Hosted by David Bernstein & Carlton Reid since 2006 Posts

27th June 2023

The Spokesmen Cycling Podcast

EPISODE 332: Emily Kerr

SPONSOR: Tern Bicycles

HOST: Carlton Reid

GUEST: Cllr Emily Kerr

TOPICS: Oxford Green councillor Emily Kerr talks about 15-minute city conspiracy theories, LTNs and cycling to your wedding. Recorded at the Move mobility conference at ExCel, London.

TRANSCRIPT:

Carlton Reid 0:13
Welcome to Episode 332 of the Spokesmen cycling podcast. This show was engineered on Tuesday 27th of June 2023.

David Bernstein 0:28
The Spokesmen cycling roundtable podcast is brought to you by Tern bicycles. The good people at Tern are committed to building bikes that are useful enough to ride every day and dependable enough to carry the people you love. In other words, they make the kind of bikes that they want to ride. Tern has e bikes for every type of rider. Whether you’re commuting, taking your kids to school or even carrying another adult, visit www.ternbicycles.com. That’s t e r n bicycles.com. To learn more.

Carlton Reid 1:04
I’m Carlton Reid and today’s show is a bonus episode recorded when I was at the move mobility conference at London’s ExCel last week. It was there that I bumped into Oxford green Councillor Emily Kerr. We had earlier bonded on Twitter, over our use of the Telraam citizen traffic counter. And we met on the Telraam stand at Move. We talked about Oxford’s 15 minute city conspiracy theories, low traffic neighbourhoods, of course, and cycling to Emily’s recent wedding.

Emily Kerr 1:43
Yeah, so there’s a decision happening right now about the Cowley low traffic neighbourhoods in Oxford. So we’ve sort of had two sets of low traffic neighbourhoods, one is in Cowley one is in East Oxford, my ward’s in East Oxford, but obviously anything that happens to Cowley has implications for for my ward. So the decision being made right now is whether the existing on lockable fixed bollards should be replaced with ANPR cameras or not. And if they are, who should be allowed through that ANPR. So there was a consultation that proposed that it should just be emergency services. And in fact, you’ve been lorries, you know, other kinds of those kinds of services. But a recommendation that came out is that taxis should also be exempt. So I think there’s a discussion happening as to whether, you know, whether that will, we know that any additional car on the road creates additional road danger, right? And I think there are some situations, for example, that ambulances were the trade off is that, you know, you have quicker ambulance services. And so maybe that’s worth the additional road danger. Whereas the if you start adding more and more and more, it depends how many cars are coming through and how fast they’re going, how much more dangerous those roads will be. Yeah, I think the taxi firms are professional drivers, you know, I’m optimistic that they will stick to the speed limits. But if we suddenly started having a hugely increased flow of cars, it does increase road danger. Those routes are key for kids getting to school. And suddenly you see a situation where people won’t feel safe for their children to walk and cycle or people will only, you know, will revert to driving. And I think that’ll be a real shame when that decision is.

Carlton Reid 3:20
You can imagine it’s a no brainer for emergency vehicles. But the decision is also for taxes. So what is the actual decision?

Emily Kerr 3:28
The decision is whether the ANPR replacement should be should happen at all firstly, right? Because in fact, we’ve seen in Cowley that the ambulances are not very delayed by the existing LTNs structure, they can unlock the bollards and the rerouting system. So in fact, there doesn’t seem to be from the data, much delay to emergency services. So then there’s a question about whether you should replace the bollards at all. And then secondly, the second part of the decision is whether that should just be for emergency vehicles or whether it should also exempt taxis as part of the public transport infrastructure in Oxford.

Carlton Reid 4:00
Here at the show yesterday, Mete from from Hackney. Yes, we’re saying the reason they brought in their LTNs Yes, clean air and stuff, but it’s very much to remove through traffic. And he was saying the according to their stats 40% of motorists going through on the main roads of Hackney, we’re never ever going to stop. They’re using it as a through route only.

But if you have ANPR to let residents, you’ve still got 60% In that case, even in Hackney, which are very low car ownership, you’ve still got 60% of the people in that case, potentially using cars. So ANPR is no solution if you’re going to allow residents in for instance, because that you still got an enormous amount but so you haven’t got that decision and not gonna be residents.

Emily Kerr 4:54
As you’ll be familiar with, like a lot of people are asking for a lot of different things. There’s a lot of different suggestions and and some people have mooted the idea that residents should also be exempted. And I think that’s extremely dangerous. That ends up in a situation like South Fulham, where it’s used as a as a mechanism to control congestion. But actually, it doesn’t promote active travel, because there’s simply too many cars going too fast, people are not switching to cycling, and walking, and they’re kind of scared to walk in cycling, we’ve got a survey in Oxford from Oxford share from a couple of months, a couple years ago, which shows that sort of 70 to 80% of the reason people don’t cycle more is fear of traffic, like and that’s consistent when you look at so. So if you have more traffic, you necessarily have less cycling. And again, at low levels of traffic, we know that every percentage increase in traffic provides a corresponding increase in road danger. So if we’re going to let five times as many vehicles through, for example, you’re making it five times more dangerous. So I suppose I’m, I’m also very keen, you know, you and I’ve talked about tower encounters, right, which are brilliant, because they can measure what’s happening. So regardless of what happens in this decision, I’d really like to see better measurements. So we can see, you know, I’m concerned if taxis are allowed through that we might see some speeding and a lot of increased rate data. But you know, we might also not taxis or professional drivers, maybe everyone will stick to the speed, maybe we’ll find that, you know, and they only use it when they really need to, to to drop off and they take the long way around. And you know, also in Oxford, we are having traffic filters, you know, in the next 18 months. So there’s sort of opportunities to tweak the scheme. You might concerns might be baseless, we may not have any problem. And I think that’s why measuring it is so important.

Carlton Reid 6:31
Yes. And I told Telraam guys, I’m talking about land because I believe that tech is ground changing for people like me and you and any person on the ground trying to get these kind of like counters. Now on the stage this morning. I was talking about 15 minute cities. Yes. And I kept it very positive. I just mentioned about the conspiracy theories. I said, and neither of me and Henri who was from Dott, we neither of us are paid by the W E F. Oh, geez. Oh, okay. So you are pay. Okay, we have my scoop of today. Emily is drinking from a World Economic Forum water bottle.

Emily Kerr 7:11
Yes it was quite amusing present from someone. Yeah, I like this. Yeah. Brilliant.

Carlton Reid 7:14
Yes. Yeah. It’s just to throw it in there. So you’re not a shill. I’m not a shill Henri wasn’t a shill as well. But there is an enormous amount of conspiracy theories. Yeah. So my question really is, how on earth are you getting through this? Because you must be getting bombarded with I’d like to say fringe. It’s almost no longer fringe. It’s almost a sizeable proportion of people. I know that you are absolutely the locus for this in Oxford. Yeah. How on me? How are you coping with the abuse you must be getting?

Emily Kerr 7:56
So I think that, weirdly, it’s not been as bad as it sounds in Oxford, because what’s happened is, it’s been such a big deal, that people have gone away and informed themselves. And so I think it’s actually within Oxford, it remains friends. You know, we had a massive protest, almost all of those people came from outside Oxford. And so that started to make people in Oxford that went and fought, you know, really question what was going on and be like, and in fact, you know, I had a couple of, uh, several people come up to me and say, I don’t agree with the LTNs. But I don’t agree with people coming in to Oxford. And I like Co Op, this debate even more, and actually, now I’ve been reading about them. And you know, maybe there are some advantages to the LTNs. I’m still not sure about them. But like, you know, and so I think it’s not been as bad as it probably looks externally. In Oxford.

Carlton Reid 8:45
But you’re still getting threats?

Emily Kerr 8:46
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. But

I think, you know, I’m a woman on the internet, like, it’s, it shouldn’t be like this, but it is. And I think what you really realise is it comes from a very small group of people. So I was interested in that the Harry and Megan story, right, I think there was some stat that showed that sort of 80% of the abuse came from like, 50 accounts, or something like that. I’m sure he was one of them. But you know, I think it’s the same thing, actually. Right, particularly on Twitter. I blocked people that are personally insulting to me, that’s really the main reason I blocked people. Otherwise, if they make ad hominem remarks, I just block them, I actually now get very little abuse, because it’s a very low number of people that are aggressively attacking pretty much everybody that does anything in active travel. And I think, you know, I’m kind of optimistic about the population and people’s level of education when they decide to understand something and actually, I think you’re not so good. We’ve seen a lot of people decide to understand and get interested in traffic. And you know, you and I talked about this with Telraam, it’s like citizen led reporting, like how can we I think getting people more involved can only be a positive except for the fringe of people who probably are trying to co op the debate for their own purposes. But so yeah, it’s, it’s okay. It’s

Carlton Reid 9:55
very positive and good to hear, especially from an Oxford point of view because I assume You must mean you must be at the centre of the maelstrom there. But as you’re saying it’s people who are outside mainly Yeah. Who are doing this. And if you look at all the people who were the main ones, yeah, these are coming travelling. Yeah,

Emily Kerr 10:11
Exactly. And also, I really did enjoy, and the council’s recently pedestrianised Broad Street, which is the main area in the centre of Oxford, which is obviously where the anti 15 minute city kind of parade gathered in this beautiful place. And it had been pedestrianised just a few months previously, and they would have had no chance of getting in there earlier, because obviously, it was filled with cars, and now it’s no longer carpark. It provides a sort of gathering for people that want to protest. And you know, I’m from the Green Party, I support people’s right to protest peacefully. And even though I don’t agree with it, like, you know, they should be allowed to come and protest

Carlton Reid 10:41
In your pedestrianised area, but beautiful pedestrianised. Yeah, I think I made the point at the time, if you count the number of people who are walking down Broad Street, if you had them in cars, and they were protesting, you’d have basically gridlock for city for hours, hours and hours. Whereas you get one group of you know, okay, there was a hundreds and hundreds of protesters there. But they then walk through and there’s no, no exact nothing is basically happening to the city whatsoever, because they’re just walking through. Yeah. And that was almost an advert for why you should be having 15 minutes cities, it was like, why are they not seeing this?

Emily Kerr 11:17
Exactly? Yeah, you know, we, I had a, particularly when the move was first announced, and it when it first became a kind of, you know, a global conspiracy theory, I had people coming up to me at the school gates and being like, is it true? We’re not going to be allowed to leave our houses bike? You know, I thought, Well, no, it’s not to actually what’s happening is you’re going to have to drive to a bit like, you know, we have had on Oxford in Oxford for more than 20 years, you’re not allowed to drive through the high street in a car between 7am and 7pm. And everyone’s like, Oh, is that it? And I’m like, Well, yeah, I mean, you know, you’re not gonna be able to drive through the city centre. The reason for that is we need to speed up the buses, we need to improve access to people in bands, yeah, et cetera, et cetera. We need to lose private cars from the city make it safer for people to switch. And people are right. Is that it? And so, you know, I think that, as I say, it was obviously very alarming for people when it was first announced because they hadn’t understood it. But I suppose in general, I think people down do now understand that and support the idea. Oh, that’s really good.

Carlton Reid 12:12
Really nice to hear.

Emily Kerr 12:13
Let me caveat this with obviously, people that

Carlton Reid 12:17
Where I’m from Jesmond, also, it’s actually a very posh area. Yeah. It’s a high level of education. Basically, it’s university lecturers, it students, this should not be this level of misunderstanding on this, and I don’t think there is a misunderstanding as they just want to continue driving. Yeah. And it does tend to be I get told off for this if I bring the age thing in. But there ain’t that many young people. The students are not protesting. Yeah, actually, it’s the, again, I’m getting told off of this. But it’s inescapable. It’s the boomers. Yeah. And you see the comments on the petitions. It’s my eight year old mum kinda is like, sorry, it’s basically an age thing of people who have grown up with a motorised society cannot imagine not using cars and also on the petition, you find that people are, they’re not saying they’re trip chaining, they’re not saying, you know, I probably get 20 miles away. And it’s, you know, the last mile has been, they’re saying, I want to drive 500 metres I want to go from, they give their location, I want to go from here. And I can’t any no longer get to these posh shops 500 metres away. And they can. But it’s the older people are just they are so married to their cars. And it’s like, Why are you driving in Jesmond? Even if you’re older? Why are you driving in Jesmond? Are you finding the same isn’t the same demographic.

Emily Kerr 13:36
So there was something that I did find particularly funny, which was a person that was very outraged that they were going to have to take a long but right way round to drive to Merton colleges, real tennis court. I was like, I mean, you know, like real tennis is an Etonian sport that only a very few people play, you know, fundamentally in my ward, 50% of people don’t own cars. And I don’t see why someone that should be able to drive a quicker route to Merton to play real tennis, you know, and do it through doing so impose road danger, bad air quality, you know, on my residence, like, so. So, I think that’s true. I also think, though, that probably what we see in Oxford, where we already have a high cycling share, is that there are quite a lot of people who are much older, you know, in their 80s and 90s, who don’t drive any longer because they don’t feel safe to drive, but they cycle and tricycle. It’s amazing, you know. So in fact, that there are, of course, people whose parents in their 80s will suffer through not being able to, you know, get somewhere as quickly or they’ll have to take them but in front, there’s actually a lot of people that it’s given freedom and the ability to get around on like low car routes. And actually, you know, it’s amazing. My mother is one of them. My mother won’t drive she’s in her late 80s. And when she comes to visit us, she can cycle around, obviously, she can go anywhere. I did an interview with a 94 year old cyclist you haven’t driven for years, but he has the freedom to get around Oxford, you know, on a bike and we see this In the Netherlands, you know, when you look at someone that’s got truly high share of cycling for older people, that people talk about the freedom of it, you know, and in fact, I talked to some refugees, we have this amazing charity in Oxford that does refurbish cycles for refugees. Now, those people cannot afford four grand a year to run a car, because that’s what cost you know, and so they’ve got a cycle and this, you’re talking about cycling, giving them freedom. So they’ve been given this cycle, that’s like 100 quid, reconditioned lights, you know, helmet, lock, all of that kind of stuff. And suddenly, it’s like, oh, I can visit my friends in Oxford, I can visit other people from my community, I can get to church. So I think the narrative of cars is freedom applies to a specific demographic. And actually, for a lot of people, that’s not true. If you’re poor. If you are, you know, unable to afford the space or, or the money to own a car, like actually safe cycling provides freedom. And I find it really kind of motivating and interesting.

Carlton Reid 15:53
And I agree with you, because I’ve interviewed people. Yeah, it’s actually in my local sourdough shop. First worle problems, yeah. But as you cycle then it’s like, it’s actually 15 minutes to get there, literally 15 minutes for me to cycle there. Which is handy. But I was, I was I was talking to her in the queue. And she’s telling me that exam kind of, um, well known, yeah, my area. Yeah, you know, I’m stalked by the opposition, who take post photographs of me on bikes. And so it’s quite, quite creepy. She knew I was, cuz she hangs out on one of these groups. And she was talking to me and she’s saying, Well, I would have normally driven to Jesmond in mind, she’s got a little, you know, little car, which is now because she lives in a like a, like, yours is, you know, one, one district removed. She’s, you know, one step removed from Jesmond. And she says, but now that they’ve got the, the LTN, I’m now cycling that and she is in that demographic, she’s very much in that Boomer demographic. So it’s freed up for her. And that, you know, counteracts the people who say, but it’s made it more difficult for me, and it’s given me there’s not freedom. So there’s probably a huge number of people. Yes, who are saying it’s damaging for me, but then we’re not hearing from the people who’s like, actually, no, I’m not cycling there. So do you think there’s, there’s a knock has to make giving it a silent majority? Or is it just 50/50? What do you think?

Emily Kerr 17:19
So, you know, I’d say I actually do hear from a lot of those kinds of people. Because as a local councillor, a lot of people come up to me and talk to me. So I remember this sort of a sad day, someone came up to me and a lady again, a boomer lady came up to me and was like, Emily, I had to cycle to my a lot. But today, I suppose that makes you happy. And I was like, actually, I think we both lost. And like, I’ve seen her since. And yeah, she switched exactly the same, you know, it’s because they’re a lot much used to drive. And, you know, I really see it at the school gates, because I’ve got young kids. And so now, you know, the shift in my school is astonishing. And we now have 13% of people who drive their children, the national average is 65%. It’s remarkable. And that is driven by the LTNs. What was it before, unfortunately, we do not have the pre and post data. So there’s another school, very nearby larkrise. And we do have the pre and post data there, and it was 35% driven. And now it’s 15% chance, there’s been like a massive shift due to LTNs. Due to other measures. In terms of that people now cycle their kits, they feel safer. But also, it’s easier than humans take the easiest option, right. And so if the easiest option is cycling, people cycle, you know, and we need to make public transport, and cycling and all of these other ways of getting around easy and private cars, because there’s not enough space for private cars. And you know, again, the emissions like in the UK, we have 80% household car ownership worldwide, it’s 15%. Do we really want to add in an extra 5 billion cars to the planet? And whatever the number is? That’s it? Yeah. And, and the associated emissions manufacturing mining is such that we really don’t, you know, we need people to use cars when they need cars, and otherwise have other other ways of getting about.

Carlton Reid 18:59
And what are you doing here at this mobility conference?

Emily Kerr 19:02
I’m here to look at some of the kinds of new and innovative stuff that’s happening. So I was very interested in talking to the Dutch delegation. So as you’ve seen, they’ve got like a whole group of Micromobility and other company, other companies and organisations there, I’m interested in seeing some of the kind of car sharing stuff that’s happening, you know, and the switch to electric. So all of those there and also, I’m here to listen to some of those really great speakers. I’m interested in innovation, how we can learn from other countries because they think UK is lagging to a degree and how we can really shift about improving public health, improving road safety and you know, helping people to get around by bike because I love cycling. It’s great. So you know, that’s probably what I’m here for.

Carlton Reid 19:45
Now. Tell people where they can get more information on on your job, your work in Oxford, and then your Twitter feed so you can use those two websites.

Emily Kerr 19:59
Perfect. And so yeah, so I think in Oxford, we’ve got the Oxfordshire county council, who are the highways authority, and I actually work for the City Council and not the county council. So but you know, I think we work together fairly kind of collaboratively. So I think probably the Oxford county council website, it’s got a lot of press releases and a lot of information about some of the brilliant stuff they’re doing. Obviously, they’ve got a Twitter feed, I’ve got a Facebook etc, etc. I have a Twitter account. So I’m @EmilyKerr36 on Twitter. And I try and share not just what we’re doing but also what sort of everyone’s doing I’m interested in Lambeth we were just talking about Lambeth you know, Lambeth started brilliant curbside strategy. There’s loads of cool stuff. Obviously, Jesmond, you now I’m seeing what you’re you guys doing up there. Wales is doing Brilliant stuff. I think there’s a lot of local authorities, national authorities that are really looking at this in the right kind of way, and we need to be trying to learn from each other.

Carlton Reid 20:50
Thank you. And finally, has there been a decision?

