And I don’t just mean from the global warming emissions. Car crashes account for millions of people killed and injured every year. More than most wars, more than terrorist attacks, more than many well known medical illnesses, so why don’t we have a war on cars?

Calling a car a shitbox. I know it is childish but I giggle every time I hear someone call a car this. What fun names do you have for cars?

Beware the car effect!

You will have to indulge me here, as this is only tenuously related to riding a bike in Boston but stick with me. I will often have little light bulb moments. Often these little revelations are things that other people have already figured out a long time ago, but I take a certain amount of happiness in being able to come up with them on my own…even if I am years (even sometimes decades) behind much smarter people. So while I don’t think this is an original idea, I came up with it all on my own, so there!

I am a huge movie fan, I like all sorts of movies bad ones good ones, and besides riding my bike and making stuff it is one of the few things I do on a regular basis that makes me really happy. Tonight I got a bit of a hankerin’ to watch Deep Impact. You might remember this movie as “that comet movie, the one without Bruce Willis.” Perversely I LOVE this movie, for reasons that would take a whole other post to explain so I will skip why, just accept that I do.

While watching the movies climactic final scene where the first of the two comets is about to smash into the earth, that light over my head popped on.

There are thousands of people stuck in traffic, traffic of biblical proportions, while behind them the harbinger of doom (a giant comet) is about to kill them all. If only they could move faster, they would escape this horrible fate. One could make some sort of comparison to death and the daily grind, but I will leave that to someone smarter than I. The scene does a superb job of depicting hopelessness, helplessness, and despair all through the visual metaphor of a traffic jam. I started to think, what other movies have used traffic, and traffic jams, and how have they used them.

The first movie to use this metaphor that came to mind was Office Space.

The opening sequence shows the ‘hero’ stuck in traffic, moving from one lane to another in a pointless search for “just a little more speed” only to be thwarted by what seems like an endless stream of cars that only move when he is not in that lane. Out the window an elderly person in a walker slowly moves faster than the traffic. The despair is both real and comic at the same time.

The next movie I could think of was Matrix 2, where they do some kind of car chase on that ominous highway.

Falling Down also came to mind, the movie where Michale Douglas goes crazy after having a very bad day (being stuck in traffic played a huge part of this)

Movies use visual short cuts to tug emotions out of you. It struck me as interesting that over and over again they used traffic jams to showcase, negative emotions, rage, helplessness, hopelessness, fear, despair, loneliness (ironic considering how close you are to so many others), and danger. As I thought about each movie, and how the traffic jam is used in it I started to feel really bad for people who drive. I mean, even if they only experience a small amount of the negative emotions that the people in the movies experience, they would have to do so every day year in and year out…no wonder those horns get honked so much.

I then started to think “well how is riding a bicycle portrayed in movies?” I instantly thought of E.T.

Then I thought of Breaking Away (if you have never watched this movie stop reading this and go rent it now) where the main character races a semi truck.

Then Quicksilver (another great).

In each of these movies the bicycle is used as a metaphor for good emotions. Freedom, speed, health, escape, love, happiness, hard work, accomplishment.

I know movies are not real, and I know they don’t always reflect reality. But I found it striking that in almost any movie I could think of the bicycle represented good emotions, and the traffic jam bad ones.

In no movie that I could think of was a traffic jam a good thing. This might seem obvious, but the second light bulb that went off in my head was that in almost every single car commercial I have ever watched, the car being sold is portrayed on an empty highway free to go as fast and as far as it wants, with no one else there to slow them down or get in their way.

Turn the sound off on these two and imagine someone telling you about the smooth lines and styling and how awesome you will feel while driving them…

When as we all know the reality of car ownership is much more often slow plodding progress through traffic jammed streets.

I would argue that movies about traffic show a much more realistic view of reality than car commercials do (I have more thoughts on this I think I will save for a future post). The point of this unscientific rambling dissertation? If you want to feel free, if you want to escape, if you want to travel the open roads with speed and efficiency, don’t listen to car commercials. They are selling a lie, instead go get on your bike and go for a ride.

