A reader has submitted a YouTube video which we are delighted to embed below. The auteur has made and exhibited his film in order to demonstrate his fear and hatred of people getting about on bicycles. This is commendable, and we look forward to seeing many more films from him exploring this theme.
However, even the greatest works of art have a flaw, and we hope that the film-maker won't mind that we point out what has been missed. It's quite obvious, really. And it's actually really good news!
In his precis on the YouTube hosting page, the auteur expounds at length about how much he fears and hates people using bicycles on the pavement.We feel for him - no-one likes feeling frightened of stuff. But we also think that the video gives us reasons to be happy.
In the film, the priority given to motor traffic in the very centre of Aberdeen is demonstrated to have forced people on bicycles into conflict with people on foot. Can't our filmmaker see that this is exactly what is required?
For if conditions for people on foot and on bike have been made so very unattractive on the streets of Aberdeen "city and shire" that these people are squeezed into an ever-decreasing share of the urban realm, herded behind barriers and forced to use two-stage crossings with those enclosures in the middle which traffic engineers unblushingly call "sheep pens", then the logical conclusion will be that more and more of these people will abandon their attempts to use "active travel" and just get in the car for their city-centre shopping trips. Then our Victory will be complete! So we thank the film-maker for submitting this video which documents that every day we force more people on bikes off of our roads; and by doing so, we make it more and more likely that they will just take the car the next time they're thinking about going to Union Square for some Handmade Burgers. In this way Aberdeen City and Shire can help to pull the UK economy out of recession.
Check it out:
(aaargh! Royalty-free music soundtrack warning! Turn down your speakers!)
Showing posts with label Guild St. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Guild St. Show all posts
Thursday, 16 August 2012
Tuesday, 17 May 2011
Sinister Forces of Re-allocation. Guild St
Can you see what's wrong with this picture? Yes, that's right - it's the most insidious threat to the drivers of Aberdeen Cars - the Sinister Forces of roadspace re-allocation have been at work.
At first, you might not notice what's happened. But then you'll see the oddly-curtailed road-markings, the strange mid-pavement placing of a lamp-post. A mid-pavement gutter. And then you realise - the pavement has been built-out onto the motorists road-space! What?! We can see no good reason at all for this unilateral annexation of the roadtaxpayer funded carriageway space in favour of the tax-dodging pestestrians.
The location is Aberdeen's Guild Street and this road forms part of the vital giratory system at the heart of the city's inner-city ring-road. Where once the giratory was three-lanes wide, now it is pinched to just two at this spot outside the Station Hotel. That's a 33% re-allocation in favour of the scroungers.
From this giratory, important executives in their nice Aberdeen Cars are distributed west to the ever-popular upmarket villas of Ferryhill, south to the oil-industrial estates of Tullos and Altens and north on the Denburn Dual Carrageway to the rest of the city. This makes it all the more perplexing and worrying to us that the anti-car, anti-economy, Sinister Forces of roadspace reallocation have chosen this spot to go about their foul business increasing the size of the pavements. We understand that this extended footspace (is that what it's called?) is intended to 'accommodate' increased pestestrian flow between the Trinity Centre shopping mall and the Union Square shopping mall. But that can't be right; both these malls have large car-parks, so what sort of person would want to walk between the two and get all windswept?
A closer look at the photo above perhaps gives us some clues. Not one of these people is wearing a suit. None of them carries a briefcase. What with all those casually-dressed people walking around Aberdeen these days rather than use the lovely big road, the place is looking a bit like DSS-land or StudentVille or something. This sends out all the wrong messages.We can only thank Ford that they are constrained behind those aluminium railings, lest they just come out of nowhere and endanger our no claims bonuses!
But, on a very serious note, this roadspace reallocation work sets a dangerous precedent. We are aware that the Sinister Forces of re-allocation are girding their loins and have the Denburn Dual Carriageway in their sights. That's why it's vital that all Aberdeen Drivers of good faith join our our popular campaign to to "Save the Denburn Dual Carriageway!" ('like' us on FaceBook, 'follow' us on Twitter)
Our numbers are swelling. Our collective voice will be heard!
At first, you might not notice what's happened. But then you'll see the oddly-curtailed road-markings, the strange mid-pavement placing of a lamp-post. A mid-pavement gutter. And then you realise - the pavement has been built-out onto the motorists road-space! What?! We can see no good reason at all for this unilateral annexation of the roadtaxpayer funded carriageway space in favour of the tax-dodging pestestrians.
The location is Aberdeen's Guild Street and this road forms part of the vital giratory system at the heart of the city's inner-city ring-road. Where once the giratory was three-lanes wide, now it is pinched to just two at this spot outside the Station Hotel. That's a 33% re-allocation in favour of the scroungers.
From this giratory, important executives in their nice Aberdeen Cars are distributed west to the ever-popular upmarket villas of Ferryhill, south to the oil-industrial estates of Tullos and Altens and north on the Denburn Dual Carrageway to the rest of the city. This makes it all the more perplexing and worrying to us that the anti-car, anti-economy, Sinister Forces of roadspace reallocation have chosen this spot to go about their foul business increasing the size of the pavements. We understand that this extended footspace (is that what it's called?) is intended to 'accommodate' increased pestestrian flow between the Trinity Centre shopping mall and the Union Square shopping mall. But that can't be right; both these malls have large car-parks, so what sort of person would want to walk between the two and get all windswept?
A closer look at the photo above perhaps gives us some clues. Not one of these people is wearing a suit. None of them carries a briefcase. What with all those casually-dressed people walking around Aberdeen these days rather than use the lovely big road, the place is looking a bit like DSS-land or StudentVille or something. This sends out all the wrong messages.We can only thank Ford that they are constrained behind those aluminium railings, lest they just come out of nowhere and endanger our no claims bonuses!
But, on a very serious note, this roadspace reallocation work sets a dangerous precedent. We are aware that the Sinister Forces of re-allocation are girding their loins and have the Denburn Dual Carriageway in their sights. That's why it's vital that all Aberdeen Drivers of good faith join our our popular campaign to to "Save the Denburn Dual Carriageway!" ('like' us on FaceBook, 'follow' us on Twitter)
Our numbers are swelling. Our collective voice will be heard!
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