The Other Urban War

Will this be the decade of e-bikes or giant electric pick-ups?

A lot of people want to say American cities are a war zone. They’re not. The whole country is.

But there is a form of warfare happening in our cities. It’s a development war, a transport war.

It’s happening for two reasons.

First, cars don’t scale. Each car takes up space, whether moving or parked.

Second, demographics and economics are creating urban density. A research university, and the businesses that spin off from it, cluster together. The people who work there don’t always make a lot of money.

Cities and suburbs are structurally different from one another. Suburbs have single family homes, with huge parking lots around shopping and commercial districts. The cars grow bigger every year. Some no longer fit in parking places. They long ago became too big for drivers to see nearby bikers or pedestrians. They’re tanks that can go 100 mph, with drivers who like to do that.

Cities, meanwhile, are trying to restrict cars. There’s a growing demand for “road diets,” narrowing streets to accommodate a more diverse transport mix. Especially electric bikes. An e-bike can let even this old man travel 5 miles in a half hour, comfortably, without a lot of sweat. The kid carrier I bought for my road bike in the 1980s is finally practical with an e-bike. Many e-bikes come with baskets for shopping or space for a passenger.

There’s also an increasing demand to get rid of urban parking. Atlanta’s MARTA lots are being replaced by mixed-use developments. Parking requirements on new developments are being waived.

If you live in a suburb, with a huge pick-up or SUV, you feel unwelcome when you come to town. I’d never drive a car in Manhattan, and cities are becoming Manhattan-ized. It’s fine as far as it goes, but there’s resistance, and pushback.

Just the other day I was nearly run over in a crosswalk near my house by a large pick-up. I yelled at the driver, who had the nerve to stop his car, turn around, and confront me about it. He didn’t have a gun, or I wouldn’t be writing this. But did he really think it would be OK to run over a pedestrian, even without the crosswalk? I think he did.

Suburban people are unwelcome in cities because the cars they need for the 30 mile commute don’t fit. Urban people are unwelcome in suburbs because e-bikes go just 10 miles per hour. Suburban people believe that if you’re not in a car you don’t belong. Urban people believe if you’re in a car you don’t belong.

It’s another example of one country becoming two.