Emily Kerr 20:54
What a great question. Let’s check live.

whether there has been a decision on this the Oxford to be still you haven’t you? haven’t? You haven’t? Yeah, it’s

there’s a lot of people speaking on this that often is

Carlton Reid 21:07
No decision when we were recording, but a few minutes later, Oxford Clarion local democracy Twitter account revealed that councillors voted through the decision to allow some motor vehicles to access the LTN via number plate recognition cameras. Taxi drivers, would now be allowed through for instance, making the LTN roads into well, taxi superhighways. That’ll be an interesting development to keep an eye on. But meanwhile, let’s get over to David for a quick commercial break.

David Bernstein 21:39
Hello, everyone. This is David from the Fredcast. And of course, the Spokesmen. And I’m here once again to tell you that this podcast is brought to you by Tern bicycles, the good people at Tern build bikes that make it easier for you to replace car trips with bike trips. Part of that is being committed to designing useful bikes that are also fun to ride. But an even greater priority for Tern, is to make sure that your ride is safe, and worryfree. And that’s why Tern works with industry leading third party testing labs like E FB, E, and builds it bikes around Bosch ebike systems, which are UL certified for both electric and fire safety. So before you even zip off on your Tern, fully loaded, and perhaps with a loved one behind, you can be sure that the bike has been tested to handle the extra stresses on the frame, and the rigours of the road. For more information, visit www.ternbicycles.com. To learn more. And now, back to the spokesmen.

Carlton Reid 22:49
Thanks, David. And we’re still with Emily Kerr, because she wanted to tell us about cycling to her recent wedding.

Emily Kerr 22:57
I didn’t want to talk about my writing not just for the sake of talking about wedding, but because I’ve been thinking about relation. Thanks so much. I’ve been thinking a lot about location based events and how we need to try and drive that shift. And you know, I got married in Oxford. And so most people came by train, some people came by bus, my husband and the kids got to the church by bus, and so did most of the wedding party, I arrived on a cargo bike which was taken by our local cargo delivery firm.

Carlton Reid 23:25
You weren’t pedalling you were being

Emily Kerr 23:27
unusually I do pedal, but I wasn’t. And my photographer arrived on a bike, you know, we had and, and some people arrive by car. So you know, we had some people with limited mobility. I had a couple of friends arriving with young kids. You know, I don’t think we should ban cars at all, you know, some people need cars. And that’s really not a problem. And even if, you know, there were some people that didn’t feel like it on the day. But I suppose the point is that we it’s a situation where most people shift to public transport, cycling most people came by by, you know, is is a good system for everybody because it means that people that need to come by car have space on the roads to do so.

Carlton Reid 24:02
Thanks to Emily Kerr there. And thanks to you for listening to Episode 332 of the Spokesmen podcast brought to you in association with Tern Bicycles. Show notes, and more can be found at the-spokesmen.com. The next episode will be out in early July and will be a whole bunch more interviews recorded at the Move conference. But meanwhile, get out there and ride

13th June 2023

The Spokesmen Cycling Podcast

EPISODE 330: Andy Boenau

SPONSOR: Tern Bicycles

HOST: Carlton Reid

GUEST: Andy Boenau — White Collar Epidemic

TOPICS: Andy discusses his urban planning background and his proposed new documentary, White Collar Epidemic.

MACHINE TRANSCRIPT: 

Carlton Reid 0:13
Welcome to episode 330 of the Spokesmen cycling podcast. This show was engineered on Tuesday 13th of June 2023.

David Bernstein 0:28
The Spokesmen cycling roundtable podcast is brought to you by Tern bicycles. The good people at Tern are committed to building bikes that are useful enough to ride every day, and dependable enough to carry the people you love. In other words, they make the kind of bikes that they want to ride. Tern has e-bikes for every type of rider, whether you’re commuting, taking your kids to school, or even carrying another adult, visit www.ternbicycles.com. That’s t e r n bicycles.com to learn more.

Carlton Reid 1:04
I’m Carlton Reid. And on today’s show, I’m talking urban planning and more with Andy Boenau speaking to me from his home in Virginia, USA. Andy is an award winning filmmaker, and we talk about his background in transportation, and his proposed new documentary, White Collar Epidemic. And if you were last on the show in 2019, do I have to update the profile picture that we use the last time? And I’m gonna say not because I saw you on video a second ago, you look the same. So well.

Andy Boenau 1:40
Well, I was gonna show when you make when you make deals with the devil, when you’re doing urban planning work? Yeah, you get to keep your look.

Carlton Reid 1:48
Yeah, this is why my good looks are still the same. Yeah, no, I completely agree that were the bad ones. We do deals with devils. And we continue to look wonderful. And if we’re going to be talking about a project of yours in a moment, but first of all, I’d like to come on to because people I’m sure will remember vividly that 2019 show we did with In fact, it was about bike share. So that can kind of like give people a clue because you had a bike share book out at that time, didn’t you? That’s what we’re talking about the last time bike. Yes. So how did that pan out? Are you still interested in Bike Share? What where’s your where’s your interests bubbling up right now?

Andy Boenau 2:34
My, the short answer is yes. I’m looking at an oversized poster on an old canvasses an old advertisement from some French magazine propaganda with a cartoonish woman on a bicycle. I still adore not only bicycles, but bicycling propaganda. My

Carlton Reid 2:57
Propaganda? Marketing?

Andy Boenau 3:01
I’m taking back the word I’m taking it back propaganda. Yes, because it’s messaging, like I want to find, I want to find people’s emotions, I want to hook people. Because we’re silly creatures, we like to think that we’re logical. And we’re in so many ways, we’re just not. And so whatever the thing is, whether it’s buying diapers for your newborn baby, or trying to figure out which bicycle is right for you, if you need to be able to connect with people, and so at its core, that’s what, that’s what I do. It’s that kind of messaging. And so my entire career 25 years has been in mobility or urban planning of some kind. And so I developed organically a strong bias for transportation systems where you can walk or ride a bicycle as ways to get around not only because it’s good for the air, good for the environment, those are happy accidents. And for me, anyway, I, I just I want to be able to get around and I want other people to be able to get around without having to be stuck with only one option being a personal vehicle. And so yeah, years ago, when you and I talked, I was working specifically with the bike share company, I was helping them grow out of just doing Bike Share operations at universities and become more of a shared mobility offering where fleets of electric vehicles will be connected, so scooters, bicycles, trikes, low speed, electric vehicles, that sort of thing. But my kind of Northstar and this is both for professional work that I get paid for but just also some fun things like street photography has to do with happy, healthy communities. I am a people watcher. I like to see happy people. I want people to be able to live in an environment wherever they are, whether it’s a city or a suburb, That doesn’t matter, but to be able to be healthy. And what really infuriates me is infrastructure that blocks most of us from choosing healthy habits like walking around here and there riding a bicycle here and there. But we

Carlton Reid 5:18
wouldn’t be right in thinking that you started your career in designing that exact kind of infrastructure. Now, have you kind of rebelled?

Andy Boenau 5:27
That’s a great question I because some would, if they if you just read my career arc on a piece of paper, you would say, Oh, he’s he’s a reformed traffic engineer, because I began my career as just doing traffic analysis. And in a sense, yes, I was, I was the bad guy. But, but I didn’t I don’t think I don’t think it’s that simplistic that traffic engineering, but the people in it are our ministers trying to destroy things around them. What I the reason why my career has taken the path that it that it has is, and what I think why it was different in certain groups that I worked alongside. I didn’t know when I started my career, what I wanted to do when I grew up, and I still don’t really know, I just know that I know, things that I enjoy doing. I know a handful of things that I’m decent at. And when I stack those up, it ends up being unique in this infrastructure, sort of business planning and design. And so as I was going through analysing traffic, for consulting firms, you know, doing these projects for city governments and counties and state DoD departments of transport, I just asked a lot of dumb questions like, Why do we do this? Why do we analyse that? Which options do I use as the default settings? And not not coming from some place of no it on this? I didn’t know. I didn’t know anything. And so all my questions, were always coming from a place of I want to be able to do my work, and pay the bills and not have like, not have to keep going back to my boss. And along the way, these questions kept being answered with forms of, well, this is the way we do it, just because that’s how it’s always been done. And that doesn’t stick well with me. And so I’ve I do like transportation and urban planning. And I’d like, like I said, I’m a people watcher. And so it’s interests me how people move through space. And so the questions that I asked, were never about, I’m going to append an industry or, you know, I’m just going to stick it to the man, I just thought, wow, these these basic assumptions about how we calculate and then put judgement values on how much time it takes people to get around. It’s not really, with the human being at the centre, it really is with the machine at the centre. And it is even hearing myself say it, it sounds silly, it sounds absurd. But that is the heart and soul of modern traffic analysis. And it’s, it’s kind of silly tonight. And so when you disk when you put it, you know, back to why I use the word propaganda or messaging on purpose, when you put these things in just plain language for people to understand how it is that we analyse how people get around, it sounds so bonkers, that you can’t think it’s possibly true. So a human being sitting in a vehicle waiting for say 60 seconds for a red light to turn green, that’s considered unacceptable delay. But if a human being that same human being is standing at the corner of the intersection, and they have to wait 60 seconds to cross the street, that’s considered totally fine. In fact, if they if that person standing wants to complain while they should walk to the next block and wait maybe there’s a shorter wait over there, like go five minutes out of your way or 10 minutes out of your way. So it’s that sort of thing when you

Carlton Reid 8:59
it kind of just kind of started kind of talking to that because before you then segue off into a different subject I don’t think I want to zero in because I’m gonna use your background here in what you were doing and exactly what you said that about the what we would call in the UK a traffic light a stoplight for pedestrians so it’s a conscious decision by the municipality by the traffic engineers at the end of the day to a certain and a certain amount of time for as you said the machine and a certain amount of time for the human so they are presumably doing that a consciously be using figures using data so or is it just a bias in that no, the car should have more time the motorists should have more time more time than the pedestrians. How is that bigger now that that timing?

Andy Boenau 9:57
It’s so there’s a lot in there So, before I tell you about, like how it’s figured out, I think one of the reasons why because this is probably also something in some people’s mind. Well, why would this be? Why would people consciously go along with it? Because yes, there are, there still are in the year 2023 human beings operating the software programmes to analyse traffic. And I think so much of this goes back to the education system where we are trained to conform, not trained to be intellectually curious. And if you challenge how things are done, just the act of challenging it is seen as a you’re now part of an out group, even if your goal is I want to understand how it is we do this so that I, the engineer, or the planner can do my job better. You’re, you’re expected to conform not only at the individual kind of and team level, but then also at corporate levels and local agency level, the municipality level people in these businesses are expected just to just go with the flow. how it’s calculated, is it’s an, it’s another one of those silly things where you if you were to tell a child, a 10 year old, they would say no, that can’t possibly be if there’s these tables that you refer to, to determine whether or not the delay at the stoplight or a stop sign is air quotes, acceptable or not. And they have this genius way of getting us to agree with acceptable and unacceptable, and that is using letter grades just like you got in school. And so A, B, C, D, F, everybody wants an A, and then everybody’s like, Well, maybe if you get a B, okay, maybe not everyone can be an A student, but at least I gotta be. But if you’re getting C’s and F’s, on your stuff, come on, you’re like, No, your parents are gonna start asking questions, right. And so if I’m regularly turning in work, that’s getting D’s and F’s, somebody’s gonna go wait. And he’s got problems here, he needs to get with the programme. That’s how they label intersection analysis. And so if a car only has to wait, you know, 10 seconds, 15 seconds, that’s good level of service, a so good grade, good job. If if the person sitting at the light in a car has to wait a whole whopping minute, that is unacceptable, F. And now if you’ve got an F, what are we going to do about it? Well, what can we do to get this grade up to a, we probably need more space for cars, not just to drive along a corridor, but to stack up at the front of the intersection so that when the light goes green, boom, they can all head off. And so that means of course, more lanes to get people to get cars closer to the front line. So it’s kind of like if you picture the NASCAR. I’m not a NASCAR fan, but like a car race where you have. So I got speaking in an area that I don’t know a lot about, I can picture the starting line, or even the finish line. If you imagine all of these cards next to each other. That’s the kind of thinking behind standard traffic analysis that if if you get a bad grade on your report card, then you need to make more space up at the front, so that you don’t have a queue of people waiting. And what happens when you do that is anybody else on any so any anybody sitting on the car on the side street, they’re having the same issue as the main street, or the High Street, they’ve got to have as little delay as possible. So pretty soon, you’ve got two left, turn lanes, multiple lanes going through, you’ve got a separate slip lane. To the right, I’m gonna have to reverse all these for people in countries where they turn on the wrong side of the road. And then, of course, as you expand the streets, in the intersections, if you’re walking, or riding a bicycle to get around. Now, not only do you have to wait a while for it to be your turn to cross the street. But once you start crossing, like forget the safety implications for a second, just the time it takes you to walk across all of that pavement is wild. So these two things he’s kind of human being on foot or or on a saddle and human being inside of a machine are treated very, very differently.

Carlton Reid 14:33
But isn’t that you described moto normativity? You’ve described carb reign, as some people like to call it but isn’t that 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s maybe thinking and the modern traffic engineer who came after you and the ones today you’re not thinking differently and then no longer using such such crazy? A car brain tables to work things out?

Andy Boenau 15:00
Ah, I wish that it was. So I, I wish that there was reform. I mean, the thing is, they’re each I think, each generation and then subgroups within generations, there’s, there’s some hope put in them that, oh, this group of people, they’ve learned this thing, they’re now enlightened, they will do better. But then what happens is they get to the workplace. And they have a mentor who reminds them either explicitly or implicitly. We’re about conformity, like, go with the flow, this is how we do things. It’s just the way it is, I wish things were different. But this is just the way it is. So all of these decades later, it’s no different. I remember, near the start of my career, there were some I would hear things occasionally, there would be somebody interviewed on something like NPR in the US, you know, public radio, kind of a niche interview with somebody who would have these ideas about a mixture of traffic, calming and livable places, and how great this could be, if we were to reform the transportation industry. And as I got into my career, I started hearing things like, well, younger people these days, you know, the on a Gen X or so the millennials coming up behind me, Millennials don’t care so much about car ownership, they’re more interested in the environment. And so there were these news stories that would pop up, that would suggest, hey, things are going to change, because the next generation, this next group of people coming in, when they get to the office, they’re going to be different. And it’s, it’s just not happening, whether or not they want to, so maybe they care differently about social issues or environmental issues than the people before them. But that doesn’t matter if they’re not putting their ideas into action. What still happens at the office is the same as it ever was, it’s land use rules. And in the United States, we have most of these things are local, local municipal rules that dictate where you can build different types of buildings, different types of land uses. So if you live in a house, you go over here, oh, you want a small house, okay, that’s a different zone, you need to go live in this zone. If you want to have a shop or a market, those belong in this zone over here. And so then the planners have all these rules that lead to car oriented roads, to connect all of those zones. And then you’ve got the traffic analysis that comes behind it and says, Okay, we’ve analysed all the traffic going between these zones, there, back to the letter, the letter grades, we’re not getting good enough grades, we need to add more infrastructure for the cars. And it’s just this never ending thing. Because I think a major part of it is this, this issue of conformity, it’s just, you just are supposed to go with the flow and not stop and say, Wait a second, if we are here to serve the public interest to to deliver infrastructure that is helping people, this thing that we’re doing this process is not helping. So is there a different process that would get to the outcome which we want, which is vibrant places, Healthy Places, safer places.

Carlton Reid 18:14
I want to give you an anecdote, actually. And that this is very personal to me. And when you’re making your point, I was kind of thinking of it and that was there’s a bike lane put in in my home city of Newcastle upon Tyne and it’s a very wide bike lane it’s in many ways it’s it’s a very good bike lane. But what it’s done is made my journey through into into Newcastle City Centre longer if I follow that protected bike lane, and that’s because the stoplight which they put in the middle where before I was in with the traffic and effect when I’m not being vehicle a cyclist about this, but before, there wasn’t a huge amount of traffic on this road anyway, because it’ll be filtered elsewhere. And but I would go with the traffic lights, and I would go reasonably fast now to put this protected bike lane in but at a at a at a junction, there’s like an hour for way perhaps even more stoplight where every thread to go through. So now as a cyclist, you’ve got to wait there for enormous amount of time to cross and then when that goes green, you know you’ve got like just a few seconds, whereas the motorists get loads of time, you know, they get like five, six cars, you know, they get maybe four times the amount of time as the poor cyclists get. So I now no longer use that world class superlative very expensive bike path. I will often use the the road just because the engineers the traffic engineers through their timings of this, these lights have made my transit through that area much much right now. They could if they want the reverse car Rain, they could make it longer for the motorists, and it could be, you know, super fast for the cyclists spending all that money on this great bike lane. And they just my point of view they’ve blown it.

Andy Boenau 20:11
Yeah, I’ve seen that sort of thing in the US also. And one of one of the common bits is, you’ll see, you’ll see things described as bike infrastructure. That is nothing at all. It’s the word infrastructure is just silly to apply there. It’s a stripe of paint on a road, that’s essentially a highway where motorists are going 55 miles an hour, and just right next to the elbow of somebody riding a bike. So you’re never going to a normal person, even a well abled adult is not going to ride there, let alone your wobbly children or wobbly senior citizens. It’s frustrating, because yes, we then if you want to ride a bicycle as transport, you end up finding a different route, even if it is circuitous. And it adds 10 or 15 minutes because you’d rather Arrive alive. And it gets I think it gets to the heart of this issue of why are you what’s the outcome of your traffic analysis and your road design? Is it safety is our number one priority, which many departments of transport or public works? That’s their slogan? Is that really your your mission? Or is your mission to make driving as convenient as possible? And I argue in practice, it’s like, it doesn’t matter what your policy says, if in practice, you are making driving the most convenient thing and not only driving but driving often fast or recklessly that’s that’s the real kicker.

Carlton Reid 21:49
Now on your website if you don’t mind me saying so it almost doesn’t read as though it’s you know, your transportation expert website yet, of course, you you have that on there and you have all your, your credentials, etc. But it’s talking about storytelling. It is almost as though this is like, you know, an actor or writers website. So you right at the top, it says create, distribute and amplify stories. And then you know, the the text below is storytelling, storytelling, storytelling. So why do you think you have to tell stories? And what are the stories that you’re, you’re trying to tell?

