PRESS RELEASE
Bike the Bridge! Coalition
Contact:
Jason Meggs, BTB!C East Bay Coordinator,
PAGE: 510-720-2818 ; work: 510-643-5722 ; voicemail: 510-273-9288
FAX: 510-486-1528 ; e-mail jmeggs@lmi.net
Web site http://www.bikethebridge.org/
PRESS STATEMENT
Bicyclists have risked arrest today by riding the Bay Bridge because we
have reached a point at which the system is clearly not working. The Veto
of the Good Roads Bill, Senate Bill 1629, exemplifies the utter failure of
this system to address the needs of the people, the planet, and our
collective future. This is not a democracy, it is a chain gang society
wherein each state-mandated automobile is a personal prison.
What is more important than providing for the safety of all who use our
public roads? Why would anyone want to design future roads and highways
yet only provide for the safety of those who hold the privilege (by state
definition) to drive. How can we continue to build roads that people
either cannot use, are too scared to use, or are too unsafe to be used?
This amounts to both state-mandated discrimination and a state-mandated
dangerous condition. In the insurance industry this would be known as
negligence. How many pedestrians and bicyclists have to be killed on
public streets before it is considered to be the negligence of the City,
County or State to provide facilities that are safe for all travelers?
These policies are in stark contrast with the recent release of a new
report, Dangerous by Design, by the Surface Transportation Policy Project
(STPP) which states that California ranks last among all states in the
nation for federal spending on pedestrian facilities.
The report also exposes that while pedestrians account for nearly 20
percent of all traffic fatalities statewide, the state spends far less
than one percent of its federal transportation funds protecting them --
$40 per person is spent on highway projects in the state, and only four
cents per person on pedestrian projects. In 1999 alone pedestrian
"accidents" (so-called accidents) cost the state nearly $4 billion in lost
productivity and medical expenses while government agencies spent a only a
tiny fraction of that on prevention.
In the larger picture, beyond the Governor's veto, our society is killing
not only ourselves but our planet. The private automobile is directly
responsible for a vast array of our social and environmental
ills. Bicycling the Bay Bridge is a powerful symbol of reclaiming our
streets, our lives and our planet, by standing up to the tyranny of the
automobile. We humans are the stewards of planet earth, yet we are
destroying ourselves. What is more fundamental than to be able to travel
under one's own power? To make it illegal to travel under one's own power
begs an overthrow of the current system. Environmental racism, rising
rents, urban decay, deforestation, genocide of indigenous peoples, habitat
destruction and massive extinction, ever-increasing congestion and
ever-lengthening travel time, paving over of prime farmlands, disease
caused by pollution and inactivity, global warming, exploitation of
"developing" countries and so much more are inherent to the dead-end
crash-course we are on by investing almost entirely in automobile-only
systems.
Rather than sinking hundreds of billions into an unsustainable, ugly,
deadly motorcar-only system, why not build a beautiful and sustainable,
ecological city, where traffic jams are a thing of the past and everyone
feels safe to inhabit the streets? The bicyclists on today's ride are
inspired by the international car-free movement. The landmark new text,
Car Free Cities, by J.H. Crawford (www.carfree.com) is one visionary
blueprint of how we can restructure our society for maximal mobility and
quality of life, as well as sustainability and balance with the earth. We
are also inspired by local transportation activist Eric McCaughrin's new
film, Think Big. Think Big shows us a world where fast-moving motorways
are transformed into tree-lined parks featuring high-speed rail. City
centers are revitalized into car-free plazas rich in culture rather than
rich in exhaust and noise. In this vision of a better world, bridges and
other major public works projects focus on efficient passenger-friendly
rail systems, never forgetting equal access for bicycling and walking.
Today's demonstration is a wake-up call to the Bay Area to save what we
have while we still can.
Join the Bay Area Bridge Access email discussion:
Back to the Bike the Bridge! Coalition
PRESS RELEASE