Month: December 2013

By The Onion
WASHINGTON—In a landmark report experts say fundamentally reshapes our understanding of the global warming crisis, new data published this week by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has found that the phenomenon is caused primarily by the actions of 7 billion key individuals.
These several billion individuals, who IPCC officials confirmed are currently operating in 195 countries worldwide, are together responsible for what experts called the “lion’s share” of the devastating consequences of global warming affecting the entire planet.
“Our research has proved conclusively that, year after year, the acceleration of the rate of global warming and the damage caused by this man-made acceleration can be clearly linked to 7 billion main culprits,” explained lead author Dr. John Bartlett, noting that many of these individuals have links to climate change going back nearly a century. “Worse, the significant majority of damage was done within the past two decades, when the consequences of climate change were widely known and yet these specific individuals did nothing to curb or amend their practices.”
“Now that we’ve done the hard work of identifying the key players responsible for this crisis, we can move forward with holding them accountable,” Bartlett added. “And it is my opinion that we need to regulate these individuals swiftly and decisively before they do any more damage.”
According to policy analysts, urgent regulation is needed in order to monitor and govern the behavior of these targeted individuals, who experts say collectively commit as much as 100 percent of violations to the environment each year.
Researchers have isolated numerous instances of environmentally harmful activity committed by these 7 billion perpetrators in the past few decades alone, identifying practices such as using electric lights, shipping packages, traveling by car, traveling by air, buying clothes, washing clothes, using heat, using air conditioning, buying food, buying water, eating meat, commuting to work, shopping, exercising at the gym, disposing of waste, operating computers, operating televisions, operating other household electronic appliances, and showering—alarming activities that experts say show no signs of remitting.
In addition, IPCC officials confirmed that billions of pounds per year in waste products can be traced to these 7 billion individuals alone.
“We’re actually looking at a situation where a select group of individuals—7,125,985,886 of them, to be exact—are singlehandedly responsible for global warming and are refusing to do anything about it,” author and activist Dan Cregmann told reporters, noting that these culprits have a horrible track record of following recommended environmental guidelines and disclosing their total energy consumption. “Many of these offenders have of course pledged goals for fighting climate change and going green in their daily operations, but statistics show these proclamations have been largely ineffective and halfhearted at best.”
At press time, IPCC officials confirmed that, since their report was released this morning, 153,007 more individuals had been added to the list of top contributors to global warming.
https://www.theonion.com/articles/new-report-finds-climate-change-caused-by-7-billio,34658/?ref=auto

[B’ Spokes: It would be nice if we could start something like this here,]
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by ALEX SCHMIDT, NPR
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Enter L.A. Bike Trains — an organization that arranges commutes by bike in groups. Each Bike Train route has an experienced conductor who serves as a guide. Insua especially likes that these volunteer conductors offer new riders door-to-door service from their homes to the train.
"He came and picked me up from my house," Insua says. "[He] went out of his way to get me to bike for two or three weeks. Then I was conditioned. Then I was brainwashed."
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https://www.npr.org/2013/12/01/248063342/shifting-gears-commuting-aboard-the-l-a-bike-trains

BY RESONANCE
Cycling is much more than an amenity or a status symbol or a reason to buy, although it can be all those things. It’s wellness on two wheels. And wellness is, as the New York Post recently reported, the new cronut of travel and recreation. Compared to that, golf is child’s play.
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For us, the message was clear: increasingly, the future of recreational development – and, in the bigger picture, tourism – will be happening on two wheels, not in a golf cart.
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So while cycling fitness is edging out golf’s technical finesse as a status symbol amongst the leisure elite, cycling is also gaining ground as a lifestyle. The news is full of stories about bike lanes, bike sharing and Bike to Work. According to the League of American Bicyclists, commuting by bicycle increased nearly 50% between 2000 and 2011 – the time frame in which the oldest Millennials entered the work force. In the past five years, the number of golfers in the U.S. has dropped by 13%, according to the National Golf Foundation and there are a million fewer private golf club members today than there were in the early 1990s.
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https://www.resonanceco.com/blog/is-cycling-the-new-golf/

Via Light, Sharpness, and Song

Amsterdam children fighting cars in 1972, Via BICYCLE DUTCH

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Image from the documentary from 1972. The streets are dominated by cars and there is not a tree in sight.

The same street as seen in Google Streetview is very different. The carriage way was narrowed. The homes renovated and the trees and bicycles make the area a lot friendlier.

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Excerpt from a 1972 TV-documentary about the traffic situation for the children in an old Amsterdam neighbourhood.

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https://bicycledutch.wordpress.com/2013/12/12/amsterdam-children-fighting-cars-in-1972/