Andy Boenau 22:31
That’s a fantastic question. I love that. I learned through so this is this is a shift, since you and I last spoke were my, throughout my career working in planning or, or engineering for transport systems or for for downtown areas, you know, mixing, bicycling, and walking and transit and all those sorts of things. My work was project to project. So it was a specific thing like this corridor, we were, we are doing something on this particular corridor. And the last few years I’ve been freelancing, or as I say, Now storyteller for hire, and all but related to the built environment. But why it’s so important. The very, I’ll tell you briefly why it’s important. And then I’ll tell you how I discovered this. It’s important because that’s how human brains are wired. We I mean, I’m not the first person to say this. Many people have said, humans are Wired for Story, like go back to the cave days. Any point in human history, if it’s just a campfire, if it’s peers getting together, if it’s old friends, if it’s new friends, whatever. Whenever people congregate to or more. We tell each other stories, even if it’s just an itty bitty story. Or if you’re me and you tell a long winded one. That’s how we communicate we we talk to each other. We convey information through anecdotes, we don’t just simply list facts. And that’s it, we’re done. We, and it’s especially true. If we’re trying to persuade someone, then then we absolutely have to integrate stories because that’s what makes somebody turn their head and go, Wait a second what I need to hear more about that, either because they’re delighted by something or they’re outraged by something, or they’re hopeful about something or whatever the emotion is, that kind of stuff comes out of storytelling. So I discovered this because I happened to enjoy advertising. I was fascinated by propaganda campaigns of World War Two from all of the countries that were involved because it’s interesting in the sense that simple things like posters with slogans and and illustrations, were moving people to action of some kind. And this is not only true for war time, but those just happened to get so much attention that it’s easy for people to pictures Don’t think in their mind like, oh yeah, I’ve seen those before. But the same is true or was true for, like, cigarette advertising. Things like four out of five doctors recommend Camel cigarettes. You know, things like that, like, whatever the product is, people who make stuff and need to sell stuff, they understand how to tell stories to get people’s buy, in that case buying behaviour to alter, or how you think about a particular issue or a social issue. So I was trying, as I was learning about that stuff, I was applying it to my technical work. So if I was helping to write a proposal for a traffic study, or in a downtown master plan, you know, long range plan about how you deal with the land use, I started incorporating that kind of storytelling that I was learning about, into the proposal into cover letters into how I did slide design, and it kept working. And I know it was working, because I would ask or go to meetings after we would when when these contracts, and ask questions, so that I could be better the next time. And I

Carlton Reid 26:11
ended up far better for me. Sorry for stopping a bit far be it for me to poopoo that idea. But does this not also say that anecdote beats data. So you can be a traffic engineer, for instance, let’s just say, who’s got this great set of data on for instance, a low traffic neighbourhood and how what we have in the UK, and how you restrict cars. With 21st century traffic engineering, thinking, you then reduce congestion and you improve air, you’ve got the data that says that, however, members that public with anecdote say no, it’s not like that my life has been made hell. So the storytelling, actually Trump’s actuality. So do you not see that storytelling is potentially have problems, you could be spinning lies here, Andy, by using your excellent storytelling techniques when you should be using hard data. So how do you square that circle?

Andy Boenau 27:20
It’s the you’re right, in the sense that any anything’s possible. I mean, the fact that humans are able to speak is wonderful and terrible at the same time. I mean, I’ve joked that I’m an extrovert. And we extroverts think that everything that comes out of our mouth is important. That’s not great. So on the one hand, yes, anything could come out. But I compare this, when I’m when I’m talking about stories, and, and data. I compare this to the voting booth. So if you were to if two different people who played politics, go into a voting booth, and they’re given a piece of paper that has the the same, the same piece of paper, a list of 10 indisputable facts, and they’re asked based on these 10 indisputable facts, which politician is going to serve us better. And these two people will pull different levers. And they’re both convinced that their person, their team is going to address these indisputable facts in the better way. So that’s one way that I connect that idea of data and stories. The other is it’s not I’m not suggesting that people just spin stories without any data. The trick is using data to tell stories. If you what’s really fun, though, I mean, I find I take sick pleasure in trolling people who don’t do this. But if somebody if you catch somebody, like a road designer, or a traffic engineer, or somebody from the planning department, who is making a claim, without data, they see you, you know, they don’t really know what they’re talking about, then it’s extra fun, because you can take what you know to be true. And make some excellent stories. And when I say story, I that is not equivalent to lies that is just simply a narrative. It’s some kind of there’s a beginning middle end, there’s a conflict, there’s a resolution you know, that’s what I mean, when I say story. You you are going to be the most effective when you take some facts and then do something with it. So for example, like one simple thing with with traffic safety in the US. I know and this is it’s it’s not exact every single year, but about 100 Americans are killed in traffic every single day. So that’s that is a stat statistic. I can use that in different ways and in different stories, or another one would be Our local governments, in their zoning rules that dictate where you can live where you can shop, where you do all the different things like they’re very when you look at those, those rules, they’re very rigid. And so if I look at that, I can take a fact. Like, you’re not you’re only allowed to have a certain type of home here. And I can say something true from that data, which is, this is interesting. You outlaw townhouses, or I don’t know, maybe you call it row homes, but narrow attached homes, like a lot, a lot of places in America, outlaw those, when you tell someone that it sounds so ridiculous, it can’t possibly be true. It is true. But if I don’t put it in a way that hooks them that catches them that makes them go, Wait a second, what? It’s illegal to have a townhouse? Well, yes, in a whole lot of areas, it is illegal to have a townhouse. So that’s, that’s the kind of way that I say, use data to tell stories.

Carlton Reid 31:04
Okay, yeah, so I wasn’t saying you can pay using stories. And I appreciate you kind of like, you know, you can use stories for for good, of course, you can, as you say, you know, humans have have use stories forever in a day to get across their point of view, and whether that’s a politician, or in fact, a storyteller. Now, after the break, we’re going to talk about white collar epidemic. But right now let’s go across to David for a brief intermission.

David Bernstein 31:34
Hello, everyone. This is David from the Fredcast. And of course, the spokesmen. And I’m here once again, to tell you that this podcast is brought to you by Tern bicycles, the good people at Tern build bikes that make it easier for you to replace car trips with bike trips. Part of that is being committed to designing useful bikes that are also fun to ride. But an even greater priority for Tern, is to make sure that your ride is safe, and worryfree. And that’s why Tern works with industry leading third party testing labs like E FB, E, and builds it bikes around Bosch ebike systems, which are UL certified for both electric and fire safety. So before you even zip off on your Tern, fully loaded, perhaps with a loved one behind, you can be sure that the bike has been tested to handle the extra stresses on the frame, and the rigours of the road. For more information, visit www.ternbicycles.com to learn more. And now, back to the spokesmen.

Carlton Reid 32:44
Thanks, David. And we’re back with Andy Boenau. And we are going to be talking about White Collar Epidemic which is Andy’s forthcoming project. But first of all, I want to go backwards, not not to what we were talking about before the break nd but the awards that you’ve won. So this this white colour epidemic is a proposed film. But first of all, tell me about your previous films, because I see on your on your website, your storytelling website, where it says you’ve 2013 2014 and 2015, you won awards for short films at the New Urbanism Film Festival. So what what were those three films,

Andy Boenau 33:24
those were walk, don’t walk, streets, floatation, and war on congestion. All three were short as I would call them, my documentaries, where I was making up true stories like we were just talking about. Having come out of the World of Traffic Analysis and transportation planning and traffic safety. I know how things are done. I like I know how projects go from start to finish. And so it frustrates me how they move. And so I took that and put it in short film version. So that first one walked don’t walk was essentially that’s what really got me excited about doing these kinds of projects because I realised there aren’t people, especially not that long ago, talking about these issues of how we move around in space, how we use public space in a way that normies would pick up on and understand we were so used to using jargon, like intersection level of service and functional classification. And even even with urban planning, well meaning people like walkability, this is a term I use, there are terms like that, that they get used so much that it becomes almost wallpaper that’s just in the room, and you you kind of forget about it. And so I wanted to take some of these ideas, where I know there’s a problem out there, and it’s gonna get worse unless we intervene. But wait, there is a way to intervene and things can get better in the end because I know I’m I am an intern No optimist, but I know I’m right things can get better in the end.

Carlton Reid 35:04
So we’ve established that you’re wondering how long they’re short films, by the way, how short? Well,

Andy Boenau 35:11
there are between, I think each of them is between 11 and 15 minutes. I think the longest one is 14. Okay.

Carlton Reid 35:18
So they’re not like, you know, Instagram short, they’re not like one minute, they are 1015 minute documentaries. Now, the one that you’ve got your crowdfunding for now, white collar epidemic tool, we’ll start talking about how long do you think that one’s going to be? Is it gonna be longer? Or is that going to be like another 15? minute one,

Andy Boenau 35:36
it’ll be a solid hour. And in fact, at first, I was thinking maybe 70 or 80 minutes, but then I’ve been, I’ve been getting some advice from other filmmakers more much more established filmmakers. And that’s where I settled on an hour is probably the sweet spot from those advisors. And it’s, in part because there’s just so much to pack in. I was, I was talking with a journalist yesterday about this, that there are so many smaller personal story arcs that I’m finding that this, I think long term really needs to be a series. It whether you know how that ends up coming to fruition, I’m not sure yet. But I know what I can control right now. And that is make a one hour long documentary. And so that’s where I find myself and it’s still, this one is different for me, because it’s bringing in an industry that I am not an expert, I don’t have expertise in I do on the infrastructure side, of course, but this is linking to things, infrastructure, and health. And the premise came out of just this. I mean, there were a few things happening a few years ago. And as I was jotting notes in my my personal idea book, I put something I wrote something down to the effect of a doctor prescribes walking, but the patient is unable to fill the prescription. And that note to myself was because I was I was reading articles and blogs that people were sending me about doctors in the United States who were doing just that they were writing prescriptions, but instead of pills, it was for Active Living, it was take a walk once a day, or ride a bicycle once a week. But if you’re in the States, most most of us whether it’s a city or a county, that doesn’t matter. Most people in America, if they get that prescription, and they walk outside of the doctor’s office, and they look at the street, or the the network around them, they go, how can I possibly fill this prescription? There’s no way. So a doctor is going to tell you riding a bike will help treat your anxiety and your depression. But good luck. Yeah, you can’t you can’t do what he’s saying. So doctors no and this, this is what the title might change. But tentatively, this is where it came from. That healthy activity is prohibited by design. So you’ve got on the one hand, this one group of white collar professionals, the medical community, where they’re saying, This is what’s good are these things are good for the human mind. And the human body, and, you know, has to do with movement and getting around interacting with other people being social, they know what’s good for us, then you have this other group of white collar professionals, highly educated. That’s the infrastructure community, they’re saying, nice, try not gonna get it. It gets back to what you’re describing before, even if they do something like put down a white stripe and say, That’s a bike lane. Now, nobody’s using it because it’s, it’s just awful. And so by design, infrastructure does not fit, healthy activity, healthy living or active living. So that’s, that’s kind of the rub. So I want this to be focused on that on highlighting that conflict to show people. There’s a lot that can be done to improve mental health and physical health. But there’s something blocking and it’s not just a something, it’s an entire profession of very smart, well educated people. And it’s, it’s I mean, it’s kind of it’s crushing. It’s so I know the physical types of physical impacts that I already knew about with infrastructure with things like doing traffic safety work for years, crash injuries, and so car on car crashes car on bike, car, and pedestrian, like I understand that very well in terms of physical health. What I’ve been learning a lot about and realising I just had no idea how bad things were. is things like the top 10 causes of death in America. Can all Trump adequately be reduced by active living. So it’s not like going to the gym necessarily and pumping iron and running on a treadmill and then going back home with that, that could be fine. But just it doesn’t even have to be that intense. And so in the US, we have things like, one in two Americans has a chronic disease, and the numbers keep going up. But I think it’s one in three are obese right now. And then something that doctors have been studying for, I think this is going on 25 years, where people who do not live in a neighbourhood that’s walkable as in they can easily walk to say, a market or, or a pharmacy, or

Carlton Reid 40:43
a minute cities. And

Andy Boenau 40:45
there we go, there we go. We’ll be extra controversial and say, people who don’t live in the 15 Minute cities, they’re trapped. The flip would be if they have to take a car everywhere. Those people have higher rates of obesity, higher rates of heart disease, and diabetes, and then and a bunch of other ailments. And so that kind of like the beginning of my career, when I was just asking dumb questions like, why is this? Why do we do this, learning these things about just physical health was jarring to me. Because, sure, it makes sense that if you move around, you won’t, you won’t gain as much weight. But the extent of your body’s damage by not having regular movement was was pretty eye opening to me. And then also, the other thing that I would say, that was really eye opening was just how strongly the connections are between humans being active and their mental wellness. So anxiety and depression are by far the big ones. But then also, other things that are are harder to pinpoint, like cognitive decline, or creativity. They they’ve been researching that. This is to show when people are moving around when they’re active, they’re way more likely for their brains to stay intact for far longer than if they’re just seated and alone and isolated. And it’s not the doctors have answered why behind all of that. But they do know this correlation that these things happen together, that when people are stuck in a car dependent area, they are more likely to experience these bad things. And so that’s why I say like, we hear headlines every year about infrastructure is crumbling. infrastructure is crumbling. And I’m saying that’s only the first part of the sentence the full sentences infrastructure is crumbling our minds and bodies

Carlton Reid 42:42
so in on the you say that infrastructure programmers bodies on the the YouTube video that’s on your your, your your seat and spark pitch there. But under the third one down the third line down it says watch the quest to legalise healthy neighbourhoods, what do you mean by legalise healthy neighbourhoods.

Andy Boenau 43:02
So that’s, that’s part of the storytelling based on data. So in the United States, we have local land use rules for this is this is generally true, where it’s not usually the state level, that tells you how exactly a neighbourhood has to be designed. But at the local level, we have these rules. For example, like I mentioned to you about townhouses where townhouses are often outlawed. Another example would be, you’re not allowed to have a front yard business. So let’s say you have a garage next year, you could be in a single family dwelling, this is not about living in a SkyRise in Manhattan or something like that just in a normal in a normal neighbourhood, you’re not allowed to just have a garage converted to a barber shop, or a nail salon or a tax accountant, you know, something like that. It’s whatever it is, you’re just you’re not allowed, it’s illegal to mix the business with the residential. It’s illegal in in most of these places to have a corner market. So you end up having to drive to the grocery store or to the market. You can’t just walk a block or a couple of blocks to the market, or restaurants or pubs. You can’t have those in neighbourhoods, it’s outlawed by local land use rules. And so what I’m pushing on you I’m using those, that language very intentionally, I want to deliberately remind people, this is not accident. This is not an accidental circumstance that we find ourselves like, Oh, if only our forefathers had thought ahead and developed mixed use neighbourhoods. Now this is active rules that are still on the books today that prevent you from living in a place where you could walk to these things. It’s that’s how I want to legal as in this is part of the What I hope is the outcome of this film is highlighting for people, this huge problem of how infrastructure and health are currently going at each other like they’re in conflict. And I want people to see, there are ways at the local level to make things better. So this is not about who’s president of the United States, or even who your state senators are, this is at the local level, if you make enough noise, you can make change. And so that’s what I want. I’m not this is not about preaching at people, that they should always ride their bike everywhere, even though I think the bike is a wonderful tool to get around. This is about highlighting a conflict that has not yet been talked about in the documentary format.

Carlton Reid 45:47
And when when this documentary comes out this over an hour or adventure series, where’s it going to be distributed? How are you going to be this is like film festivals, where do you see it being broadcast?

Andy Boenau 46:00
It’ll be a, that’s a yes. And as they say, it’s, I want it to be as widely distributed as possible. So I’m going to be if I can raise enough funding for the film festival entries, the more that I’m able to raise the more festivals that I will, I will put it in. But then also, just old fashioned networking, I’m gonna, once it’s done, I’m gonna reach out to as many people in my network about this regularly about this, find some influential people who can help amplify. And then of course, some of the folks that have already volunteered to contribute to it are fantastic people. I mean, they’re, they’re loaded with information on their own.

Carlton Reid 46:47
I’ve seen the list, it’s a good list. And so Chris Bruntlett who’s been on the show, of course, with his wife, who’s Dutch cycling embassy, in Vancouver? Yeah, there’s a whole bunch of stuff. So these are these in the can? Or the are you going to be going to these people, how many of these interviews have you done and how many are still to be done?

Andy Boenau 47:10
They’re, they’re fantastic people. And I’ve had I call, I call the pre interviews with all of them. So we re recorded with every so every person listed on the website, I’ve done a short recording with, because there’s, they have a couple of areas of not just bias, but perspective about some of these, some of the areas that enter that, that are involved in this conflict of health and infrastructure. And I’m not, I wasn’t asking any one of them to be the overall an overarching expert in this issue. But they all bring something very important. So the reason why I have so many people in here is I know that there are so many potential ways that this kind of main storyline of the documentary can go. I also know that 20 different people, that’s I can’t have 20 different storylines, that’s just going to be overwhelming. So I don’t know for sure what the final stories are going to be. So when part of the crowd funding for this, this film is to make it possible for me to as I narrow down the stories, which is one of the things I’m doing right now, to then be able to go in person and do what what you would say, is a traditional kind of in house interview format, with the lean team that I’ve got. So that’s that’s the plan. But all of these folks were and there are even more who have since said that they want to be able to contribute in some way. But we haven’t we haven’t gotten them on film. But it’s it’s fascinating to me that there are so many people who are both in health and an infrastructure. As soon as I give them the pitch of this just this idea that a doctor prescribes healthy activity that another group says Cool story, bro, you can’t get that. It hits them quickly. They’re like yes, that’s true. And yet the industry as a whole is just not budging and and I think a lot of it just goes back to how we’re siloed in different areas like traffic safety is one silo and land use planning is another silo and architecture and cognitive design that an assessment works on that’s another silo. And they don’t interact with each other. They don’t have they’re not incentivized to interact with each other. And, and so because of that, we the human being that just wants to get around, we suffer the consequences.

Carlton Reid 49:47
So this you’re using, and this is a platform I’m not familiar with, because I’ve used Kickstarter in the past seed and spark. So that’s like Kickstarter. Yeah, but do you do you Get your money. Even if you don’t reach the total because of Kickstarter, if you don’t hit your total, you don’t get any money. So how does this one how to seed and spark work?

Andy Boenau 50:10
Seed and spark is very similar to Kickstarter or Indiegogo. It was made specifically for filmmakers. And so years ago, I had done something with Kickstarter. This is one where you need to raise 80% of your goal before it’s greenlit. I’m optimistic that we’ll be able to get there. But it is one of those things like you’ve got to get the vast majority 80% is what you need to get, which for this project is about $10,000. So the goal, the overall goal for this is $12,000, which includes all the production, travel, the interviews, all that kind of stuff, the in person stuff and then be rolled along with some of these stories that are coming out. So this is going through the month of June, we’ve got 21 days left As of recording, so about three weeks. And then and then we’ll we’ll see where we stand. And then once once we get to the end of this, crowdfunding assuming that it’s successful, I’ll be I’ll be well on my way to scheduling FaceTime with these great folks. And then also adding in some, some local stories in in a couple of cities were not people, they aren’t experts in their field. They’re just people who have been on the receiving end of unhealthy infrastructure. And those stories need to be told. So

Carlton Reid 51:35
this is seed and spark.com. The URL is way too long to actually say this on air. But basically you search for either your name or probably easier because your name is quite difficult to spell.

Andy Boenau 51:48
It’s my forefathers. So I made a slight colour epidemic. You can search for that you could also go to urbanismspeakeasy.com/film.

