I am in Washington, DC today where I will be speaking at the National Bike Summit about how advocates can be effective in fighting for improved road safety. Tomorrow (Wednesday) Delaware’s cycling delegation, led by House Majority Leader Valerie Longhurst, will head to Capitol Hill to deliver a similar road safety message directly to Delaware’s…
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“I’m sorry, Officer! He came out of nowhere!“ “Sorry, mate, I didn’t see you!” Every cyclist has, at one time or another, had the feeling of being “invisible” to motorists. Bike Delaware has written about this phenomenon – called “inattentional blindness” – which has been extensively studied by psychologists. But while we have grown to understand why both…
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As Mayor Williams moves forward with his meetings with civic leaders about crime in Wilmington, it seems an opportune time to again suggest an additional strategy. From accounts in the news, discussions about crime in Wilmington seem to always involve (versions of) the same ideas: Persuading drug dealers to stop shooting at each other Jobs Better…
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The front page headline in yesterday’s News Journal described discussions in Wilmington about whether to remove Wilmington’s Chief of Police. Wilmington’s murder rate is more than 5 times higher than New York City’s and one of the highest among small cities in the country. But the current Chief of Police in Wilmington, Christine Dunning, has…
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“You can’t make people use streets they have no reason to use. You can’t make people watch streets they do not want to watch. Safety on the streets by surveillance and mutual policing of one another sounds grim, but in real life it is not grim. The safety of the street works best, most casually,…
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UPDATE (August 29, 2015): Researchers confirm that “Share The Road” Doesn’t Work: http://www.bikede.org/2015/08/29/share-the-road-is-a-problem/ In August, Bike Delaware asked DelDOT to permanently discontinue its use of the “Share The Road” plaque in Delaware. The article on our ask, which can be read HERE, was viewed on the web more than 15,000 times, “liked” more than 1,800…
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“80% of success is showing up.” – Woody Allen Is Woody Allen’s advice still valid in 2013? Yes. For politics, it’s more valid than ever. But in a world of pervasive and ubiquitous email, social media, mobile devices and ‘online’ communication of all kinds the need to, and the huge impact of, just ‘showing up‘…
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Bring your kids. Bring your siblings or folks. Bring your friends and neighbors. You can drop by for 10 or 15 minutes and then leave. But, whatever you do, just show up. What used to be a crazy, pie-in-the-sky scheme (a bicycle highway connecting the downtowns of Delaware’s largest and third-largest cities) is poised to become a real…
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A bicycle highway connecting the downtowns of Delaware’s largest and third-largest cities? A greenway easily accessible (within 2 miles) to 20% of the entire population of Delaware? It’s not just a crazy, pie-in-the-sky scheme anymore. It’s an actual, official DelDOT Public Workshop on October 1. How often do we have a chance like this to make…
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