cycling for communal growth

Cycling has taken off in some areas of the country while stagnating into oblivion in others, namely rural areas.

    The urban environment that has seen growth of cycling infrastructure has almost across the board seen upticks in health, mental well-being, economic boosts, and communal engagement. Areas that have put money into rigorous multimodal transportation have seen economic capital regain at much higher rates than others who have strictly vehicular planning. Why is it that cycling a not as prevalent in more rural areas? And how can planners promote multimodal, nonvehicular transportation as a means to drive up communal engagement in a way that benefits the health of the community and the overarching health of that area’s environment. one video I have seen showing rural American’s attitudes towards cyclists is that they believe cyclists “bring an air of moral superiority, left leaning politics, environmental concerns, and a propensity for vegetarianism.”

 

 While i find this assumption to be probably true, and they are some tenets that the rural American community may benefit from exploring, it does not change the fact that to get rural American communities involved in commuting means that don’t involve strictly driving their lifted trucks to Walmart and back home, we need to break down any stigma of social class or politics that are attached to cyclists in these areas. cycling is for everyone, and should be planned as such. maybe we could plan our communities in the American south to always have a separated shoulder allowing for the use of a pedestrian and cycle lane without the need for extra sidewalk work. maybe we could plan cycling in these areas to spur off into the wooded areas to allow for hunting and fishing expeditions to be even more accessible than by vehicle. in any case, we are going to need to learn to play to the crowd of these communities to ever spur a real change. the culture seems be one that is comfortable being stuck in its ways, so we need a serious education overhaul about benefits of cycling and it’s ability to enliven a community. 

I believe that the southern communal identity is tied in with almost exclusively high school sports affiliation, church affiliation, and maybe work affiliated. could planning for, and educating towards cycling engagement and communal cycling planning be a solution to get southerners to interact on their commute rather than leaving their private properties, in their private vehicles, and never really engaging with the community along the way? can we reframe the ideologies associated with cycling into the rural west? can we drive the southerners set in ways of vehicular transport and identity through rigorous planning? this question will pose as a theme in several posts to follow. thank you for reading the first introduction to this topic in this blog!

Links for consideration

https://transportation.ucla.edu/blog/how-biking-helps-your-community

https://ijbnpa.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1479-5868-7-8