Carlton Reid 52:01
Thanks to Andy Boenau there and thanks to you for listening to Episode 330 of the spokesmen podcast brought to you as always in association with turn bicycles shownotes and more can be found at the hyphen spokesman.com. The next episode features the Midwest correspondent for The Economist, Daniel Knowles. We talk about his new book, Carmageddon. But meanwhile, get out there and ride

26th May 2023

The Spokesmen Cycling Podcast

EPISODE 328: BBC Bike Bureau with Anna Holligan and Kate Vandy (and Jack)

SPONSOR: Tern Bicycles

HOST: Carlton Reid

GUESTS: Anna Holligan and Kate Vandy

TOPICS: “Just two journalists building a mobile studio on two wheels”

MACHINE TRANSCRIPT:

Carlton Reid 0:13
Welcome to Episode 328 of the Spokesmen cycling podcast. This show was engineered on Friday 26th of May 2023.

David Bernstein 0:28
The Spokesmen cycling roundtable podcast is brought to you by Tern Bicycles. The good people at Tern are committed to building bikes that are useful enough to ride every day, and dependable enough to carry the people you love. In other words, they make the kind of bikes that they want to ride. Tern has e-bikes for every type of rider. Whether you’re commuting, taking your kids to school or even carrying another adult, visit www.ternbicycles.com. That’s t e r n bicycles.com. To learn more.

Carlton Reid 1:03
I’m Carlton Reid and welcome to this episode of the Spokesmen podcast in which I talk with BBC correspondents Anna Holligan and Kate Vandy and the formation of their mobile news gathering studio, the BBC bike bureau. A glitch scuppered our first chat so I’m not able to produce a companion video version of that conversation but I have been able to rescue a short segment that I will place on YouTube as a clip and the audio is at the end of this episode. The segment features Jack, an elderly British gentleman living in The Hague and who saw Anna as we were recording. He was thrilled at seeing a BBC reporter next to a cargo bike, and he politely butted in. Not that he knew Anna was part of a three-way chat, of course. But he soon did and Jack became the first person to be interviewed by Anna using the new kit on the BBC’s Bike Bureau …

Kate, where are you because I know you’re somewhere gorgeous? So So tell us where you are. And and make us jealous.

Kate Vandy 2:24
I am in Sydney at the moment, which is my hometown and I am lucky enough are very lucky. The BBC sent me here for six months to work. I’m going to be covering the Women’s World Cup and a few other things while I’m here. But it is autumn going into winter and each day is 20 degrees. 22 degrees and blue sky and bright sunshine. So it’s pretty good.

Carlton Reid 2:49
It’s actually quite nice and Newcastle. To tell the truth it’s we’ve we’ve come into spring it’s beautiful. And then same question to you Anna. So what’s the weather like in I’m assuming you’re in The Hague at the moment I am in

Anna Holligan 3:02
The Hague is beautiful. It’s a beautiful sunny day, I’ve just done the school run, hopped off my bike and dashed inside to speak to you.

Carlton Reid 3:09
Yeah, cuz when you came on, because we record this, and this is just audio. But I did get a wee bit of Anna’s. And it’s like, it’s almost like I don’t recognise we are close on type thing. I don’t recognise you away from a bike. You know you’re in, you’re in a real room. It’s like over that we have that Santa. Cuz normally I just see you with a bike. Anna. How weird is that? That you are basically in my mind. And I’m sure lots of people you’re associated with your cargo bike.

Anna Holligan 3:34
It’s funny, because before I came to the Netherlands, I was just a hobby cyclist. But here, it’s just something that you do so naturally, and that you start to incorporate parts of your life on the bike. And that’s kind of been the evolution of the bike bureau in part.

Carlton Reid 3:49
Hmm. And we will get onto that because you talked about the bike Bureau at So where were you when you’re in Leipzig, weren’t you so that was like a week ago, fellow city so so tell us about what you were doing in Velo city.

Anna Holligan 4:01
So I was talking about the evolution of the bank bureaus. So how it came into being. So starting off with Kate and I growing on a cycle tour of Europe, looking at Europe cycling revolution. And during that trip, we filmed with some parents who were using electric cargo bikes. And then Kate and I started to think well, wouldn’t that Empress actually be so perfect for what we do too. So it became something all about enabling multi skilled digital first mobile journalists like us to do our jobs in the most cost time and climate efficient way. And so that’s what I was really talking about, but but also the the journey that has brought us to this point of having such a revolutionary pioneering model to show people and the way in which I’ve been using it and kind of trialling it and finding out the stories that really lend themselves to being covered by the bike Bureau because it takes us right to the heart After breaking news and places where traditional radio and satellite vans and trucks I wouldn’t be able to get to with all of the kids on board. So that was kind of what I was talking about. And it’s really interesting as well with that kind of audience because they are are already so enlightened when it comes to cycling, but then to be able to bring something brand new to them inspiring, innovative. Yeah, it felt really, it felt like it was a validation of something that case that I have been working on for so many years now.

Carlton Reid 5:34
But you were talking to a very friendly audience there, obviously, who a would know who you were B would be absolutely, you know, dialled in on the benefits of cargo bikes in cities. What about an audience that isn’t as friendly as that? Can you imagine going to, you know, another conference and discussing how mainstream Do you think this this project you’ve got going is and that’s both that can be both to both of you, in fact that that particular question?

Anna Holligan 6:03
I think Kate has already had some interesting conversations with with colleagues about this.

Kate Vandy 6:08
Yeah, I mean, we’ve actually been pleasantly surprised by how many people are super enthusiastic when they’ve seen the project. So we kind of think this has the potential to be really mainstream, and hopefully one day really ordinary, and just something that everyone has the possibility to do. Of course, it wouldn’t work in every single city. But if you if you look around you, you know, I’ve been living in Brussels for years now. But if you look to Paris, Barcelona, Vienna, Copenhagen, Helsinki, and further away, the cities like Vancouver, Melbourne, in Australia, Bogota, Tokyo, Taipei, I mean, so many cities in the world already offer the infrastructure in which something like this could exist. So I just think, what we’re doing, we’re hoping we can lead the way and show people that there’s really simple solutions to kind of change what they’re doing in their everyday life. So our hope is that it becomes super mainstream, as quickly as possible,

Carlton Reid 7:04
you kind of you kind of need it to be a bike friendly place. So you think

Anna Holligan 7:09
if you look at this, just from the perspective of the BBC News, content priorities, first of all, as journalists, they’re all about delivering for our audiences, the best journalism being the best at live news, breaking important stories, but then missing audience challenges too. So tackling news avoidance, reaching younger and underserved audiences, and building trust through transparency. And the bank Bureau has been seen and kind of understood by people as the perfect vehicle to be able to do this because we can show people how we are gathering news, how we’re going live from a bike, and one of the other priorities is about creating a fun and friendly and collaborative culture. And for me, this is the embodiment of the the bike Bureau, and there are so many places which are already suitable for riding an electric cargo bike. And over the years, Carlson, you’ll be familiar with these arguments, you know, it’s too hilly, the weather’s not good enough. Well, the fact is, an electric bike flattens or hills and I have written around Edinburgh on a non electric bike, and I know how desirable that is. But also weather wise, because I have been using this for more than two years. Now, I’m not doing it for fun, I’m doing it because it is the most obvious and practical choice. And what I want is for women, especially in journalism to be empowered in the same kind of way. So for getting to the kinds of stories where it wouldn’t have been possible with another mode of transport. And most of the time, I don’t have another pair of hands. So when there’s an explosion of a block of flats, I don’t want to park miles away in a dodgy neighbourhood, and then walk four miles with all of the kit, I have a bike that can now do all of that for me. And when I’m trying to cover two stories, two different sides of time when a farmer’s protests later on climate protests with water cannon, the only way to get to the scene of those breaking news stories when all of the roads around the climate protests were closed down by police was by bike and then I had everything I needed there. So I think, of course, in cities, there are challenges and we as Kate has said, we’re not trying to say hey, look, here’s the answer the kind of swiss army knife for all of the challenges that we face, no trying to be a more sustainable broadcaster. But actually in showcasing the potential of the bike Bureau it opens up so many more ideas and possibilities and it can inspire people in lots of other ways to think about they’re guessing how they’re doing their jobs. And I’m not just talking about in in journalism there and what we Kate and I are trying to do is is have one of these ideally in in suitable bureaus around the world once we have showed the possibilities by actually using it. So giving this tangible example sorry, okay, go ahead. Yeah, no, I was just

Kate Vandy 9:57
gonna say I think you know, we also have a responsibility Ready to look at how we work and live each day as people and as broadcasters, and I think the biochar is a really good way of showcasing that, you know, what changes can we make, we don’t want to just lecture people or be seen to, you know, flying is part of our job as well. But I think this is us showing that when we have control, we can make changes. And what I really hope and I know anecdotes as well as that, there’s just inspires people that see it and to just to step back and think, What small changes can I make each day that might make any have an impact on the environment positively, and also, all these other things. And I mentioned a really important as well, like empowerment, flexibility cost, or, you know, there’s, there’s a lot of different things going on with it.

Carlton Reid 10:46
And I mentioned speed there, because the police have got bikes, you know, they they get to incidents quicker. And then the squad cars, emergency services, you know, the paramedics use bike for that reason. So you could probably get to a story quicker than many other of your colleagues and maybe competitors, you can actually speed somewhere and get to the story quicker.

Anna Holligan 11:13
Our colleagues will be our competitors and colleagues will be inspired to hop on a bike of their own in the future, actually, to all be racing, they’re on two wheels.

Carlton Reid 11:23
Because Jon Snow, I mean, I remember interviewing him and that was one of his things he said, this is when there was like, you know, a producer of camera, sound, you know, electricians etc. And it’d be like a big squad of people would have to arrive places, but he would say he would get to incidents on his bike far quicker than his crew could ever get there, then he would start his interviews and or you know, you’re sending the prep. So that’s that’s the potential that you could get to places pretty darn quickly.

Anna Holligan 11:54
Jon is not alone in that respect.

Carlton Reid 11:56
Let’s talk about the bike itself than so we can geek out and I have I have been shown around the bike. You showed me around the last time we talked, but let’s kind of go round virtually and discuss it again. So it is a cargo bike. It’s the same cargo bike that we are familiar with. Is that right?

Anna Holligan 12:16
Yes, it’s the same cargo bikes. So this is my personal bike that we’re using for this project.

Kate Vandy 12:22
And it’s an electric cargo bike just to point out for people, especially on Twitter who seem to think it’s not, it would be awfully heavy for Anna to pedal around. Otherwise, it isn’t.

Carlton Reid 12:33
It’s got a bucket on the front in effect. And normally you’ve got your daughter in there. Yes. Yes. But you’re telling me the last time that you can actually fit all these kids in and your daughter? Yes. So

Anna Holligan 12:47
the idea was, I started doing things with news and my daughter on the side, pretty much as soon as I invested in the cargo bag, after we had filmed this documentary and realised the game changing potential in work and life. And so just within a couple of months, I was picking her up from school popping her in the bike to cycle her home, and then doing a live from just outside the school gates. And there is video evidence of this on the BBC. And then it was kind of like a playpen. And there was enough space for both of those vital parts of my life. But then, as we and especially Kate has seen more potential to do more with this vehicle we’ve built over the years. But we still want to keep it really manageable and small. And we’re mobile journalists, we’re mostly using our phones for broadcasting. But we wanted to build something that could allow us to go further and stay on air for longer. But that all still kind of fits into a backpack and can be transported from my bike to other bikes, because we have to be really clear about this. I use an electric cargo bike that I chose, but in theory, we’ve designed a bike bureau that can be transported to any bike and not even just an electric bike, you know, if you’re if you’re much fitter than I am, and you’ve got some strong side muscles, then in theory, this could be a regular a regular bike,

Carlton Reid 14:17
huh, so you can get on your gravel bike, and you can go off road and you can go and do some weird and wonderful stuff just as long as you’ve got the kit in your backpack.

Anna Holligan 14:25
Yes, that’s something we’re working on. Exactly. Because the bike is kind of like the frame at the moment. And we have all of these arms and lights coming off it. But yeah, the idea is and it is kind of morphing all the time as we are learning lessons from the work that we do with the bike bureau. But the idea is that in the future, you can use any bike it wouldn’t have to be a cargo bike electric or otherwise. And Kate wise, this is yeah has been so much trial and error. So I think Kate is well placed to talk through how it has gone from being me with a kind of selfie stick to something so much more sophisticated, which is the boat bureau?

Kate Vandy 15:04
Do we want to go through the kits? Sorry? I’m slightly interrupting our flow. Yeah.

Carlton Reid 15:08
No, no, totally. I mean, basically start with maybe the solar panels and the folding solar panels.

Anna Holligan 15:15
Do you know what we could just bring up the actual bike pure peace. I have like a photographic memory now of all of the component parts. But if we want to be really like technical, then it’s good idea to have the list in front of us. But I can talk about how we dial up while Kate looks for the kit list. I could talk about what we use in terms of broadcasting. So from our phones, we have studio capabilities through Lucy live going through to the radio studios directly, and we can choose which studios or which programme, and then we’re connected to go live on air. And with TV, we use the Live View mobile app, which I think was developed in partnership with the BBC. So when the phone is attached to the bike, it just gives us studio capabilities from anywhere in the field literally now, going to places that would have been out of reach in the past. And

Carlton Reid 16:10
5g network. So basically the 5g network as I’ve extended where you can get to

Anna Holligan 16:15
well and and being on wheels and two wheels instead of 4k.

Carlton Reid 16:18
Have you got the list then? I do? I do. Apologies. So that’s okay, so so we’re gonna we’re gonna start with the solar panels so that you need extra power. Yes, yeah. So

Kate Vandy 16:31
one of the big things that’s really helpful, I’ve seen Anna work, you know, not for 24 hours, but you know, really, really long days in the field on her own. And I know one of the biggest things that was going to be a help would be a solar panel with an energy bank, because otherwise you’re sort of scrambling around for battery packs, or trying to find sockets, when actually you need to be outside broadcasting live. So that was the main thing that we wanted to find a sort of lightweight solar panel attached to an energy bank where Anna could charge her laptop, could charge her phones, which have at least two phones on her when she’s broadcasting if not three. And we could also charge lights, microphones, very important coffee pot. So

Carlton Reid 17:17
very critical as equipment, coffee.

Kate Vandy 17:22
For journalists, getting coffee, coffee is probably number one. So that bank, obviously if it’s not a sunny day, obviously, that’s fine, because we can already have had it pre pre energise and fall for when she goes out to work. So that should last at least a day, if not longer, depending on what she needs to charge. And so then, we have this desk now, which is amazing. And it took us quite a long time to find didn’t find a lot of looking. And we’ve looked at building our own, we’ve been designing different ones. And then and I came across this amazing desk, which is like a suitcase, and you unclip it and pull it up. And it can then be set to whatever height you want. And it’s really sturdy and really strong. So we’ve got that as well in the middle of the bike. And to that we’ve been attaching small rigs with magic arms. And on the end of those are the shoulder pods. And on the shoulder pod, the phone is placed. There’s a possibility to place light at a microphone. But we’ve been using wireless rode mics for now. And I think that’s it, isn’t it? And some likes as well. Ring likes, we’ve got attached at the moment. Yeah, and

Anna Holligan 18:39
we’ve got the radio mics as well in case we want to be able to move further away. And I’ll tell you what, this, there will be people who are perhaps not so familiar with the potential of bikes and broadcasting. But actually, it’s if it was a gimmick, and we’ve read the good and bad comments if it was a gimmick, this is not something that I would have been using for two, three years. And a few months ago, there was sadly a train crash 12 kilometres from here in Bruges Houghton. And I had to get to the scene of breaking news as quickly as possible and they wanted me an hour and a half an hour. And I thought okay, there’s no way I can cycle there. I’m just gonna have to hire a car because having a bike to do my news and from my life allowed me to get rid of my car. So now I rely on rely on green wheels and various other car

Carlton Reid 19:36
sharing short term rental

Anna Holligan 19:38
car shares, they’re really big here in the Netherlands. So I took one of those instead. And as soon as I got there, I was just wishing that I had my bike. I thought you know what, I should have just waited I should have waited another half an hour and I’ll be there with my bike because on that day I was having to borrow charge from colleagues. I was having to drive back and forth. to a cafe to get a decent charge up, it was an absolute nightmare. I didn’t have anywhere to edit, it was sunny there was I hadn’t managed to carry drinks and all that kind of thing. And for me in that moment, I thought, you know, I want everyone to have one of these, I want to this isn’t about gimmicks, it isn’t about, hey, look what we can do. And sustainability for sustainability sake is not worth anything to us on the ground. But the, the, the way in which this allows us to do our jobs, that takes away the danger, the hard side of it, and it’s already hard enough being on air constantly for radio and TV, providing digital content. So to have a vehicle literally, that helps to manage that load is just so empowering. And it allows us to do more on air, because we’re not having to worry about going back and forth for for charging and drinks. And you know what it does need and Kate and I we have to discuss this maybe off air is a toilet. That’s the only thing that’s missing

Carlton Reid 21:08
because it doesn’t have a toilet. So that’s the kind of same kind of revealing.

Anna Holligan 21:16
Yeah, so it’s if I hadn’t say, oh, sorry. No, no, no, go ahead.

Kate Vandy 21:21
I was gonna have to say there were a few people asking if it was actually an April Fool’s joke when we posted it on Twitter. And I have to let them down. It actually is not a joke. But again, with Anna, you know, it’s, we just want to make sure people understand this is really sincere. I mean, this is something that the majority of time we’ve spent researching this has been our own time. And as Anna mentioned, it’s her own personal bike that she’s allowed us to experiment with. And, you know, it’s been a real passion project for us. And we just wanted to make something as best we could with what we could find. And yeah, just that it’s sincere, and it’s not a joke. And hopefully, it can only get better from here, really. And hopefully we you know, we’d find even better solutions to the kinds of things we’ve been, we’ve been looking for

Carlton Reid 22:05
the things that you’ve said your research was including that table. So what do you use the table for? But you haven’t, you haven’t explained what that was for what what exact quantity and type table comes out of a suitcase? But what do you use it for?

Anna Holligan 22:17
laptop and then editing mostly. But yeah, so it’s a desk. So you can have your laptop on you’ve got the coffee, the curves. But for editing in the field. So if we wanted to edit on location, we don’t have to go and find a desk in a cafe we can do it from from where we’re standing. So that’s a really but also like, if there’s a complicated story, you need to have some notes in front of us, containers, and data have a laptop at eye level.

Carlton Reid 22:46
That’s brilliant, actually, yeah, I’m thinking I need a concertina type table that I can just get out my

Anna Holligan 22:52
part. And the thing is, we’re still working on this. And we want to also be really clear about that, because this is a pilot project, but it’s also just a prototype. And as we’ve been building every time we’re like, hey, you know what, we could get a solar panel that’s more, that’s neater, that can be folded up or rolled up. And so we want to incorporate a bit more 3d printing to try and get exactly the right dimensions to fit with what we need to do and have the kit built into a box that then supports the desk and the woman is very portable, it’s very modular, so it can be folded up. But I think in a year’s time, the bite Bureau will look very different from the one that we’re looking at are talking about today.

Carlton Reid 23:35
I’m gonna cut to an ad break right now.

