"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."
"Like I always say, there's no 'I' in "team". There is a 'me', though, if you jumble it up."
We would worry less about what others think of us if we realized how seldom they do.
Wisdom - that part of knowledge that isn't only true, but also happens to be helpful.
Wisdom speaks softly... Thereafter the volume increases proportionate to the level of ignorance
A punctured bicycle
On a hillside desolate
Will nature make a man of me yet?
All designed objects are propaganda for a certain way of life.
Sometimes we need to stop analysing the past, stop planning the future, stop figuring out precisely how we feel, stop deciding exactly what we want, and just see what happens.
We are not the same persons this year as last; nor are those we love. It is a happy chance if we, changing, continue to love a changed person.
"Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence." --Napoleon Bonaparte
The best designed clothes: invite being removed but reward being kept on.
It's that you just can't take the effect and make it the cause
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Russian police trying to make motorists respect pedestrians on zebra crossings thought of drafting in exotic zebras to halt Moscow traffic.
Only, police in the Russian capital could not get any zebras – so they painted black stripes on white horses instead.
They paraded the horses over crossings, forcing motorists to slow down and read road safety messages.
Thousands of pedestrians die in road accidents COLLISIONS in Russia every year.
(CLICK HERE FOR MORE »» BBC News – ‘Zebra’ stops cars in Russia road accident campaign: [
continue reading ‘Zebra’ stops cars in Russia road ‘accident’ campaign (what’s accidental?)
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On this street every single house has off-street parking for at least two vehicles. Baron Gardens is a very wide street, four to five lanes wide, which could easily be converted to a cycling-friendly street on the Dutch model. Instead the ‘cycling-friendly’ council has re-allocated road space to car parking. Not only are there parking bays at the side of the road, parking bays have even been created down the middle.
This is car dependency gone mad. It also deters cycling, because it creates lengthy pinch points where cyclists are forced into conflict with vehicles approaching from [
continue reading #Redbridge council: suppressing #cycling and promoting #car-dependency
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Let’s say it again. Among the greatest obstacles to the development of mass cycling in Britain are the nation’s two leading cycling organisations, the Cyclists’ Touring Club and the London Cycling Campaign. They both deeply damage the prospect of cycling ever really taking off in Britain.
Both are fundamentally committed to the doomed strategy of ameliorating the conditions of vehicular cycling. Cycle lanes are a perfect example of this campaign strategy, supposedly delivering an improvement in conditions for cycling. The fact that cycle lanes have failed to raise cycling’s modal share is of no interest to the [
continue reading The #CTC : suppressing #cycling
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The IAM, the UK’s largest independent road safety charity, recommends cyclists:
Take up a primary position around 75-100m before reaching a junction, in the centre of the lane, providing it is safe to do so. This move will mean that drivers exiting the junction will be more likely to see the cyclist as they are in the same traffic flow as more hazardous vehicles. Take the “secondary position” when cycling along a straight stretch of road which is clear of junctions [
continue reading Cyclists: claim your lane, says IAM
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Well this is rich isn’t it? “If the app stops you having one ‘bad’ accident” – what is the sliding-scale and what would be accidental!! SHAME ON YOU TUAW – AND APPLE© FOR ALLOWING IT ON iTunes.
Is Text’nDrive Pro worth $19.99? If you avoid even one traffic citation for “texting while driving,” you’d probably come out ahead. If the app keeps you from having a bad accident while you’re distracted by your iPhone, then it’s worth every penny you pay for it, and more.
(CLICK HERE FOR MORE »» TUAW review: Email while driving with Text’nDrive [
continue reading be an ARSE and email while driving with Text’nDrive Pro for iPhone (!!! you what?)
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If you stripped an urban bike-sharing system down to its bare essentials and tossed in a healthy dose of technology, you might end up with SoBi, the "social bicycle system."
SoBi uses a gizmo that fastens to the back of any bike and functions as a lock, a GPS unit, and a bike computer. With a SoBi account, you can use a mobile app (of course) to find an available bike nearby. When you're done, you just lock it to an existing bike rack where someone else can pick it up. Without the need for [
continue reading Sobi: A Leaner, and Maybe Smarter, Bike-Sharing System
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The outcome of all that PR for cars is more sales as well as more congestion, more pollution and a greater demand for scarce parking spaces. There would have been no need for the congestion charge in London if not for the success of the auto industry’s publicity machine and the popularity of motoring programmes.
