Report on the State of Bicycling in Washington D.C.

The Well-Loved Crescent Trail in Washington D.C.

I recently visited my parents in Washington D.C. and as is my wont I paid particular attention to bicycling-type activity that I saw. As we rode through Adams Morgan on the bus, for example, I was pleased to see freshly painted bike lanes, but my adulation turned to horror when I saw that the lanes abruptly disappeared and reappeared as we rode alongside. And sure enough the bicyclists I saw cast their votes by their behavior: I saw lots of bicyclists driving on the sidewalk rather than risk driving on such deceitful bike lanes. (By the way I am purposefully using the word “driving” instead of “riding” for what a bicyclist does. Now that more and more bicycles have passengers, I reserve the word “rider” for what the bicycle passenger does.)

But for the most part I was pleased by what I saw in D.C. I saw an active bike community. I saw groups of tourists touring the city by bicycle. I saw lots of bikes and scooters parked around the buildings downtown. And for me the crowning jewel of our nation’s capital is not the Capital building, but the Crescent Trail. This wide tree-shaded bike trail circles more than 10-miles around the western side of the city. It is well-used by bicyclists, runners, and strolling families. It is built from an old railroad bed that passes over and under most cross streets. It is I think what all cities should aspire to create, ultimately for all short-distance non-commercial transportation. Imagine if all the beltways in our country were replaced with tree-lined boulevards on which ultralight vehicles (bicycles and cars weighing less than 100 pounds) rolled along at 15 mph amongst runners going 6 mph and pedestrians strolling at 3 mph. You might say “yes Larry it sounds very idyllic but it’s not practical; people wouldn’t be able to get to work on time on a bicycle.” I would reply that Washington D.C. is only 10 miles wide; at 15 mph a bicyclist could get from any one point to another in less than an hour. That’s certainly not the case now for people traveling by car. The Crescent Trail is the best example I’ve seen of How Wonderful Transportation Could Be If Only We Decided That’s How We Want It to Be. It doesn’t require any new technology. It doesn’t require drastic sacrifices. It just requires using what we already have in a new better way.

The Most Heroic Hero of the Decade, Maybe the Century

If you are Quaker (as I am) the biggest thing to shake up Meetinghouses and make young friends’ hearts throb all over the country is Jon Watts. I first heard about him when his video “Friend Speaks My Mind” made the rounds around Ithaca Monthly Meeting. Besides being very funny, with lots of Quaker in-jokes, this video had a further resonance for me. It single-handedly brought into the open an issue that has been festering unspoken: are all Quakers Christian? I’ve longed to affirm in some way that I am a Quaker but not a Christian for a long time. But I was always afraid that others in the Meeting might be offended. Jon finally puts into words what so many of us have been feeling:

I’m not a Christian but I’m a Quaker
I’ve got Christ’s inner light but he’s not my savior

So that’s number one why Jon’s my hero. Number two I discovered reading the Xtracycle forum Roots Radicals. Someone mentioned a young man riding an Xtracyle Radish from Richmond to Boston on a music tour. Sure enough: Jon Watts! Furthermore, he’ll be going through this area. You can read about his tour on his blog. I am looking forward to seeing him at the Farmington-Scipio Spring Gathering. Why is he biking? He writes:

Why not just drive a car like any other rational American would?

It would be easy for me to spout off a guilt-based justification about how quickly our society is killing the Earth, and how each of us is individually contributing a great deal to that destruction by owning and over-using personal vehicles. And it would be true. I do feel guilty and hypocritical about simultaneously mourning the destruction of the natural world and contributing to it.

But the deeper reason why I am riding my bike the 600 miles to Boston: I find driving, for all of it’s convenience, to be spiritually deadening. So let’s turn the question on it’s head… why, when I could be actively using my body, engaging with the land and the environment around me, viscerally feeling the miles go by underneath me, and genuinely living would I isolate myself in a sound-proof, wind-proof, experience-proof chamber?

Why in the world would anyone do that?