David Bernstein 23:37
Hello, everyone. This is David from the Fredcast and of course the Spokesmen. And I’m here once again to tell you that this podcast is brought to you by Tern bicycles. The good people at Tern build bikes that make it easier for you to replace car trips with bike trips. Part of that is being committed to designing useful bikes that are also fun to ride. But an even greater priority for turn is to make sure that your ride is safe and worryfree. And that’s why turn works with industry leading third party testing labs like EFBE, and builds its bikes around Bosch ebike systems which are UL certified for both electric and fire safety. So before you even zip off on your Tern, fully loaded and perhaps with a loved one behind, you can be sure that the bike has been tested to handle the extra stresses on the frame and the rigours of the road. For more information visit www.ternbicycles.com to learn more. And now back to the Spokesmen.

Carlton Reid 24:47
So we’re back with talking about the bike bureau with Kate Vandy and Anna Halligan. And when we did this previously, we had a we had a few tech glitches, which means we can’t do the whole thing. But you you actually, what I’m not gonna say it costed you in a cost. You, you, you were you were welcomed by an elderly gentleman who was very lovely, who was wonderfully surprised that you were there on a bicycle and that you were the BBC. So tell us about Jack.

Anna Holligan 25:23
He thought he was dreamy, it must have just been the most surreal moment. He’s taking his dog for a walk, by the way, he was on a bike and he was 82. He is amazing. And he came out of the corner of a canal. And there I was with the bike Bureau, BBC Randy on the laptop. He was just a bit astounded, I think. But it was, it was such a fortuitous meeting, because Jack was just he saw us like that. And instantly, he could grasp the concepts. And we were talking about broadcasting to younger audiences and connecting to younger audiences being transparent and authentic in the way that we gather news. But here is this lovely old guy saying, hey, you know what, this makes so much sense.

Carlton Reid 26:06
Now, I will probably play audio, I’ll supply some audio in here of Jack and I’ll put the clip on YouTube because we can work and there was enough non glitch that we could capture that bit. But it was wonderful. And we were sitting there you know, I was in Newcastle. Obviously you were you were live with with Jack yourself. But then and Kate was in Sydney. And we were just sitting there thinking this is really cute. This is nice. This is beautiful, that you’re so accessible.

Anna Holligan 26:32
I think that has been something that has grown and is still it still feels unusual. And we welcome that if it helps audiences to feel a connection and to be able to understand and connect with what we’re trying to do and see that this is authentic, and that we are working from a grassroots level in creating this. And it’s something that I have been really conscious of over the last few years using the bike that audiences who have traditionally been showing us avoidance or been AMSI. The mainstream media just feel as though this is something different that they can embrace in a way that sometimes when you go into neighbourhoods, they don’t want TV crews there. But when you’re coming with a biker when they feel as though they already know you chatting to them as as a one to one as a normal person, then it makes our job so much easier because we don’t have those same barriers to break down because they see us as as humans on bikes rather than Cairo journalists who are going to tell them the news, which is something that BBC has moved far away from already, but audiences don’t with see that and so the bike is such a great way to access those people and those stories that might have been hard to reach in the past.

Carlton Reid 27:54
Now I know you’ve got to rush away, perhaps you’re you’re you’re busy BBC journalist, you might have to go to live in like three seconds. I don’t know, I know you gotta go away. So I just want to ask one final two, two final questions. And the second one will be please tell us how we find you on social media. But the first question, and this is straight to Kate, in fact, and that is so Anna’s talked about, you know, epiphany on the cargo bike. Your epiphany on a bicycle is a bit older than that. And you’re a bit more of a kind of spandex lycra kind of person or to tell us your kind of

Anna Holligan 28:31
proper cyclists. Okay, yeah,

Carlton Reid 28:34
I was, I was trying to be as polite as possible there. So tell us about your cycling, Kate, how you got into it and how you’re in it right now.

Kate Vandy 28:44
Well, I mean, I love cycling and bore people to death with my Instagram stories. And here I am cycling somewhere else every other day. But I’ve always been I’ve always been a cyclist. I used to do triathlons as a teenager and university student. But I’ve really returned to road cycling and gravel riding in Belgium where I’ve been living for five years. And I’m racing in, in a league there in the Belgian league. And I’m a member of a cycling club actually, which is aimed at getting women into cycling, which has been amazing. I think they founded this cycling club in Brussels two years ago. And it now has over 300 members and it’s all sorts of women all sorts of bikes. Meet on Sundays and have a fantastic time. So yeah, I do a bit of bit of racing but of serious stuff, but also really love cycling with whoever will cycle with me.

Carlton Reid 29:41
That’s wonderful. And thank you ever so much for your time today. So for ending today’s episode, how about we’ve even though we know where we can find the kind of videos but tell us your social media handles and anybody who maybe, I don’t know maybe it’s new to this and actually hasn’t seen And the bikepath videos that you do and so how do we how do we access both of you in, in the virtual world. So

Anna Holligan 30:09
Kate’s has been really instrumental in setting up our social media. And then making sure we’re actually posting from there because there’s so much going on, it’s hard to, to what we want to do is create a space or what we’re we are now doing is creating a space purely for bike Bureau content. So people who want bike Bureau and not don’t choose from the cycle first can confine this because it’s a very separate entity. So bike Bureau, we are at the bike Bureau at bike Bureau on Twitter, and same on Instagram, I think, Kate,

Kate Vandy 30:42
I think it’s at good news cycle on Instagram

Anna Holligan 30:46
cycle. Because and also, that’s something else that we have kind of in the pipeline, but we’re working on something along those lines, but can’t reveal much more just yet. So and then Dutchies from the psychopath is just on my psychopath. You know, no matter how much I try and pause and say it properly, it’s just psychopath. I really have to work on that. So it’s actually it’s from a cycle path a gesture from my regular Twitter. And it’s, you know, the funny thing about that is that it’s just three news stories done by bike, but because the psychopaths here are so incredible, so many people watch, and I don’t I’m no offence taken that I know, people are not coming from me. They’re not coming for the news. They’re coming mostly for the views. But if we can just sneak some news in there on the site, then that’s great. And I think it’s also helped to show people what more can be done because we are the first journalists to build a bike Bureau for news broadcasting and actually be using it for lives for news gathering. And in a country full of cyclists, the fact that no other broadcaster has done this here in the Netherlands, let alone anywhere else. It makes us feel really proud. Actually, it’s kind of like we’re blessing our child out into the world to see how it will find its first steps and we are at a very early stage.

Carlton Reid 32:11
Before I cut to the outro. Here’s the bit with Jack in The Hague. You’re actually recognised as the bike reporter. Even in the Netherlands, even having a bike and being reported is different to people, Dutch people.

Anna Holligan 32:29
And how crazy is that in a nation of cyclists where they carry surfboards on bikes? We’ve got a young gentleman taking his dog for a walk on the bike. I ended up Yeah.

Jack 32:45
The BBC

has a cute little doggy. We almost can’t Campos going through the middle of all of COVID. And they look like lost souls. But

Anna Holligan 33:11
I’ve taken a wrong turn must have taken.

Jack 33:16
I’ll say maybe you thought it was

Anna Holligan 33:21
nice to meet you. We’re just doing a podcast for Carlton talking about our setup, which is not actually something that’s been done anywhere else that’s quite excited to show this to you. Thanks so much. That’s really nice to

Kate Vandy 33:39
include that in the article as well. It’s a damn good idea.

Anna Holligan 33:45
It’s very useful for many All right

Jack 33:55
what’s your name?

Anna Holligan 33:56
Nice to meet you.

Jack 34:00
Congratulations to the BBC on innovation.

Anna Holligan 34:06
Thanks for the word. Thank you.

Jack 34:09
Did you come up with the argue

Anna Holligan 34:11
Kate case and I came up with this idea. This is Pete here so

Jack 34:19
I shall go back to my Dutch life and say the BBC is everywhere now.

Carlton Reid 34:26
Jack? Jack is obviously a Brit. What are you doing in the Netherlands? You’re gonna live there.

Jack 34:34
I was tricked into coming over here because my wife said oh, I can live in England. And of course she lied like a trooper. So I sort of gave up the ghost retired and said okay, I like coffee terraces and there are plenty of them. So I can live in a place with coffee terraces. This bicycles Jack, one thing to me.

Carlton Reid 35:05
And bicycles Jack plays with bicycles.

Anna Holligan 35:09
Jack is on a foldup Dunlop bike, a foldable. Right? And dog walking at the same time and walking the dog. He asked how you how old you are

Jack 35:20
82 This is

Anna Holligan 35:25
how recycling is still so

Jack 35:30
yes, we could do so

I also have a step which does 60 kilometres an hour, and but it’s not legal. So that’s why I’m on this.

Anna Holligan 35:52
It’s just incredible like your AC to this is one of the about cycling in the Netherlands that it just keeps you young, you could be 16.

Jack 36:01
If you’re going to produce things like this that can get to places that the BBC doesn’t normally go to, then that is a wonderful thing. Yes,

Anna Holligan 36:12
I want to hug you but I will. I’m so nice to have your input because this is exactly what we’re trying to do. We’re trying to be really transparent. We’re trying to get to places people aren’t able to get to and bring these types of stories. So you’ve actually just been the first interview that we’ve done, I think from the bike period. So congratulations, Jack, Down.

Jack 36:38
This is Thank you, Jack, an unexpected pleasure. You’ve made my day and a few more. Keep it up and you’re definitely on the right path.

Anna Holligan 36:51
Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Say over here. And finally.

Carlton Reid 37:01
Thanks to Anna Halligan and Kate Vandy there and thanks to you for listening to Episode 328 of the spokesmen podcast brought to you in association with Tern Bicycles, show notes, and more can be found at the dash spokesman.com. The next episode features the maker of a classic 1950s cycling jacket and the Swiss factory which makes the jackets fabric. That episode will be out in the first week of June. But meanwhile, get out there and ride …

10th April 2023

The Spokesmen Cycling Podcast

EPISODE 321: I Cycle Therefore I Am — Book Chat With Authors James Hibbard and Max Leonard

SPONSOR: Tern Bicycles

HOST: Carlton Reid

GUESTS: James Hibbard and Max Leonard

TOPICS: From highbrow psychedelia to being defined as a cyclist — discussing “The Art of Cycling: Philosophy, Meaning and a Life on Two Wheels” with author James Hibbard and blurb supplier and author Max Leonard.

TRANSCRIPT:

Carlton Reid 0:13
Welcome to Episode 326 of the spokesmen cycling podcast. This show was engineered on Monday, April the 10th 2023.

David Bernstein 0:28
The spokesmen cycling roundtable podcast is brought to you by Tern bicycles. The good people at Tern are committed to building bikes that are useful enough to ride every day, and dependable enough to carry the people you love. In other words, they make the kind of bikes that they want to ride. Tern has e bikes for every type of rider. Whether you’re commuting, taking your kids to school or even carrying another adult, visit www.ternbicycles.com. That’s t e r n bicycles.com to learn more.

Carlton Reid 1:03
I’m Carlton Reid and on today’s longer than usual show, one hour and 45 minutes, I talk with ex professional cyclist James Hibbard, author of The Art of cycling a lyrical book on philosophy and a life lived on two wheels. And joining me in a sort of tag team was fellow author Max Leonard, who supplied one of the blurbs for James’s wonderful book. I am honoured today to be joined by two authors, one of whom Max Leonard is actually on my timezone. So Hi Max, and whereabouts are you Max Today

Max Leonard 1:49
I am in sunny East London.

Carlton Reid 1:51
It’s sunny in Newcastle as well you know we’re living the dream here in the UK at the moment, not in the UK and not on our timezone. We have another author another cycling connected author because we’re all cycling connected authors here at James Hibbard. So hi there, James.

James Hibbard 2:09
How you doing Carlton? Very good to actually be on the podcast and it’s sunny as well in Northern California. Although that’s probably a little less funny than a less surprising than sun in the UK.

Carlton Reid 2:20
Now, people on this podcast, we have a frequent number of guests from Southern California who I always joke and say what’s the weather like there? Because I know it’s going to be you know, the worst that’s going to happen is they might have to put arm warmers on you know bad that literally is generally the worst they have to do

James Hibbard 2:37
up here it’s actually been a bit a bit bad Carlton it’s been bad in Northern California here it’s been like like rain like I never recall since childhood so it’s not it’s not always saw

Carlton Reid 2:49
you on I guess it Northern California is different isn’t because most of the guests who are regulars on here are Southern California. Oh, we’re gonna be do get more weather that we get a lot more

James Hibbard 2:58
and we’re going to be talking a lot hopefully about California. And yeah, I think we can dive into some of the big cultural differences

in fact, between southern and northern California when it comes to cycling culture, okay.

Carlton Reid 3:09
So at first I want to I want to because we’re going to be doing a tag team sort of here or a Madison you know, thrown off kind of thing here with with me and Max, we are going to be ganging up a little bit on on James and we will talk about it because it’s James as in effect, Second Edition, so paperback edition of his book, rather than that that first paperback hardback version of his book. But let’s get to max. First of all, Max, I’ve done numerous stories. Well, at least two on your Kickstarter books, including one of which I know you’re working on now on a famous California mechanic. So you can tell us about that. But can you first of all, tell us about you’ve done other books, you’ve done a kind of a cycling climbs book and what and why cyclists are attracted to going up against gravity. And you’ve also done a book about the last rider in a race I almost want to say lose it there. But of course the the person’s last in a bike race isn’t a loser at all. So to ground us on this this show by first of all, Max telling us about

Max Leonard 4:17
your books. Okay? Yes, my first in inverted commas. Proper book was called lanten Rouge, the last man in the Tour de France. And that really does exactly what it says on the tin. And the last guy in the tool was given the nickname the lantern Rouge. The Red Lantern, probably after the lantern that used to swing on the back of a on the back of a train to show the guard that every character has passed through. And I think it was a kind of underdog thing given by the fans. It was never an official Tour de France classification. They didn’t like it because they thought it you know celebs I did failure and it took the shine off the winner and took the focus off. But actually, I thought, you know, cycling is a nice road cycling is a team sport and you have all these other aspects to the story, you’ve got, you know, self self sacrifice. You’ve got, you know, working for your leader, you’ve got the teamwork aspect, you’ve got sort of horrendous injuries, you’ve got incredible stories of really great cyclists who’ve managed one way or another, to come last. So really, that was digging down into, you know, trying to subvert the ideas of success and failure. And, you know, take a look at what we mean when we think about those things. And, you know, for in a lot of ways, if cycling, cycling race is just a publicity game, then, you know, the last guy in the race gets a lot of publicity, then he’s really done done a dozen responses and, and guys use people used to hide a hide behind cars and you know, lose time deliberately to try and get last place.

Carlton Reid 6:04
Right, and then and then your gravity book.

Max Leonard 6:06
Yeah, well, it’s called a higher calling. And this is maybe where we’re getting kind of more into Joneses kind of territory, because high calling was was the subtitle is, cycling’s obsession with mountains. And, and that end is really trying to work out why we like going to the mountains and why we like doing something that’s so difficult in a way. And so that breaks down into a few different things you can say, Well, partly there’s the kind of, you know, competition thing. So I, I went to a mountain in the south of France, but the bonnet in the Alps, which is the highest mountain, the highest road passed in the Alps, or at least, that’s what the signs say, and how to try to dig into, you know, the kind of competition of Tour de France and the dirt Italia and all the beautiful history, but also the natural environment you’re in the kind of the training that goes into it, and people who are around there and and the history of the place, and all the different things that make mountains such sort of special obsession for cyclists.

Carlton Reid 7:12
And the Alps and mountains and bikes comes into the jobs Bradbrook really he was, he was a big champion of cycling in Europe, wasn’t he? Yeah, it

Max Leonard 7:23
gets Brian was he was a, a strange character, who I heard of, because he he he made what is the kind of the definitive text on wheel building, or at least it was back when people used to actually build wheels and not just buy them ready made it from a factory. And he was a California cyclists to kind of a mentor to people like Tom Ritchie and other frame builders in the area, and he died in 2015, I should say so. So if you were alive now he’d be he’d be 90 or so. And he wrote, he wrote in the Santa Cruz Mountains and the Sierra Nevada and all these amazing places in California and just took his road bike into the dirt in ways that people in the 50s and 60s 70s 80s just didn’t really do, I’m talking about before mountain biking, before mountain bikes were invented, and definitely before gravel bikes and all of that. But he also would come to the Alps every year for 50 years, and do kind of exactly the same route, or pretty much but depending on the weather, each time staying in the same places and taking pictures in the same place at the same place for 50 years in a row. And he left behind this amazing archive of photos and ride reports and stuff like that. And he was he was pretty influential and into it big in the bike industry to his own sort of weird outsider kind of way. So he he worked with a local company in California not far from where James is called avocets and came up with all sorts of stuff that they then put on the market

Carlton Reid 9:07
and local computers and and all sorts of things like that.

Max Leonard 9:11
Exactly. He was a was the guy who came up with the idea of riding trendless tires, which people thought was crazy when when he when he he proposed it and everyone else had some tread on it. He said you know he was a real kind of engineers engineer and he proved to Avocet and then to the rest of the industry that that be you got more traction from a from a trendless tire and that you can actually lean further at least you know if you’re talking about a perfect tarmacked road anyway so so yeah, he was really interesting guy and I remember seeing these photos of him years ago and being blown away by this. He was six foot five and so he had a bike frame that was about I think we had a 65 centimetre frame with a head tube as long as as long as my arm basically and There it is, then there’s pictures of him in the Alps on on gravel roads before they’re all tarmacs and just, you know, sort of expanded the idea of what cycling could be for me.

Carlton Reid 10:10
And what stage are you at with that? Because you you were successful in your Kickstarter. So what stage are you at now?

Max Leonard 10:15
We are just finalising the layouts and spreads and it goes to print in the next few weeks. So it is it. The hard work is almost done. But it’ll be a while till it’s out. It’ll be around in your sometime in the summer.

Carlton Reid 10:34
And then there’s, there’s a slight link there in that, you know, you’d unmade up roads, cycling in the Alps. Sunny cycling in the mountains, is a link to another one of your books, which is also kickstarted, which was like the rest of fellowship?

Max Leonard 10:51
Yeah, exactly. And probably the context of these these photo based books is I decided that I started a publishing company a few years ago, and have just by accident, I guess or by luck come across these amazing archives of photos and things. The rough stuff fellowship was, they’re known as the oldest, the world’s oldest off road bike club, founded in 1955, in a pub in Leinster, which is in Herefordshire, not far from the Welsh Welsh border. And that it seems funny to think about it, but back then the idea of off road, they call it rough stuff. And actually, the roads themselves can’t have been, you know, lots of them in very good quality at all. So the idea that they’d go off and seek the kind of byways and bridle paths and that kind of thing. Really set them aside from cycling of year and they would not, they’re very non competitive, it was all about camping and enjoying the outdoors and that kind of thing.