Reversing the trend of ever-increasing car ownership and use is not as difficult as it seems. If governments were to limit car advertising, as they did with alcohol and tobacco when the health impacts were recognised, people would take decisions about their [
continue reading Want to promote cycling? Cut back car adverts now
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Seriously, this is the future that China’s envisioning: huge friggin’ buses engulfing smaller cars on the road. Despite the silly picture and the eccentric “3D Express Coach” branding, this cunning project by Shenzhen Huashi Future Car-Parking Equipment actually makes sense. The idea is to make use of the space between regular-size cars and bridges, thus saving construction costs as well as minimizing congestion impact by allowing cars to drive underneath these jumbo buses. Fancy hitching a ride? Y
(CLICK HERE FOR MORE »» China to build ginormous buses that cars can drive under (video) — [
continue reading China to build ginormous buses that cars can drive under (+ video)
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The real reason why conservatives hate the enforcement of speed limits is that this is one of the few laws which is as likely to catch the rich as the poor: newspaper editors and council leaders are as vulnerable as anyone else. The conservative reaction to speed cameras suggests that they love laws, except those which apply to them.
(CLICK HERE FOR MORE »» Monbiot.com » Tory Boy Racers: .)
With city budgets stretched thin and more people riding trains and buses, public transportation is getting more crowded. As the Washington Post reports, in Washington, D.C., and Manhattan (and probably elsewhere!), there’s a growing irritation with "seat hogs": people who intentionally sit in an aisle seat in an empty row forcing their fellow commuters to stand.
Brooke Timmons grasped a bar in the middle of a crowded Red Line rail car and held on, looking exasperated as she tried to keep her balance while the train jerked and accelerated down the track.
On both sides of [
continue reading “Seat Hogs”: The New Scourge of Public Transit?
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This map shows all trains (yellow pins) on the London Underground network in approximately real time (screenshot). Click the stations for a local map of that station. I have a (per-station) National Rail version, and a bookmarkable train times planner.
Live map of London Underground trains.
The Journey is the Thing from Tony Blazejack on Vimeo.
Sorry to interrupt your afternoon with this tear-jerker but man, this is intense. Maybe it’s the weather here in NYC today but watching this was a really moving experience. I’m stunned. Makes you think about people who have lost their lives on a bike.
(CLICK HERE FOR MORE »» Prolly Is Not Probably The Journey is the Thing: [
continue reading The Journey is the Thing
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“Black cab drivers are a pampered minority”.
That rather provocative statement comes in a post about taxis on theCrap cycling and walking in Waltham Forest blog yesterday. Now, almost all of us uses taxis from time to time but do black cabs really require the special privileges they currently enjoy: use of bus lanes, dedicated [
continue reading Why are taxis king of the road when they carry so few passengers
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This is one of the key infographics wheeled out by Sustrans folks in their PowerPoint presentations to local authorities, Government bodies and other organisations. It’s a jaw-dropping demonstration of less is more. The link between activity levels and obesity in selected European countries is clear and obvious.
Quickrelease.tv » Blog Archive » The most influential bike graph ever?.
I am so glad people still say this.
That’s the take that Chris Kostman has on riding off-road. Mountain bike? No way. He just uses his road bike, and he’ll leave any mountain biker in the dust, he claims.
These two quotes will tell you where he’s coming from:
1. “[T]he mountain bike is the most over-rated, most improperly used, most over-built, and most greedily promoted piece of hardware to hit the sport and fitness industry in modern history.”
2. Can’t ride off-road without wide, knobby tires, and at least some suspension? Chris’ retort: “‘Technique beats technology any time, anywhere.”
[
continue reading Mountain Bikes – Who Needs ‘em?
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Last year, research supported by CTC found that drivers overtook cyclists closer on roads with cycle lanes. This doesn’t mean that cycle lanes should never be used, but where they are needed – on busier roads where space is available – they should be wide enough to compensate for people driving slightly closer.
Wider cycle lanes also allow parents to cycle alongside [
continue reading What’s wrong with a bike lane that cyclists can use safely?
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WHAT´S FIAT MIO? THE FIRST CAR MADE BASED ON CREATIVE COMMONS
In order to understand MIO, we rescued the thinking of a great Italian, like Fiat, namely Michelangelo. The sculpture master believed that by just simply lapidating and chipping away the rough material one would find a great work of art in any stone block.
continue reading Sobre o Projeto « Fiat invites you to create a car. A car to call your own.
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To celebrate the launch of the iPad, design consultancy and technology research lab MAYA created a simple iPad application that can be worn by a cyclist as a back mounted display. The display acts as your own personal bike indicator, letting the traffic as well as any cyclist behind you know your intentions ahead of time.