When I ride my bike I feel amazing. The wind on my face, the freedom of moving as fast as my legs will make me go, the amazing simplicity of it all just makes me so happy. I feel great when I am done with my ride, healthy, strong, alive. I never think about traffic. I know how long it is going to take me to get from point a to point b, and it is almost always the exact same time regardless of what time a day it is. I never worry about parking. I don’t plan my day around rush hours. I simply don’t think about that sort of thing, ever.

If you drive a car, if you drive one every day, examine how much of your time is spent thinking about things like gas, parking, traffic, etc. Is moving about the city a stressful activity for you? Have you ever decided not to go some place because of traffic? Do you schedule your day around traffic? Are you a slave to traffic? Is traffic reducing the quality of your life?

Do you own a bicycle?

Reader Grim sent these to me…as you can see the new bike lanes on North Harvard have not been totally understood just yet by the drivers in the area…perhaps a couple 100$ dollar tickets would smarten them up.

more pics here

Did you know that if you are going down Cambridge street towards the Longfellow bridge that if you wait patiently at the first two red lights, you can then make every other light if you simply go the correct speed? Did you know that most of the lights in Cambridge turn green exactly three seconds after the walk guy pops up? Did you know that it takes almost as long to “lane hop” (walk out onto the dividing median and then wait for traffic to clear on the other side) Com ave in Allston as it does to simply wait for the light to turn green. I know these things, because in a very real way knowing these things helps keep me alive. If you drive a car, you probably don’t know these things. Your world is totally different than mine. You are stuck in a little metal box, your vision is obscured, you are low to the ground, your vision is limited by the cars in front of you, behind you is filled with blind spots, your ears can’t hear past the sound dampening, your nose smells only what is inside your car…I simply have more senses on the job, and more inputs for those sense. Trust me I know what I am doing.

You honk your horn because I am going too slow, only to be stopped by the red light in 50 feet. If we go slow that light will be green when we get to it and we can both go through without stopping. Trust me.

You get mad because I am moving over into the center of the right lane, but then you almost hit the car pulling out of the drive way. I saw that guy moving out into the street a block down the street. Trust me.

You give me the finger because I am riding 5 feet out from the left edge of the bike lane, but don’t notice when the cab door opens and tourists pop out into the bike lane. Trust me.

You wonder why I am taking the full left lane as I approach the Boston side of the Longfellow, only to be totally taken off guard when someone makes a right hand turn onto Storrow Drive from the far left lane. Trust me.

You wonder why I am riding down the middle of State street heading towards Government Center, only to be forced to slam on the brakes when A group of tourists staring at the sky walks out against the light clogging both sides of the street with human speed bumps. Trust me.

You give me dirty looks as I take the far left hand side of the right lane, only to be forced to slam on the brakes when the bus in front of us pulls hard to the right and slams on the brakes. You are are again surprised when I move to the center of the left hand lane and are surprised again by the pedestrian crossing in front of the bus. Trust me.

Going really fast only to have to stop at the red lights is not efficient. They’re no parking spots, don’t even bother looking. If you want to drive a car in this city get ready to stop a lot. Did the price of gas just go up again? Nice parking ticket. Hey look someone backed into your bumper.

Being on two wheels has it’s advantages, perhaps you should try it, trust me.

Check out this article on Newbury Street becoming a pedestrian way during the weekends of July and August.  Mayor Menino is behind this, as are the stores who would love to see the increase of foot traffic and happy shoppers.  Look for expanded storefronts, possible street vendors, music and fashion shows, and good vibes all around.

One Newbury Street shopper had the complaint of :”Where are they going to park? That’s a big problem.”

Please, spare us.  When the choice is between a street that can be used safely and comfortably for the general public all the while increasing revinue (and space) for the stores, or used for leaving one’s oversized SUV tank next to the curb, I personally choose the pedestrian way.  Even if it means I have to get off my bike and walk down Newbury because there’ll be so many people.

This is a great idea, and I hope the city adopts more changes like this.  Here’s one: how about Comm Ave, from BU Bridge to Kenmore, closed to through traffic – which can be diverted through the top part of Brookline, down Park Drive, and channelled out to Beacon Street.  Imagine, students crossing with peace, biking, skateboarding, four-squaring, and socializing in the middle of their own campus?  How could that ever possibly be?!  How radical a thought?!

Or we could just leave that public space for people to park their cars.   I suppose it’s a toss up.