Carlton Reid 11:54
And also masochist, there’s an awful lot of masochism, there wasn’t that there was still like, you know, there were quite happy to walk up stuff, which was

Max Leonard 12:05
one of the founder members, he, his famous, infamous quote from him says, I never go for a walk without my bike. And so I think basically, that, you know, they just wanted to get out into the great outdoors. And you know, we’re happy pushing their bikes if if it meant that they could go across, you know, pass in the Lake District, or through a field or up on the walls or the Fells. And, again, they left behind this incredible, I say, left behind, the club is still going strong. But you know, over the past 50 6070 years, they’ve created an amazing archive of beautiful pictures of people carrying their bikes through fields, essentially.

Carlton Reid 12:48
So that masochism, and the outlier ism is definitely going to be picked out here when we’re talking to James because James is the author of and I’m going to just name the whole title here and it’s subhead, the art of cycling, philosophy, meaning and a life on two wheels. Now I’ve given before before we came on air here, I gave maxed, complete carte blanche to jump in whenever he wants to on this. But I have got a bunch of questions for James as we go through here, but I’m going to start by by by maybe describing before I even come up with the first question I kind of described because I’ve read James’s book is fascinating. It’s wonderful. I know it’s been shortlisted for a bunch of awards. And this as I said before, this is like the paperback edition that we’re talking about now, because the hardback clearly has been successful. And the publisher who’s the publisher,

James Hibbard 13:54
it’s quick, it’s in the UK and Pegasus in the United States, we’ll be publishing the hardback on May 2 of this year. So it’s the first American edition.

Carlton Reid 14:03
So I’ll just describe it to people. I mean, I want people to go out and buy of course and read it for themselves, but I’ll just give it a brief thumbnail sketch just kind of philosophy for Dummies, but we’ve added spandex. And then you’ve got this challenging three day ride with two of your fast mates. So you’ve got two, two former pro cyclists because you James, you’re from a pro cyclist in the US, right? So there’s this it’s this kind of interplay between the history, mostly of Western philosophical thought there’s some Eastern stuff, there’s certainly a fair bit of Zen stuff in there towards the end of it’s only Western stuff. Then it’s that it’s almost like why we cycle there’s a definite section there and that the pain and the suffering and the masochism definitely comes out there and then the kind of the almost the owner ism comm comes out there and how cycling attracts perhaps a certain kind of person. And but then you’ve got this, this, this, just it’s a narrative of how I’d like to say enjoyable, but of course it’s cycling. So it’s not enjoyable. It’s just something that you suffered with fellow riders. So there’s you leave your wife and your young child, and you go off and you haven’t written for a long time. And they’re 10 years, since you’d written

James Hibbard 15:32
at least 10 years since I’d written seriously. Yeah.

Carlton Reid 15:35
So it’s there’s a nice die certainly associate myself with that period of not riding and then getting back into because you’re like, basically training to go on a training ride, right? So there’s, there’s that huge segment of the book is power hub in Canada, but it’s probably the biggest segment of look is actually this narrative of this ride in California, with with with your your mate. So that’s basically what the book is about. It’s a very long book, very interesting and fascinating books. I’m not belittling, like there, but I’m kind of trying to precis it anyway. But first of all, because there are bits in there, that I’m when I’m reading this I know parts of where you are, because you’re Morgan Hill. Yes, indeed.

James Hibbard 16:20
So yeah, really a little bit south of San Jose is where I grew up. So that that gives you any

Carlton Reid 16:25
Morgan Hill is is um, you say in there, it’s like it’s saw the convergence of cycling and the counterculture and as soon as I read that, I thought of Gary Fisher. I thought of mountain biking I thought of Grateful Dead right and and their connection with cycling and then Morgan Hill of course, you have I’m sure you must all the time. When you go riding you must see Mike’s in yard. And and the specialised Indian riders who go out and suffer. Every lunchtime

James Hibbard 16:55
I did and actually spent some time working

working for specialised as well. So I know, I know, Mike. And certainly that whole sort of ecosystem that Max was alluding to, of really a counterculture meeting, cycling, is very much grounded in the Bay Area, the peninsula companies like Richie Avocet, specialised in Mike’s vineyard, Jim genties, and Jiro. So this whole sort of confluence of 1960s counterculture meets European road cycling. And and I think that that was certainly a pre Lance Armstrong era, and very much an era that that influenced me through my first club. And the shops owner, who I mentioned in the book named Terry Shaw. And this whole sort of ecosystem of looking at the Kony manual and juniors ride rollers in small gears, a very sort of, I think, lost lost art view of what the sport of cycling is, in a very sort of describing

Carlton Reid 18:05
the book. The coding manual is, yeah, SEO and I dot dot, dot, dot, dot, then in Italian, purely translated book, so but just tell people who don’t know what the coding manual is.

James Hibbard 18:16
So it’s this, when there was very, very little information on what European cyclists were doing. The Kony manual was a training manual that was translated from the Italian into English, and essentially, was the only sort of insight window into into how it was that that European cyclists were so much better than American cyclists, right, when there was this sort of continental European mystery about the sport, the sort of first insight in I believe, was the late 70s, that it first showed up in the United States. But this was the sort of of manual that that was up there with, okay, how does how to all the great Italians, how does even sort of great Belgian writers, how is this being done, and this the coney manual versus sort of proxy insight into European cycling at a time when there was this very, very little knowledge of what was was actually being done from a physiological perspective.

Carlton Reid 19:16
So just bringing Max back into this in that the reason I’ve connected you to is because I got a press release from from your publisher in the US asking me to, to write about this book, and I needed to go back and said, Well, yes, I’d like to get more information. But what jumped out at me of course, is that because I know Max, and Max is one of the names that’s on the blurb of your book, and he is on the press release. So it’s like oh, well, Max, I you know, I’ve been in you know, in rooms writing with Max in on the same publication. So let’s Max in here. So Max, what What is your connection? And you could even maybe even read out your blurb But you’ve said for for James But But what? What is your take on James’s book? Maybe you want to like maybe change my precis into a different precis?

Max Leonard 20:10
Oh gosh, well, I don’t have the blurb in front of me actually, I was I was searching high and low for my physical copy only, but I do have I do have the PDF, thankfully. So I managed to brush up on it again before coming on air but it’s just a coincidence that James and I are published by the same guys and in the States. But James wrote to me, I can’t remember when but you know, back when this before it was published in hardback and said, he really appreciate me giving it read and quiet and, and I did and while I gave it and read and I was just sort of enchanted by the way that it mixed together, the kind of personal story and the stuff that’s very grounded in in him and, and his his journey through through being a pro cyclist and became perhaps becoming a bit disillusioned with that and then picking up a biker gang and then going on this, this ride down the coast of California with the kind of wider things, you know, wider questions of life and bringing all these different philosophies into it and, you know, slotting names that I knew a bit of but not very much about, you know, Nietzsche Vidkun, Stein, Sartre, you a bit bit about Sartre actually, but but, you know, bringing them in and making them applicable both to cycling and into the kind of things that happen to you and your cycling, and whether that’s physical or emotional, or, or, you know, the kind of the pain that you’re talking, you’ve talked about Carlton already, but also, I think that I liked, particularly in the you know, I spent a while on a bike over the years, putting out different things and quite nice things about mountains and history and that sort of thing. I guess, but my higher calling book, you know, trying to ask the why of why we why we like mountains, that kind of thing. But one of the things I always thought about cycling was was that, you know, you know, you say I’m gonna get on my bike, and I’m gonna go out and, and think about something, maybe I’m stuck on something at work or something like that. And you got enough to two minutes, you don’t think about anything, you know, your brain has completely, completely wipes and then you come home, and then usually to me, it happens, I get in the shower, and then I suddenly have a brainwave. But but the idea of not thinking, I think is really super important. And that’s something that James comes to very quickly in the book and kind of explores, I don’t know what you think about that, James, with, there’s more more you can say about the kind of perverse attraction of not thinking?

James Hibbard 22:49
Well, I think, I mean, I keep sort of bringing it back to California culture. And I think what’s very interesting about the current cultural moment, that’s, that’s very California, but it’s very spread Absolutely, globally, is the sort of internet and this hyper rational belief that everything that can be accomplished, and the things that are most significant and most pressing, all have very tangible, rational answers, right? Where sort of what we’re talking about in terms of thinking is, in fact, price so highly in our in our current cultural moment. That what we’re talking about and trying to describe in terms of sort of using Zen or using Nietzsche or a figure like Heidegger, this idea of not thinking, because you’re so engaged in the physical world. And then the tangible is, I think, increasingly being lost by always being online and plugged in, and what tends to be valued things like writing code, or being productive. And I think that that while those are very, very important, and have certainly been emphasised, by 2500 years of Western philosophy, you’re losing a lot of what it is to be human by thinking that that is the only important experience of what it is to be alive. So I think that that the art of cycling could have been about playing the violin, it could have been about digging ditches, it could have been about chess, anything that just really pushes you back into the tangible world and not this world of rational abstraction.

Carlton Reid 24:30
That tangible world, which you describe in the book, and you talked about how cyclists are very much concentrating on the moment and and yes, as as Max was saying, you know, you almost think about very little, but when you’re what you don’t you don’t see cyclists generally on their phones, looking at screens, bringing it back to that, that that point you’re raising, right, but you do see motorists on this. Unfortunately, you see motorists on their, on their screens, very frequently, so there’s something about cycling and not just the fact you’re on skinny tires. And if you crash, you’re gonna hurt yourself, there’s potentially something more about cycling, the VIS serial aspect of cycling, that where you you’re really not enveloped by anything right very close to nature in a way that you know, even a sports car, a driver of a sports car is not connected to nature in that way. So what is it about cycling that makes you not be attached to your screen? Whereas in a car, you are you potentially you want to be attached to a screen. So because you think it’s so boring that you can just do it without having to pay attention?

James Hibbard 25:39
Well, I think I think if you you think through let’s go back to car. I mean, you’re absolutely right. But let’s go back and not lumped cars all together, let’s think about 1960s MG with a manual transmission being driven on a mountain road with a convertible, right, that’s the sort of one spectrum of driving an automobile. Another would be driving a Tesla down Highway 101. In California, right, you’re completely isolated, you’re your temperature controlled everything else. along that spectrum. I think that what’s what’s interesting to think about is this idea of how mediated it is, right your your experience in your interface with the automobile and, and hence with the road. So in one instance, you’ve got a manual transmission, and you’re trying to sort of feel through the gearshift, you’re having to sense what’s going on on the road surface. And that’s coming through direct actual mechanical interfaces rather than some computer system. So I think that that you just keep on that spectrum in terms of things either being mediated through different computer interfaces or not. And the bicycle is, of course, even less mediated than even a bike with di two and electronic shifting is less mediated than, for example, that mg. So I think that the amount of feedback that you’re getting from the environment, and whether that feedback is direct, or run through some other system to make it ostensibly easier to control or handle, is really the the way to start to think through that this idea of mediation, I think is huge when you’re operating a vehicle that’s hurtling through space, what that vehicle is telling you and how.

Carlton Reid 27:34
Because you make the point in the book about how you know speed, we all like speed, cyclists don’t like speed and logic like speed, but it’s not in the real world, you know, we are very often going very fast in our car, in an aeroplane or whatever. But we’re divorced from that, right. Whereas on a bicycle, you’re not divorced from that speed, you you’re potentially in spandex. You are that you as you say the two square centimetres of rubber is, you know, you’re gonna hurt yourself, if you fall off, or if you get in a car, you seem as though you’re going to ride 70 miles now I’ll survive that.

James Hibbard 28:07
Right? Right, the lack of of feeling that there’s consequences in a car is certainly different than, than when you’re on a bike. I mean, you you sort of 35 miles an hour on the descent feels like 85 miles an hour easily in an automobile. So yeah, this sort of sense of existential threat and consequences is on a bike is massively different than, than that of being in a car, particularly being in a modern, modern car with air conditioning and everything else. You’re just you’re, as you say, absolutely divorced from the environment in a way that you’re not. You’re certainly not ever on a bicycle.

Carlton Reid 28:51
And you make a good point. I hadn’t actually thought of this before about why, you know, people might say the pros, preferred tubular tires. And you’re describing that very well. And you’d like two or three paragraphs of it, just it just you feel the curve. You feel everything much more because of that particular profile. Right. And I hadn’t really thought of it in that way before. It’s like, yes, you should, is daft to have a tubular tie for all sorts of reasons. But you just described as like, yes, but the feeling you get from a tubular tie is unlike the control you feel you have, right.

James Hibbard 29:27
I mean, it’s just to sort of illustrate I mean, a tubular tire has a round profile that’s glued to the rim, whereas a clincher has a U shape. And you can just sort of think as you’re leaning a bicycle over, having a very consistent round profile as the bike is is leaned over to a greater and greater extent as opposed to a U shape is hugely advantageous to just have a sense for you’re not you don’t have a changing profile along with the change in the angle of the lean of the bicycle. which is a massive advantage. And yeah, I mean, I love the feel of a beautiful Italian made tubular like nothing else. The way it rolls over pavement and just resonates. Max, what

Carlton Reid 30:12
do you what are you writing on? Was did that resonate with you? Is that the were you like nodding your head heading? Oh yeah, I’m at my tubeless this afternoon. Are you? Are you a tubular rider? Are you a clincher rider? Are you a gravel bike? You want the fatter? What are you?

Max Leonard 30:28
I’m just trying to think I don’t think I’ve ever written a to the tire. Unless it was on a higher bike a track bike somewhere. But no, I’ve only ever had. clinches and latterly on my gravel bike, I’ve got tubeless but no, I, I mainly ride a what was it a kind of pretty traditional steel framed road bike with with rim brakes and you know, everything tried and tested and it’s a it’s a nice it’s a new frame and it’s stainless steel and it’s a it’s it’s pretty advanced in a lot of ways but but that’s my main ride and then I do have a gravel bike. So that’s that’s tubeless and that has squirted gunk on me all difficult situations when I would have preferred to mate well, when I’ve had to put a tube in and, and deal with it like that. So far out in the world. There was nothing else to do. But um,

Carlton Reid 31:29
so as any one of us on this podcast is a is a tubular fan. I’m with you there, Max, I’m not writing to you.

James Hibbard 31:36
They’re a royal pain. So there’s no there’s no in many ways they’re they’re indefensible.

Max Leonard 31:42
It’s funny, I don’t I don’t know when high end clinches came in, in the USA because working on this Yoast Brand Book has has it when he was writing right the way through the 60s in the 70s he would be taking his his road bike out onto the dirt roads of the Santa Cruz Mountains with tubular tires and and then every Wednesday they’d have they’d call them patching parties. So everyone and they’d have they’d have like an assembly line of people doing jobs because to men that cheapen the tires, because obviously, you know, you’re pretty likely to get flat if you take a road bike out onto a dirt or gravel or rocky, rocky road but but I think the rough stuff fellowship who also like to take their bikes on suitable places, they always look to be riding them to be riding clinches with an inner tube. So maybe it was just the hot kind of higher end of clinches that didn’t come through in the States or maybe they’re just a different culture.

James Hibbard 32:47
Yeah, I think it was really a higher end closers that didn’t show up until about 2003 2004. To be honest, I mean, anything that one would want to race on. I mean, I remember it being very late for higher end clinchers. And that used to be a situation where, yeah, train on clinchers race on tubulars was sort of the, the go to through I’d say about like, man, like 2004 2005 I did it pretty late.

Carlton Reid 33:14
So So James, I want to I want to drag this back to your book, and I will drag us back to philosophy, even. But I want to start I mean, because because there is I’m gonna I absolutely want to get in and there is depression in your book. There’s suicides in your family in your book, and I absolutely don’t want to to not talk about them because they’re important parts of your book. But I’d like to talk about something that I don’t even even know how much you’re paying attention to this but as a former pro I’m guessing you must have at least a thought on this. So you talk about Lance Armstrong era in your book obviously and the doping parts of it but that that era you know famously and you describe the Moser the our record where you almost like date the how technology took over cycling your data from like the Moser, our successful beating the max record. But the Lance Armstrong era is when when I think what most people recognise that really has come to its absolute peak. When it’s very regimented. It’s fixated on equipment there’s there’s there’s doping. Oh, martyrs. There’s Mod all these sorts of marginal gains, you know, with which again with the sky team took to it instead of, but we’re now in the era, a different era. We’re in the era of pocket char. Who’s a throwback to mercs that riding on gut instinct and pain and strength. You know, the blood and guts kind of writing that maybe you grew up on because you in your book, you describe it about how much you you grew up on that kind of European fantasy of nine Tene 50s cycling, so I’m not going to bring into the into the philosophical realm. So my question is, is pocket char, if you are paying attention to to his feats right now, which are just super, super dominant. So is he an example of nature’s own image, not the Superman, as you quite rightly point out in your book, but overmatch

James Hibbard 35:25
that there’s certainly athletes that fall into the category. I’ve I think that as I’ve moved away from sport, I’ve become a little bit more measured in terms of an athlete’s ability to fully sort of fulfil. Nietzsche has overmatch category, I think that that there has to be a measure of of artistry in it as well. And I think that poker chart comes close on that front, I think that only time will tell sort of what, if anything, is is fully legitimate. And I still worry a little bit about that in the back of my mind about the sport. So I’m, that’s why I’m a little bit guarded. But certainly his sort of style of racing, I think, is refreshing, and absolutely good for the sport. As opposed to sort of what we were talking about, and what you alluded to the sort of sky Armstrong, not just not merely the doping, but as you mentioned, a very sort of marginal gains obsessive approach to the sport that makes for very boring viewership or not emotional racing, sort of just a game of power metres and attrition. So I think that that he’s absolutely closer to this sort of Nietzsche and ideal. But sort of given my distance to the sport, I always remain a bit a bit sceptical, and these things take as we’ve seen, not just the years, but sometimes decades to fully come out. So I think the the jury is still out a little bit to be

Max Leonard 37:03
honest, it’s very, it must be very difficult being being like a, like a sort of mid or late career pro cyclist at the moment, if you’re, let’s say, you’re like 28, or, or 30. Right? Because Because, because like because there’s this new generation of just totally come and blown everything away. And it’s like, they basically they have let anyone else have a chance and Pikachu is is obviously one of them. And but you know, you there’s Evan pool as well, right, even Tom Pidcock there’s just guys that seems, you know, pretty neat other level and kind of training and stuff that they do is,

James Hibbard 37:46
yeah, there’s a whole there’s a whole group of guys about a five to eight year age band that just appear to have been totally leapfrogged over. I mean, we went from like, yeah, Valverde to

Carlton Reid 37:57
pokitto.

James Hibbard 37:59
With with I don’t I don’t know the math off the top of my head for birth years there. But it there’s there’s a sort of a big, big, I’m being a bit hyperbolic there. But a pretty big goals in terms of, as you mentioned, Max, yeah, guys that are 28 to 3435, who just apparently that that generation just didn’t have the the talent and bubble that you see for, for some of the younger guys,

Carlton Reid 38:24
that probably just doesn’t seem to have a troubled background. So it’s relatively reasonably famous that, you know, the best athletes, or the perhaps the best entrepreneurs, the best of everything, tend to have some sort of damaged, family background, personal background, and that’s what makes them strive. Is that something that you recognise, James, is that something that?