Called the MAYA Sprocket, the app uses the iPad’s accelerometer to perform a few basic functions. The app can detect whether you are going to stop or slow down, then trigger a “Stopping” sign that will [
continue reading turn your iPad into a bike indicator
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“Joel Mulligan writes with news that Velo-city Global, “the premier international conference about cycling policy, planning, design, and marketing”, will take place in Copenhagen between 22-25 June. Among the keynote speakers are Enrique Peñalosa who, as Mayor of Bototá, Colombia in the years 1998-2001, initiated the construction of over 300 kilometers of bike lanes crisscrossing Bogotá from the suburbs to the city center increasing the use of bicycles five times. Janette Sadik-Khan, Commissioner of the New York City Department of Transportation, will talk about her ambitious strategy to make New York City more green and accessible to cyclists. A [
continue reading VELO CITY, COPENHAGEN
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At Planetizen, they take note of the increase number of cruiser bikes around cities as a sign of the increased acceptance of bicycles. It’s now acceptable and easy to bike around on a silly bike designed simply for getting from one point to another, instead of on an expensive performance bike:
For the last few decades, the cruiser all but disappeared as bikes became big business. Road bikes claimed the market, and you rarely saw someone biking who wasn’t in full spandex. A revival of the cruiser began in the mid-90s as people began to reconsider biking [
continue reading The Rise of the Cruiser
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Dollyhead Books says, “A musician has spoken today of his shock at being removed from a train for ‘behaving suspiciously’ by writing a list of songs which included the band name The Killers.”
Tom Shaw was travelling on a South West Trains when he began writing a list of song titles which his band The Magic Mushrooms would play at a forthcoming gig.
But the 25-year-old was approached by two security staff employed by the train company and asked to leave the train at Fareham railway station.
Mr Shaw, who works with young people with learning difficulties, said [
continue reading Man kicked off train for writing song list that included band name “The Killers”
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congestion: the great legislator
The government signalled the end of intercity motorway building today as it announced plans for a £30bn high-speed rail network, with the first phase between London and Birmingham opening in 2026.
Lord Adonis, the transport secretary, said the motorway [
continue reading £30bn high-speed rail plan signals end of the road for motorways
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Helmets often cause rotational injuries to head and neck. A helmet, well or poorly-fitted can act like a large wrench on the head leading to a twisted (or worse) neck. This is why aerodynamic time-trial helmets are so dangerous, but it doesn’t stop rubes buying them in Condor to ride the DD. This looks interesting but does mean that the oft-repeated twist injury has its foundations in fact.
Until one of the myriad of ideas to cut down on auto-bike accidents is successfully implemented in cities nationwide, perhaps we should focus some energy on finding ways to minimize cyclist [
continue reading New Helmet Designed to Cut Down Cyclist Injury
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A security camera on the front of a bus rolls as the bus smashes into about 20 cars on the highway.
The view from the side-view cameras are even worse.
Tags: video
(CLICK HERE FOR MORE »» kottke.org First-person perspective of a bus crash: .)
These photos of a modern California housing development shows a neighborhood where the automobile and garage come first.
(CLICK HERE FOR MORE »» Philip Greenspun Weblog California Residential Architecture: Garage first: .)
Police are appealing for information or witnesses to come forward after an ambulance Cycle Response Unit was stolen in Sheffield City Centre.
The incident occurred at about 1pm on Thursday 18 February when the bike was taken from the secure bike park inside Sheffield Town Hall on Pinstone Street.
Life-Saving Cycle Response Unit Stolen in Sheffield – Yorkshire Ambulance Service NHS Trust.
Three years on from the introduction of tough new laws for using a mobile phone whilst driving, * a staggering number of drivers are still flouting the law and putting other motorists in danger by using the mobile phone not just for making and receiving calls, but for texting, calling up the Internet and even checking messages on Facebook and Twitter.
Halfords press office – Three Years On – Mobile Users still aren’t Obeying the Law?.
What do a trucker, an Israeli entrepreneur, Al Gore and Richard Branson all have in common? Proof that the real goldmines are old, neglected industries.
The name of that proof is GreenRoad. While so many entrepreneurs bang their heads against a Web and social media advertising brick wall, GreenRoad has applied common technology to an industry technology has largely passed by and—voilà—they’ve got a business that’s growing and saving lives, money and the environment.
Driving is the third most deadly profession after deep sea fishing and working in a coal mine. Not only does driving more safely save [
continue reading Al Gore Joins Richard Branson in Backing GreenRoad
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Shirdi Sai Baba: "Before you speak, ask yourself: Is it kind, is it true, is it necessary, does it improve upon the silence?"
Well known fact that any kiss where one or other party is in control of heavy machinery doesn't count for quality assessment purposes.
There is no nonsense so arrant that it cannot be made the creed of the vast majority by adequate governmental action.
The honest heart that's free frae a' intended fraud or guile. However fortune kick the ba', Has ay some cause to smile.
Life consists in replacing one worry with another, and one desire with the next, what the Buddhists call ‘grasping’ or upādāna in Sanskrit
"Every saint has a past. Every sinner has a future."
"Resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die."
A wrong decision isn't forever; it can be reversed. The losses from a delayed decision are forever; they can never be retrieved.
heavy words thrown lightly
And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.
Whenever you commend, add your reasons for doing so; it is this which distinguishes the approbation of a man of sense from the flattery of sycophants and admiration of fools
“The truth is, everyone is going to hurt you. You just got to find the ones worth suffering for.”
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