Is the age of the automobile over? The government sure thinks so. On March 15th Transport Secretary Ray LaHood wrote on the Department of Transportation blog:
“People across America who value bicycling should have a voice when it comes to transportation planning. This is the end of favoring motorized transportation at the expense of non-motorized”
LaHood’s decision followed his rock-star reception at the National Bike Summit where he delivered an impromptu, tabletop speech. This news also comes on the heels of Google’s much anticipated addition of bike routes to Google Maps. Both events, happening in the same week, have helped cycling distinguish itself as a serious alternative, and not just a hobbyist’s indulgence.
I’ve lived in Brooklyn, New York for almost six months. One thing I looked forward to when I moved from the Washington DC suburbs was leaving my car behind. New York is one of a few cities where cars aren’t only not a necessity, but they can be an excessive hindrance. Mass transit, the bicycle and my feet are all I need to get around. New York in strangled in traffic, and the solutions to eliminate automobiles have grown more drastic. As Mayor Michael Bloomberg mulls over increased bridge and tunnel tolls and more pedestrian walkways in the city, cars may slowly take the backseat to less obtrusive and cumbersome modes of transit.
What I look forward to with Secretary LaHood’s decision is not the banishment of automobiles (they are obviously needed in some capacity), but the sweetening of the pot for cyclists and pedestrians. And beyond improvements for clean transit, we may see a gradual change in how we as Americans choose to live. It won’t happen overnight, but this shift in policy far exceeds the shift of car horns to bike bells. Imagine a suburb where people lived within biking distance, rather than a car drive away. Imagine not being stuck in a motorized terrarium but out in public, interacting without the radio drowning out traffic and surrounding people. Imagine not paying for car insurance.
Biking isn’t for everyone, and the automobile is wedded to the American dream, but perhaps with a little nudging we can make it less consequential.
What about you? How can this shift in tone and priorities really affect your daily life?
On March 12th, the Texas Board of Education approved a curriculum that redefines much of American history to into a conservative ideology. Voting along party lines in a 10-5 vote, the board “added balance” by diminishing the historical importance of the separation of church and state, which they argue is not guaranteed by the Constitution. They also inflate the significance of the Republican resurgence in the 1980s and 90s, Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority, even the National Rifle Association, says the New York Times.
This is a relatively partisan decision in a state that has seen its fair share of arguments regarding creationism and other divisive issues. But why even take notice of this one state-centric battle? Simple economics, that’s why. Texas has one of the largest public school systems in America, and in turn buys the most textbooks. Due to the enormous costs of research, editing and publishing, textbook companies (which themselves are in a dire economic situation) usually only produce a single edition. And since Texas is the largest customer, their curriculum sets the standard of what is included.
However, the Times adds, as classrooms advance technologically more textbooks are available in digital form. In the last decade, these large, monolithic volumes have become easier to edit, refine and distribute. Just as the Internet has broken down barriers of traditional media, it can also dismantle the hold Texas keeps on the educational agenda. What plays in Austin, Dallas and Houston won’t necessarily affect the conversation in Chicago, Los Angeles and beyond.
But this leads to a question. How far will we go in our separate interpretations? With this lead to more liberal states passing a different curriculum that harshly castigates the second Bush Administration while championing the budget surpluses left by Clinton? Will history become a dialect based on whom you vote for and where you live?
What is your resolution for 2010? For many, I can guess it is to be more open and willing to accept the unexpected. To be surprised. With this new economy of information we find ourselves in as we enter a new decade, it is easier to listen to new, unexpected points of view. But I wonder, and I ask for your opinions to the contrary: does more information make us well-rounded, or does it further our own biases?
The last decade, has created a deluge of information in multiple mediums. How many articles and profiles have been published on the importance of Twitter, social media and the evolution of blogosphere? Online media has shifted from being from an addendum of the media to being the media. David Carr, media and culture critic for the New York Times, penned one of the better articles I’ve read about Twitter. He discusses his apprehension toward the next Internet craze, although he eventually acknowledges that this isn’t just a fun way to document the minutia of the quotidian. Rather, he sees Twitter as the guts of the new Internet, our new way to communicate effectively. Carr sees Twitter as a way to “carefully curate” the people one listens to thus creating an “always-on data stream” from the minds you trust the most. Beautiful. A custom-made brain trust at the click of a mouse. To a point that is exactly what our new information age wants. The most information with the least effort and cost. But how does more information help us understand our world better? We are getting more facts, but are we gaining a better perspective and putting all the necessary bits into context?
I believe that in pursuit of niche publications (Huffington Post, DailyKos on the left; Drudge Report and Newsmax on the right) we have further entrenched ourselves in our own biases, and dug bigger holes that are harder to dig out of.
From personal observation a good cross section of different popular but partisan news sites- opposing views are shared within the sites, but merely as a means for mockery and instant refutation. Instead of “You say X, but I must say Y,” the tone has changed to “Can you believe X? Can you even believe they said X?” These hardened beliefs have in turn left and taken the form of a coarser public dialogue. From the often obstructionist Code Pinks on the left and the Tea Partiers on the right, hardened values makes any hope of the moderate middle fading. The web makes it even easier to disregard an opinion, because you may never even see it. It is no longer a page you flip past in the newspaper; the thought was never even manifested. With the instant arguments and message board flare-ups that occur on our browsers, it is easy to see why William F. Buckley was so revered at the time of his passing in 2008. He represented a clear brand of conservatism, but also a brand of arguer and intellectual. On his show Firing Line, he didn’t bring enemies on his show to shout them down a-la Glenn Beck and Bill O’Reilly or even the increasingly popular liberal loudmouth Ed Shultz of MSNBC. Though no conservative myself, I can respect two minds engaged in conversation rather than two talking heads making noise.
We’ve squandered our new era of information by preaching to the choir. Let’s try finding some middle ground. My resolutions are to ask more meaningful questions and find better context and perspective. What are yours?
-Johnny Simon for Pangea
