alternatives to fines
- Australian cycling currently dominated by ‘road bikes’ and ‘lycra’
- Need for broader, more eclectic types of cycling beyond this particular subculture
- Emphasis on ‘bicyclists’ and ‘people who ride bikes’ rather than ‘cyclists’
- Getting people on bikes and ways of counteracting the fear of cycling
- Addressing fragmented cycle paths (esp in Sydney)
- The efficacy of helmets and current debates in Australian media
- Best practice: looking outside to UK, Holland and Denmark
- Cycle maps: innovative new map websites/technologies

Speakers presented a range of interesting cycling scheme examples:

Bike Direct

“Bikedirect is a network of bicycle routes across the Adelaide metropolitan area that was developed to encourage cycling. They provide options for people with different needs and abilities. The Bikedirect maps show main roads, bicycle lanes, local streets and off-road paths.”

Cycle Instead

“The Cycle Instead Journey Planner generates cycling routes using Adelaide’s Bikedirect network of main roads, bike lanes, local streets, off-road paths and some unsealed paths. This interactive tool allows you to choose a variety of options that take into consideration fitness and confidence levels, road conditions and speed of travel.”

Wayfinding Systems by Spackman Mossop Michaels/Langue Design

“This is one element of a new wayfinding system being developed by us in conjunction with Spackman Mossop Michaels. It is for a network of shared paths for pedestrians and cyclists. While existing symbols exist and are used for shared roads (motor vehicles and bicycles) it was felt that a different set of symbols would better indicate the unique set of conditions and priorities that users of these shared paths would encounter.”

There is a terrific overview of the Bike Politics Conference on Dave Horton’s cycling blog – Thinking about cycling . The event was hosted by the Centre for Mobilities Research at Lancaster University.

Several pictures from the Bicycle Politics workshop – thanks to Griet Scheldeman for taking the pictures and Dave Horton for sending them to me. Gives a nice flavour of the productive and friendly nature of the event (and the good food!)

One of many animated small group discussions.

Starting a session. Oddly, I appear to be juggling, but I’m pretty sure I wasn’t.

Lunchtime!

This week I attended the Bicycle Politics symposium at Lancaster, expertly organised by Dave Horton and Aurora Trujillo. I was presenting a co-authored paper on “‘I didn’t feel like a proper Cyclist’: managing problematic and provisional cycling identities”. The main argument being, that while cycling is promoted as a “win-win” policy solution to a variety of problems, being a “cyclist” remains tricky. The paper used evidence from Cambridge and Hull to demonstrate the anxiety that people feel about being a “good cyclist”, alongside fear of being too much of a cyclist – the “proper cyclist” of the paper title.

The symposium provided a great opportunity for people with an interest in cycling and politics – and the politics of cycling – to get together. With a small group of around 38 (practitioners, activists, and academics) discussions were lively and sometimes impassioned. Some difficult questions were raised – like, is cycling inclusive or can it also be exclusive? Why do we want to increase cycling? What is the relationship of pro-cycling politics to anti-car politics? On these and many other issues there was debate and disagreement.

I enjoyed listening to all the papers, but probably if I had to pick two I would say that John Stehlin ‘s and Aurora Trujillo’s papers were probably the most thought-provoking for me. John’s paper discussed how bicycles are becoming part of a new wave of gentrification and re-urbanisation in the USA, suggesting that bicycle scholars and activists need to think about how “governmentality from below” might counter the formalisation of the bicycle and the exclusions that this might produce. Aurora’s paper was on using the discourse of oppression to understand the marginalisation of cycling and cyclists.

This week I attended the second Vital Signs conference to present a paper on using mobile/visual data in mobilities research. Vital Signs is a conference focusing on novel and combined methodologies, and how to access and analyse unusual data. It was a friendly conference and I enjoyed the mix of work discussed. Unfortunately I had to leave before Gillian Rose’s final plenary where she was to reflect on her research into people’s experiences of Milton Keynes and Bedford shopping centres. Hopefully though there will soon be audio versions of the talks available online.

My session was reduced to two presenters because the third had to pull out. However, this meant that we had over half an hour to discuss the issues raised by our paper and the other one in the slot, presented by Liz Dinnie on the ethics of using headcams. There was a great discussion and lots of challenging questions about how we plan to analyse data collected, how cycling practices are gendered, the status of visual and mobile data and much more.

Here is a little video of the slides I used with my own audio recording underneath (minus the discussion – I think the discussion section may be available later on the Vital Signs website).

Mobile Practices and Visual Data audio file

Talking to Liz afterwards, I learned that her research team have also used dogcams (video cameras attached to dogs) to gather data. I thought that sounded like a fabulous idea.

Just realised the abstract for the upcoming Bicycle Politics talk isn’t on here. Here it is. I will present the paper, but as with the others the written paper will be co-authored by both Katrina and I.

Rachel Aldred and Katrina Jungickel – ‘I didn’t feel like a proper Cyclist’: managing problematic and provisional cycling identities

This paper draws on data from the ESRC-funded Cycling Cultures project to examine and compare tensions and discontinuities within cycling identities in Cambridge and Hull, UK. Interview data suggests that while “cycling” is seen as a positive practice, the “cyclist” identity is much more troubled and harder to claim. People refer to “real cyclists” and “proper cyclists”, citing their own failures to live up to the image of a “good cyclist”. Some also seek to distance themselves from more explicitly “troublesome” cyclists, such as “lycra louts” or “exchange students”.
The paper links these tensions to dominant and limiting policy constructions around cycling, which apparently valorise cycling as a practice while still (a) stigmatising some cyclists and (b) failing to confront the dominant policy context, of mass motorisation and the concomitant pressure for space on the streets. It will explore how discourses around cycling identities differ in Cambridge and Hull, linking these differences to economic, social, and policy contexts in the two areas.