Velo-City, the world's premier bicycle-planning conference, is making its way to Adelaide later on this month for the 2014 meeting.
Yes a bicycle planning conference here Down Under ... where peeps will be chatting about utility cycling, cycling for transport, shopping on bikes, picnic-ing on bikes ... hehehehehe
And Mikael, of Copenhagenize fame, is coming to deliver a keynote address ... and apparently to not ride a bicycle whilst here in Australia because if there's one thing he doesn't do it's ride a bicycle in a land of helmets!!! Funtimes!
Meanwhile I'm planning the opposite and intend to ride all round Adelaide.
Oh dear, it's kind of awkward though ...
Velo-City inevitably attracts a big global media spotlight and here we'll be, showing off our cycling wares to the world despite those wares having to include the daftness of Australian helmet laws, and the even more daftness of Australian meekness in the face of helmet compliance for over 20 years.
Hello Sue,
ReplyDeleteEarly morning here. I'm heading off soon to a solemn commemoration of the life of a young woman who was cycling to her work as a a school speech therapist when she was crushed to death by a huge flatbed truck - carrying a crane - in a viaduct under a railway line. Lots of those near my place as the Canadian Pacific line winds past just south of where I live in Montréal. She was killed exactly one week ago as I write.
By the way, she happened to be wearing a helmet, not that it would have made a whit of difference. A disproportionate number of cyclist deaths here (and elsewhere) are caused by HGVs with huge blind spots. The driver said he simply didn't see the cyclist, who was cycling in accordance with traffic rules.
https://www.facebook.com/events/699858973405946/
A couple of articles in English for this blog's readers:
http://montreal.ctvnews.ca/morning-memorial-to-be-held-to-honour-cyclist-mathilde-blais-1.1805630
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/mathilde-blais-cycling-death-spurs-calls-for-safer-crossings-1.2629712
Note usual stupid comments. Hey, someone died...
Have a good conference in Adelaide, and chase those crazy helm-heads out of town!
That is so sad, Lagatta ... such a waste ...
DeleteBig Oil, Big Corpa, they all have so much to answer for.
We've asked Mikael to address the Freestyle Cyclists Helmet Optional Ride as we gather at the Adelaide Conference Centre at 3:45 on Thursday 29th May. Not confirmed yet, but hoping he can be there.
ReplyDeleteI've also read that the police have been instructed not to fine delegates who are riding the bikes they will be supplied with. So maybe there will be a lot of un-helmeted Europeans and Americans and Asians, and, well, everybody except Australians.
More details on the ride at http://www.freestylecyclists.org