19 December 2011

A (Very) Occasional Series

Obscure Reasons for Cycling: Number 1

Photo Courtesy of BenettonTalk
I realised today that it has been many days since I was inspired to write anything here. However, this is mainly because most of the things I would like to write about the cycling, infrastructure and the gentle art of persuading the masses that they've got it all wrong is already being written, at this very moment, by much cleverer and erudite folk than me.

Nevertheless, I also thought that the more obscure benefits of cycling to work could probably do with an airing, just in case it gets forgotten that it is the simple things in life that matter. After all, who really cares about how many kilogrammes of CO2 they omit into the atmosphere at any given moment? Or how their long term lifestyle choices will shave 20 minutes off their life expectancy?

No, what we want is the here and now. And I noticed right here and right now that cycling to work has made a dramatic difference in the number of shoes I wear out per-annum, since I stopped walking to work.

I expect a drastic shift from pedestrian activity to the cycling world as soon as news of this dramatic finding gets out. In austerity Britain, watching the pennies is where it's at.