James Hibbard 38:50
I think? Yeah, I think that I think it’s a double edged sword. I mean, I think that certainly a sort of troubled background driving someone’s succeed, properly can can sort of be spun into fuel. And, but I think there’s a razor thin line in terms of that fuel turning self destructive. So I think that that for some number of people, it works and some number of successful athletes, it works at least for a given period. But then I think that there’s there’s also I recall seeing years ago, and obviously this is extra convoluted by the matter of, of doping, but some East German studies about the psychological profiles of elite athletes, that sort of just found almost the opposite, that being calm, level headed, good family background, able to deal with setbacks. Well all of these sort of pretty straight laced psychological profiles actually succeed as professional athletes at a higher rate than the sort of pro Both characters who might turn bad childhoods or ill psychological health into results in their given sport. So I think that that’s a definite double edged sword.

Max Leonard 40:12
It’s an interesting one because I had a guy speak recently cool them think he’s a doctor Dr. Lou Hardy, Professor Lee Hardy. He’s a climber and as it was a became a top level sports psychologist and he was part of various studies where he was where he made it made a distinction between, quote unquote, normal Olympians ie those who just, you know, maybe get a bronze medal or maybe even a gold but don’t do it over and over again. And and the kind of multiple med medalists the people who produce and who, who outstrip up their own achievements year after year. And and his his conclusion was that yes, there was this kind of element in, in, in a lot of their parts, there’s a common element of having a really a troubled childhood or some kind of, you know, something missing that they were trying to make up for.

James Hibbard 41:12
I think that that’s an interesting distinction, I think makes sense. I mean, you can think of, for example, the American swimmer, Michael Phelps, who has been very candid about some mental health struggles after his retirement certainly fits that that category of super Olympian. So I think that that distinction seems super interesting to me, Max and spot on, as you sort of run through the laundry list of

Carlton Reid 41:39
James. That’s that at that point, because in your book, you’re very open about the depression. Yeah. And the mental health issues you went through. So again, without wishing to spoil the whole book, were you to this? Can you just summarise it? And talk about what you you mentioned in the book? And also, was the book cathartic for you? So did it actually help your mental health? writing it?

James Hibbard 42:12
So it’s a tackle that one tackling that one? First? I would say? Probably not. I think that that there’s this idea in terms of writing that.

I think perhaps writing that is not for public consumption. Can can be cathartic. But I think that when one is writing with the idea of the knowledge, contract sign, things like this, that a book is going to be consumed publicly. I think that there’s an entirely different mindset that a writer brings to it. And you have to move away from personal, perhaps indulgent catharsis, to sort of hopefully artistic success and something that’s pleasurable for a reader. So it ended up for me definitely, unfortunately, not being cathartic. But in terms of in terms of sort of general mental health, and the way I’ve thought about it and approached it. I think that the two, the two things that I’ve pursued very vigorously my life have been cycling and philosophy, where I certainly had the idea that I was going to be an academic philosopher for a time. And I think that both of those things, in retrospect, I was trying to outrun a lot of my own demons, and it’s difficult to tell the extent to which those demons are situational or environmental or genetic. As you mentioned, there certainly is a history of depression and suicide that runs through my family. And I think that that one one is struggling with mental health. Everyone is familiar with with Rene Descartes and this idea of Cartesian Dualism, and you certainly run into that on a minute by minute basis when you’re really struggling with with depression, you sort of think well, is this owing to some genetic predisposition constitution and the way certain neural chemicals are being taken up in my synapses? Or is this something that that I can think or snap my way out of? And, and, unfortunately, the snap my way out approach, as ridiculous as it sounds, to any sort of person who’s suffered with depression or mental health, there’s an odd temptation to it. And you can sort of think that, geez, if I just try harder, there’s some way out of this thing. And it’s, it’s a very tricky, bizarre thing to navigate. And I think for me that the thought was for me Initially, if I’m just a successful enough athlete, everything will feel better. And there’s something very tempting about having depression, having anxiety, and going and riding your bike for five hours and a difficult training session, you’re just exhausted, you’re no longer anxious, you’re no longer depressed. So I think that that the sort of obsessive nature and the striving of sport sort of kicked the ball of my mental health challenges from the first sort of, I confronted in my my late teens, kicked at much, much later. And then I saw some of those answers in the same things and philosophy thinking that boy, if I if I merely understand things, things are going to be different in my mind, and my outlook is going to be entirely changed. If I somehow grasp philosopher XYZ in some fundamental way, this will shift my my brain and hence my relationship to the world and in a very basic way that will be beneficial. And the the gist of the book is, both of those don’t work well.

Carlton Reid 46:10
You describe that very well, in the book, and you’ve certainly got a background that I didn’t have, in that you seem to have conversations with your parents and your father about sugar from a very early age your father, you can’t see any cycling background to the rest of your family. philosophy comes very much from your your father’s you are having deep conversations, and it seems from like 10 years old, with your father on philosophy, but is that right in saying your cycling is a disconnect with your family, but of course, the philosophy has come from your phone.

James Hibbard 46:48
Yeah, there’s more definitely more familial continuity with philosophy. My father studied philosophy under a relatively renowned Heidegger scholar in the 60s who came from Germany at Stanford. So very much a familial connection to particularly German philosophy through my father. And generally the fact that he was around the sort of Bay Area 1960s counterculture where this sort of whole idea of not just philosophy but philosophy, changing your mind and changing your perceptions, right, this sort of can Kizzy Timothy Leary, guided ideal of what thinking could do. And that reality,

Carlton Reid 47:35
as well. Yeah. Not just

James Hibbard 47:37
not just thinking but yeah, absolutely. Yes. bound up with with with psychedelic drugs and but sort of what I was exposed to it was a sort of, I suppose high brow psychedelia. Where, where? Yes, certainly, like drugs were discussed, but sort of in service of reality, not being what it appears on the face of it. And in retrospect, I’m not sure how useful this is to convey to to kids, to be honest.

Carlton Reid 48:12
But you see, you’ve come from a milieu which discussed drugs. Yeah, I’m not saying you took LSD, or your family took LSD. And then you went into a sport that was famously certainly in the era that you were in and you were disgusted. Yeah. That you’ve seen discussed that frequently. Not just in your own book, but forward. Other books, right. The Paul Kimmage book, right. So there’s drugs have suffused both parts of your world potentially and you haven’t partaken of either.

James Hibbard 48:43
That’s funny. I’ve never really connected the two to be honest. I’ve always thought of, I guess just performance enhancing drugs just being on a different planet than then sort of anything psychedelic

Carlton Reid 48:57
Mind Mind enhancing drugs. Yeah. So what is body? Mind enhancing?

James Hibbard 49:03
Yeah, I just, I honestly, never really thought of them in the same sentence. And yeah, to be candid to begin, and like, while I was a teenager, I did with a good high school friend

took psilocybin and thought it was very interesting, thought that it was nothing I needed to return to continually it was not the I don’t know if you’re familiar, I mentioned Alan Watts, the sort of English popularizer of Zen, who had a long standing Barry of radio programme. He sort of, there’s a quote from him that I always remember when it comes to psychedelic drugs which was you know, once you get the phone call, you hang up you sort of have this experience, you realise that that reality is not constituted as the way your your teachers and your mentors and your parents and and the sort of local Lions Club would How do you believe If and then you take that information and live differently and hopefully better in a more sincere way than then everyone going to a nine to five job. And that was the sort of message that that I’ve received not only growing up, but also was was the one that permeated the cycling culture that I found.

Max Leonard 50:19
I think that’s really interesting, because because I think that the sense that you get, at least partly in in the US is that cycling is a is a kind of rebellion, isn’t it, it’s kind of against the, against car culture. And it was a very much a subculture for a long time. And from what I’ve read, and people I’ve spoken to, you know, Northern California was, you know, a kind of hotbed of, of cycling, and in a country that didn’t much care about it for for a long, long, long time. And, but I you know, I went to Palo Alto, which is not far away from where you are, last year to talk, guys and, and just as, it’s kind of, like, magical, and you’ve got these amazing mountains, and it’s beautiful, and like, like we’ve seen the sun shines most of the time. And then you’ve got these, you know, you’ve got the kind of rebels of cycling you’ve got the Gary Fisher’s and the and the Tom Richards and Joe breezes and Charlie Cunningham of the guys who invented a new thing and had like, kind of amazing attitude that comes through in New York, that part of California and so many different ways, but I was Why do you think cycling and and you’re a part of California and has been such a fruitful kind of thing?

James Hibbard 51:36
What is it? First of all, I think it’s very much changed. I mean, I think that that that sort of counterculture was allowed to flourish before Google and Apple and and sort of the financial pressures have come to dominate the Bay Area and the Santa Clara Valley and Palo Alto. Now to such an extent that I think that sort of counterculture is is really being greatly squelched. So I think that was, first of all, a sort of cultural snapshot moment from, say, the 50s, through perhaps the early 90s, if you’re being generous. But I think that the reason that that, that that confluence of factors allowed for cycling to be the sort of counterculture thing was, first of all, the the number of universities that are very close proximity. There’s Stanford University, obviously, in Palo Alto, University of California at Santa Cruz, UC Berkeley, San Jose State. So there’s a huge clustering of of universities and the sort of energy that comes from young people in universities and the counterculture. And I think that going back to psychedelic drugs, there were even a lot of government experiments about the usages of the usage of LSD for more nefarious purposes. Those were done at the Palo Alto VA. People like Ken kz, were very famously involved in some of those experiments. So going back to colleges, I don’t know if if this is the case in the UK, but almost all psych experiments throughout the 20th century were done on college undergraduates, including psychedelic drugs by the US government. So I think that that’s an interesting compounding historical factor that drove some of this.

Carlton Reid 53:40
And interestingly, the Yes, Max, the absolutely the amazing cycling culture of the Bay Area is just Yes, it’s amazing. But you’ve also got almost counter to that, in that Palo Alto, is the home of vehicular cycling. So John Forrester, that’s where he was was nabbed for cycling on the sidewalk at one point, which then leads to a huge movement of, you know, rejecting bike paths, you know, for for a good time in America. And you could almost argue that America or that that part of America has given Yes, and mountain biking and counterculture of cycling, but it’s also given you 2030 years of not going down the Dutch route and not asking for bike paths because we’re policemen pulling over a cyclist John Forrester in Palo Alto.

Max Leonard 54:37
Interesting, interested know that I didn’t know that.

James Hibbard 54:40
I didn’t know that either. It I’m not I’m not surprised, though, in a lot of ways, because I do think that what’s what’s difficult to pin down, I suppose about any complex intellectual problem or cultural area, but the number of sort of competing threads and To weird enigmatic things where you try and sort of pin something down as being bike friendly hub. And then you have an example like that sort of pushing all against it. And I think that that those sort of enigmas are throughout the the Bay Area’s DNA in a lot of ways.

Carlton Reid 55:20
I guess because you’ve got, yeah, you’ve got both pro and con there at the same time, because it’s such a rabid bicycling culture, you’re gonna get both sides of it. And at this, at this juncture, I would like to cut for an ad break. So I’m gonna go across to my colleague, David, who also happens to be in America.

David Bernstein 55:36
Hello, everyone. This is David from the Fredcast. And of course, the spokesmen. And I’m here once again to tell you that this podcast is brought to you by Tern bicycles, the good people at Tern build bikes that make it easier for you to replace car trips with bike trips. Part of that is being committed to designing useful bikes that are also fun to ride. But an even greater priority for Tern, is to make sure that your ride is safe, and worryfree. And that’s why turn works with industry leading third party testing labs like E FB, E, and builds it bikes around Bosch ebike systems, which are UL certified for both electric and fire safety. So before you even zip off on your Tern, fully loaded, and perhaps with a loved one behind, you can be sure that the bike has been tested to handle the extra stresses on the frame, and the rigours of the road. For more information, visit www.ternbicycles.com to learn more. And now back to the spokesmen.

Carlton Reid 56:47
And we are back had Thanks, David. We are back with James Hibbard, author of a philosophy book, a cycling book, a book about a nice trip with his mates, going to almost credit card touring because you sent your your your stuff ahead and you you didn’t carry stuff on your bike. So you sent stuff ahead, James. And we also had Max Leonard, who as we heard in the intro is an author of a goodly number of fantastic books on a wide range of very Catholic interest you’ve got on cycling, I can’t even think about thread that pulls them all together. James, I want to because we’re talking about your book is is philosophy book. Nietzsche is probably one of the philosophers that may be cyclists, if not understand, the most certainly quote the most because you know that that quote, the famous quote, you know, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger? Well, that’s that’s a Nietzsche, quote, to link it to max. Nietzsche, of course, also loved suffering in the high mountains, so that there’s that kind of link. But Nietzsche was also appropriated by the Nazis and not his fault, but he was appropriated by the Nazis. So maybe he’s not the best feller for cyclists to follow. After all, I give, give, give the maybe the positive sides of Nietzsche, and why we should discuss Nietzsche.

James Hibbard 58:16
So I think the positive sides of Nietzsche are immense. I think that that his Nazi appropriation was very unfortunate. And he’s someone who’s easily appropriated owing to his style. You sort of thumb through Nietzsche and you can you find some examples certainly have his anti anti semitism. And in fact, his concerns about Germans in Germany. So Nietzsche is an interesting character on that front. But where where I think Nietzsche is truly fascinating is when you look through the history, and the sort of thrust of 2500 years of Western philosophy. It’s increasingly from Plato on driven by this idea of abstraction. So you walk into any sort of intro to philosophy class, and when Plato or Platonism is explained, it’s essentially like, Hey, you can have a table, this table here in front of us, the professor knocks on and touches, is going to eventually rot and decay and go back Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, but the idea of a table is solid and everlasting and immutable, and beautiful in a way that any actual table never is. So you end up with ideas and concepts being more important, and in some ways, more quote, unquote, real than an actual table. And I think what’s very interesting is this is allowed I would for tremendous success and scientific progress, because you’re dealing with with concepts. But implicit in that is also a sort of denial of things that are that are nearest tangible, actual things, actual tables made of wood in front of you. And you can see this same sort of, of tendency, certainly in Silicon Valley. So I think that this idea that philosophy doesn’t matter or some silly, useless discipline is is just on the face of it not true, you can see that that idea is in fact, massively important to this day, this idea of the abstract and intangible mattering more than the tangible so we’re Nietzsche comes into this is Nietzsche diagnosis this right at the at the end of the 19th. Nietzsche just to orient everyone who might not be the sort of familiar Nietzsche dies, and very symbolically in the year 1900. So Nietzsche sort of sees the end of famously not only declares God dead, this sort of Judeo Christian, true belief in God, but also senses that this platonic Christian denying of the world and of bodies is is an incredibly dangerous tactic. And in fact, one that is the hallmark of, of modernity. So I think that that Nietzsche is interesting for for a number of reasons. But that is really the crux of where I wanted to engage Nietzsche, this, this desire to what he do what he calls overcome metaphysics, overcome this idea to that, that the abstract matters more than the tangible. So cycling is tied in here and as much as it’s clearly a very tangible thing to do. And, and a very Nietzsche and thing to do and as much as demands presence. It demands a tangible visceral engagement, rather than an abstract one.

Carlton Reid 1:02:11
They don’t get on a bike, because he would have liked bikes, wouldn’t he? I mean, if he died in 1900, How old was he died about he died,

James Hibbard 1:02:20
he died relatively young and was in a sanitarium. He famously debated what what took place with him, but he spent the last the last decade of his life in the sanitarium under the essential conservatorship of his sister, Elizabeth, so

Carlton Reid 1:02:38
I’m just I’m just trying to roughly black out but he must have been

James Hibbard 1:02:40
he certainly saw I’m sure he saw early bicycles, but I don’t think there’s any evidence that he actually ever rode one.

Carlton Reid 1:02:49
His is because if he’d been frightened the right time to be it’d been 30 years old. Yeah, roughly, ya know, when when bicycles first came on the scene, so he he would have been right before getting on, he wouldn’t be surprised. He hasn’t. He

James Hibbard 1:03:01
was in ill health, he had poor eyesight, he had poor digestion. So I think that’s the other interesting thing autobiographically, about Nietzsche, is that for all of his talk about sort of virility and physical strength, he was, in fact, a relatively sickly individual from from the time he was a professor. And that’s why he left his professorship in fact, was just poor physical health, sort of going from from one spot in southern Europe to another sort of looking for better air or general recuperation

Carlton Reid 1:03:41
mountain air.

James Hibbard 1:03:41
Exactly.

Max Leonard 1:03:43
He was a big aficionado of the mountains wasn’t a and and a big Walker, I think I think he was very much embodied in that sense is that he you know, walking and thinking were quite well interconnected for him

James Hibbard 1:03:57
walking, thinking, hiking, all all of that. So certainly, yes, fresh air, physic Alpine physicality, we’re, we’re, it’s all sprinkled throughout his writings. There’s also

Max Leonard 1:04:09
the kind of, I didn’t know much about Nietzsche before I read James’s book. But you know, he’s a kind of easy caricature as well. And there’s a re cycling sort of element to it. Like, I’m just I’m thinking about Henri de Mirage, the guy who started the Tour de France, and this idea of of, you know, surpassing yourself and going beyond your abilities and the Tour de France, the first sort of the ideal race is something often quoted by Henri de grandes because I’ve never found the actual quote so it could just be apocryphal but the perfect order France be one where only one guy crosses the finish line, you know, that is stripped away everyone else and everyone else has fallen by the wayside and you know, expired because they’re, they’re not strong enough, and there’s this one sort of thing. Uber men’s guy is gonna it’s gonna win. I think it’s obviously kind of caricaturing and you know, using the, the perception of Nietzsche that without actually knowing much about him, but I think it’s all quite feels quite relevant and close, doesn’t it to a certain attitude? It’s like,

James Hibbard 1:05:20
No, I think it certainly does. And I think that that it’s funny, I mean, the, from the Tour de France to sixth day racing to sort of, I’ve heard about, you know, dance contests that go on for 72 hours straight or something, it seemed like, like it was in the air in that era, this sort of whole going to one’s absolute physical limit, physical exhaustion, these sort of feats of endurance. And yeah, I couldn’t agree more Max in terms of them being very, sort of self overcoming, Nietzsche in. And I think that’s what’s key to understanding Nietzsche, I think it’s easy to read Nietzsche, poorly, and sort of think that it’s this sort of outward process of winning or beating other people or succeeding as a capitalist or something, something awful like that. But for Nietzsche, it’s very artistic and very self overcoming as opposed to beating out a system.

Carlton Reid 1:06:26
And then you mentioned in your book, James about the style and his style was important to Nietzsche, they managed to define what he meant by style.

James Hibbard 1:06:35
So I think that what he means by style is very much what we’re talking about in terms of not just doing something on a sort of external basis, not merely succeeding, not merely looking at your your power metre and winning l’Alpe d’Huez, but rather attacking with one kg to go doggedly after having been dropped and then winning. Right. It’s, it’s, it’s sort of how something is done that matters to him. Because you’re taking your own will and imposing it upon yourself. So I think,

Carlton Reid 1:07:12
isn’t there like a, sorry, isn’t there like a quiet, you just described this in the book as well, there’s this, there’s quite a lot of, you know, underdog stuff in cycling, and the person who comes second is actually more important, more famous and more lauded in cycling than the person who comes first by pure, you know, skill. It’s the one who strive and fail, right, so the failure is quite a big thing in cycling.

James Hibbard 1:07:40
I think that maths can speak to this too, from from his first lantern Rouge book, and as much as I think that there’s, there’s something very French to say about that, about not, not respecting, not being obsessed with just the winner, but the sort of perennial second place, even the the final finish are in the Tour de France, and sort of really respecting that. And I think that there’s something that perhaps Max can even speak to that is very intrinsic to French culture, and French racing, cycling culture around that. I mean, it seems like there’s a perennial Tour de France contender who never quite succeeds who’s always French.

So I think there’s something culturally to that

Max Leonard 1:08:30
that’s that’s funny. I hadn’t thought of that but I can see I think you’re right and you know, the most recent example would be Tebow Pino and well and that the poor guy was never really given a chance he was so over it’s such such a passion there you know in French cycling style gets so much energy exposure and pressure heaped upon them I think and and you’re right for every for every jacket on Catia. There’s there’s a Roman Pulido who is the eternal secondaries coming on behind him and the US for lunch and Rouge it I don’t know how that how it really happened it I think it was a sort of spontaneous I think the underdog feeling is is pretty is British as well, I think we’d go for the underdog whereas in in the in the US I think might be sort of more straightforwardly rooting for for the winner but but in Britain we like the underdog in France. The lantern roof definitely came about in the first 10 years of the tour. So it happened pretty quickly. It was it was pretty much there before world war one as far as I can tell, though, I haven’t found the first reference to it in print. But the French public really took it took it to heart They you know, they would make a Red Lantern and give it to the rider for the last stage into Paris and the carrot or the carrot along with his teammates would hang it over his head

Carlton Reid 1:10:10
so it was it was it always proudly from from the from the get go so it wasn’t like a shame mark of shame it was I’m carrying this proudly was that early

Max Leonard 1:10:19
know it from it seems so and and then sort of post Second World War you’d get with the kind of explosion in not just cycling media but all media you know with with the with the kind of mirrors sprint and those kind of picture magazines and then the radio and then TV with with media and with the sponsorship that came in the last guy it would would become quite famous and he’d get invited to all the post tour. criteriums. So, you know, these, were talking about a time and you know, the Domestique the team riders would be making really, really terrible money compared with the champions or even with a, you know, anyone else and so they’d get to earn you know, maybe their whole year salary in a couple of weeks after the tour or you know, or more than that. So, so it became very attractive and it became it became identity I didn’t never know completely positive feelings about it ever and left definitely people that felt ashamed come last but but you know, on the other hand, that say you’ve got a guy who, who, thinking in 1993, a guy called Jackie do wrong, who won the Tour of Flanders in an incredibly long break, which that was his his main major achievement in his career. But then he became lanten Rouge in 1993. After a terrible, terrible crash in I think it was stage three, and was fighting along injured and it became became a matter of pride. But he stayed in the race and, you know, pushed on to the end. And actually, he was a sort of very mercurial character always attacking and he got the the convertibility prize as well. So in that particular year, the lantern rouge, the last guy in the race got to stand on the podium at the Sean’s Elisa alongside none other than Lance Armstrong. Yeah, I think it’s in for the French public as well, I think the French, you know, proletariat always had a, you know, stick when I put the government or the you know, the rule is the authority is that kind of thing. So I think there might be an element of that, and it take

James Hibbard 1:12:46
well, and I do think it’s interesting, I think you hit the nail on the head Max in terms of, of American culture, as opposed to either British or French culture on this front. And I mean, we sort of keep, we keep dancing around it to some degree. But I think that what’s what’s very interesting is the way the sport changed, not just in the Bay Area, but sort of demographically, in a post Armstrong era. I mean, the sport went from what we’re talking about, sort of in Northern California to being the sort of from being this sort of counterculture exercise, too. I’ve heard cycling described as the new golf amongst like venture capitalists in in Palo Alto, and things like that. So I think it very much changed. And I think there was a particular cultural moment, that was far larger than cycling, that you can sort of put the Armstrong era under the heading of write you sort of, I think, now with a little bit of distance, we can think and reflect back about not just someone like Armstrong, but a general, let’s say from, you know, the late 90s through arbitrarily here or something like 2005 2010, this sort of Nike driven, when it all costs Bernie Madoff type, cultural moment. That was perhaps American lead, but certainly global. It and I think that that’s an interesting way to start to think about the Armstrong era, in a perspective that transcend cycling,

Carlton Reid 1:14:24
because in your book, Jamie, you mentioned that the biggest insult, you could say to an American, is it you’re a loser. Absolutely. That’s that’s like, and that brings like the Trump thing, you know, when when he says, you know, you’re a loser, that that’s where that’s coming from that there’s a very loaded term, whereas what we’re discussing before about you can be the loser you can be the lantern Rouge in in a European perspective, and that’s absolutely fine. And there’s, there’s lots of examples of, you know, heroic failures have been, you know, loaded, whereas you’re saying in the American culture, it’s winner takes all that’s it. Yeah. Ah, no, I

James Hibbard 1:15:00
think that that is absolutely correct and and very insightful to even invoke Trump in this instance, it and I think that yes, the sort of American game of winner take all capitalism was applied to the sport of cycling with the US Postal Service Team to disastrous results. And I think that when you do a little bit of digging about who the backers of that team were, it also becomes very apparent. I mean, they’re, they’re American Finance billionaires. So I think that there’s a very particular American, we are going to win by whatever means necessary ethos that was applied to the sport of cycling, for the first time. And sure enough, a lot of Tour de France is were won in scare quotes. But I think that that particular moment, obviously, was very damaging to the sport, and in very matte, very damaging, culturally. And I think we’re still sort of backing our way out of that, in a lot of regards.

Carlton Reid 1:16:10
But as we’ve mentioned before, the pocket child thing is that the air is, is cleaning that yeah, is almost making that just a bad membrane. You know, we have, we have a mercs of today, right? Doing superhuman stuff, Nietzsche and stuff. But without the drugs without the marginal gains, it almost seems as though you could be on any bus, right? Who cares? What, on you know, who cares where they wash their duvet? Or that, you know, they take the shower? You probably doesn’t need that, you know, he doesn’t need a pocket chart is just a superhuman. He’s just an Uber man. Right? Yeah,

James Hibbard 1:16:43
no. And I think that that’s absolutely great for the sport, that that’s that’s the case. And you’re right, that he’s he’s on a Colnago. And not, there’s not some huge push in terms of this is the newest, greatest lightest bike. It’s I think that’s nothing but good. In an era where super bikes are now costing 10 or $12,000. I mean, it’s great.

Carlton Reid 1:17:09
In the book, you do you do make the point that you’re you’re on the cusp of this era, where people were still riding bikes that are custom built for them. And then you came in and you’re, you’re the bride that you did with your mates across California was on an on your last bike, which was carbon, but you kind of you remembered the days of steel, and, and, and and maybe even experimenting with certain materials, but then carbon comes in, and how much do you think carbon has killed? The aesthetics, the feel of the road, that all of that kind of romantic stuff that you talk about in your book, but carbon potentially has killed a lot of that and it’s just a mass produced Chinese product?

James Hibbard 1:17:57
I think it has to some extent, I think it’s kind of unfortunate. I mean, I remember just images of Ernesto catalogo shop or, you know, consulting with mercs about the our record bike and things that were just beautiful where bicycle frame was bespoke individual come sort of thing rather than merely a commodity. sort of put into context. I turned professional with a team called Shaklee in 2000. And as soon as the ink was dry on the contract in the fall, we sent our measurements for custom steel frame sets, with aluminium frames for the road, or for the track, which were also custom. But I think that was about really near the end of that, and probably one of the last professional squads to be on Handmade Italian steel frames, which is American rebadged. rebatch is American but Italian made. And I think that obviously you can’t get away with that with carbon frames any longer. And yeah, just as you say, the fact that sort of, they’ve become a bicycle frame has gone from this sort of magical thing that is that is made by a particular builder for particular rider to a commodity. It’s unfortunate, but I think it’s also difficult to claim that a steel bike is objectively better from any performance metric. Perhaps you can make an argument about the way it resonates over the road and things like that certainly durability but if you’re looking to so where do

Carlton Reid 1:19:40
you stand on this? Are you a carbon guy? Are you a old school steel guy? What are you where do you sit on the spectrum?

Max Leonard 1:19:49
I I have I have owned I’ve owned bikes in in most most common materials. I was just started thinking about bamboo and Things like that can be bought in aluminium, steel carbon, and I’ve enjoyed them all I now have two three beautiful steel handmade friends and I think the aesthetics of it is it will always something will always look right to me about a steel road frame with with a horizontal top tube. I’m lucky that I think the bikes in my size are the best looking bikes I think the proportions of even that kind of thing are all All right, but one of my bikes actually made made by a company called spinner in Santa Barbara. So not Yes,

James Hibbard 1:20:47
I know I know spinner frames Well, yes, those are beautiful.

Max Leonard 1:20:51
Yeah, is it a beautiful bike but but I didn’t get to go and see see them and talk to them about it in person but but with my feather, which is my road bike that was made up by Ricky feather in Yorkshire and to be able to go and chat with someone and see the workshop and at you know, actually, the it’s a 54 centimetre square frame it’s in some ways it’s not remarkable that I was there from the start. And we talked over everything and considered everything and took in the input and thought about the angles and materials and you know, little tiny little custom bespoke things that he wanted to do that that’s what what makes it it’s made it special. And I just realised actually talking to some guys about it realise that that bite now is 10 years old, which is incredible. And it still feels just as good and fast. And I love riding just as much and my carbon bike I never had the same connection to it was objectively it was a faster and lighter and all of those kinds of things, but but it just didn’t feel feel the same emotionally.

Carlton Reid 1:22:02
So steel is real. So this this obsessing over equipment and this this is also in your your book. James, you talk about, you know, the feeling of the sizing of God as going to be writing like the kind of merch, right, you know, every millimetre has got a count on your bike, and you clearly were obsessive. And you talked about how obsessive Yeah, yeah, and all of the equipment choices. You are making your time now that you mentioned before about cycling, being the new golf or golf also attracts that creative feeling, you know, people you know, choosing the right goal, fine. I know what the description of what these things are called. But anyway, the right kind of, you know, golf bits that you hit the white ball with, you know, it also attracts the same kind of obsession with it with equipment, but that that also attracts oddballs, outsiders and outliers. So both golf and cycling attract those kind of people. Is that fair to say? I fair to all cyclists that.

James Hibbard 1:23:10
Yeah, I think that no, I think that’s it’s an apt

comparison. And I don’t I’ve look, I’ve increasingly sort of as I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to appreciate the sport of golf. So I don’t want to sort of poopoo on it by any means. But I think the reason that I sort of invoked golf there was the fact that I think that there’s there’s some socio economic things at play, where I think that certainly I would not have become a bike racer, as a junior, if a sort of entry level bike that I could raise a local cat for criterium, Junior criterium on cost $4,000, it just simply wouldn’t have happened and I was outgrowing them every six or eight months. So I think that from a sheer sort of who is going to be included and brought to the table of development as a young junior I’m a little bit concerned about the bicycle as eight or $10,000 commodity and the the sort of club system in the United States where you would get a hand me down by that all has sort of languished and been been superseded by coaches and and everything has to be paid for. So I think that we’re talking about equipment, talking about elite development and and anything else this sort of question of demography and inclusion looms large and and I just want to make certain that it doesn’t become a sport for the elite and I don’t think that cycling has ever been True traditionally, a sort of elitist sport. It’s been a European sort of working class sport. So you’d be

Carlton Reid 1:24:57
in favour then of the UCI bringing in old The regulations to stop technology

James Hibbard 1:25:02
Oh, I think whatever happens at the elite level, that’s an even Enough playing field. I think at the at the pro level, everyone’s being given bikes by suppliers. That’s not a problem. I mean, I’m concerned about the about the 11 or 12 year old whose parents saunter into a bike shop, looking for something that’s that’s, or even looking at the used market for something that’s a capable bike, and it’s just cost prohibitive. So I think that that’s, that’s where this conversation about equipment, really where the proverbial rubber meets the road. And I worry a little bit about some of those costs, and, and bicycles as expensive, merely expensive commodities.

Carlton Reid 1:25:44
So so let me bring it back a little bit to philosophy and anti cycling at the same time, and I’m just gonna quote you some Yeah, on your book there. James. So this is a quote from you. Cycling is at once profoundly social, and a tensely an intensely attractive to loners, and outsiders. So that’s what we are before anyway. So this sense of alienation of feeling cut off not just from one trues one’s true self, but from society, pulses through the very veins of existentialism. So why does it pull through the veins? Why is cycling? Can cycling be likened to that.

James Hibbard 1:26:27
So I think that, let’s go back to like, I’ll give you a sort of personal story to sort of illustrate this. I remember being like many people were at this age, I don’t know what it’s called in the UK, but in in what we call in the United States middle school. So I think I was maybe 12 or 13 years old, in seventh or eighth grade. And I remember, we were sort of on and I described this in the book, but the school I attended, there’s a sort of like elevated area with basketball courts and a chain link fence, which in retrospect, looked rather almost prison yard like, and I thought the whole thing was kind of kind of stupid, we had to do stupid things that I thought were either inane or, or boring or both. And we were positioned, though from this vantage point above a relatively large Boulevard that connected San Jose and Morgan Hill. And I remember seeing a pack of cyclists behind their team car on, I don’t know what must have been 11 on a weekday, and not just being attracted to it, but being attracted to the fact that they seemed far freer than than my life. It was a weekday, they weren’t stuck in commute traffic, they weren’t going to algebra class, they were on their bicycles going 35 miles an hour behind the team car. And that struck me as just the absolute epitome of freedom. And looping it back to philosophy, existentialism too. And just to sort of bring listeners up to speed existentialism is a predominantly French, but also German, essentially postwar philosophical movement that’s very concerned with human agency and freedom and questions of meaning, sort of in the in the wake of the Second World War. How do we create meaning in this after this? I don’t know what can only be described as moral atrocity for humanity. How do you sort of go on in the wake of every cultural norm being shattered in the face of that? And and sort of people like John Paul Sartre say that it’s in our absolute freedom. So there’s a clear sort of through line for the freedom that sort of being described by the existentialists the the freedom that I saw on the sport of cycling, and the freedom that I think is a very, particularly probably you guys can correct me if I’m wrong, but particularly American, sort of counterculture idea, this sort of wet Old West, hyper freedom. Reality is what you make it idea, all of those sorts of things were swirling in my head, and I think, brought me to the sport of cycling for that reason.

Carlton Reid 1:29:32
James, he talked about freedom. And in the beginning, the book you talk about, when you first got on a bike, it was like flat Yeah, that’s a very, very common, a very common way of describing riding, so that that freedom is is obvious when you’re going down, you know, a sinewy beautiful road ride in your neck of the woods. Yeah, in Northern California, but that that team comes Yeah, and bunch of riders behind being you equated that to free. When you read your book, that description of your youthful cycling experiences when you brought in the Olympic programme and all that kind of stuff is described talk to me like a monk. Yeah, you weren’t in a cult, you you you were not free, you are very much going along in a prescribed programme, following you know, a biblical texts in effect. You know, the Kony manual, what you mentioned was a religious experience. You were you were a monk, if you described your your your ascetic lifestyle, you know, and you took away the bike that is basically a Zen monk, you are you are just doing stuff that a religious order would do. No, you’re that wire is that’s very astute in that that team car? Well, I think what’s

James Hibbard 1:30:52
interesting about that is in the difficulty with with the American concept of freedom writ large is freedom to do what you sort of freedom is the sort of openness. And then the question quickly becomes, oh, shit, what do I do now? What do I do with this newfound openness? And and unfortunately, the responses are far more. And you see this throughout existentialist informed fiction and film, the responses are far more difficult to sort of formulate anything coherent on the other side of that freedom, then the sort of the wrestling against it is that is the easy part. So as you say, Yeah, I think I was able to escape the sort of restrictions of being an adolescent and attending school, I was able to move to the Olympic Training Centre. And to me that felt like that exit from the life of my peers felt like freedom. But in fact, it was far less free probably than than what my peers were doing at the time. It was very nutrition based sounds like

Unknown Speaker 1:32:08
prison. It was,

James Hibbard 1:32:09
I think the models that were imposed at the time by the Cycling Federation were very Eastern Bloc, it was essentially let’s let’s put several 100 Junior talent identified through competition or physiological testing or whatever else, put them into a proverbial meat grinder. And at the end of this, we will have one world champion. And at the junior and youth 23 level there, there were some world champions that came out of of that may loo but unfortunately, there were a lot of also a lot of other rather talented athletes that that washed out of that system. Looking back now, it’s just I was essentially like, an endurance track rider who could who could ride a kilometre or Team Pursuit. So relatively short events, and looking back now at at training logs and things that I kept. There were times where I was literally doing 35 hours a week on a bike plus strength training, plus additional ergometer workouts. So it was just it was absolutely crazy by today’s standards. And like I say, very attrition based staring at rollers and we were not to drop below 90 RPM or or the coach would admonish us it was lots of going so hard. I threw up and collapsing in the shower after rides and just wondering how I was possibly going to do the next day of training.

Carlton Reid 1:33:44
So are you still cycling?

James Hibbard 1:33:46
Very little, very little. I’ve got got a young son. I’ve had problems with my eyesight, so and some corneal transplants. So I basically have have just taken to running and the occasional day on the trainer. So not a whole lot to be honest. Because your

Carlton Reid 1:34:05
family is clearly important to you. Yeah. In the book, you mentioned your wife, you mentioned Graham, your child Yeah. Frequently, they’ve clearly grounded you and have suffused your life with something above and beyond the kind of the meaning that you are maybe trying to get by being a competitive cyclist.

James Hibbard 1:34:27
Absolutely. I think that that, for me that the entire sort of trajectory of the book is back to not just the tangible, but back to being capable of loving things in the tangible world. Without fear. I think there’s a lot of people that sort of escape. Escape the realities and the impermanence of the world through either trying to achieve things or through it desiring things that stand outside of space and time and are thus safe. And I think that the sort of confidence to love and return to the world is really the primary thread that I hope to convey in the book. And I think, frankly, the only, for me at least the only conceivable way forward.

Carlton Reid 1:35:23
Now the note that I made when I was reading your book, and I, of course I’m plagiarising here is I cycle, therefore I am. Because that’s what it is across as it’s like cycling is it certainly was for that part of your life, something that defined you. But you’re not showing you’re not you’re no longer cycling, no longer defined, you know, and I

James Hibbard 1:35:50
think that I think it’s very easy to, for young athletes to be defined by their sport. I mean, you sort of think of the incredible sort of feedback that one gets, as a young athlete in almost any sort of town in America. I mean, I remember being on the cover of local paper when you’re 1415. And you just sort of assume this identity, and it’s the sort of shorthand identity that is sufficient, and you’re recognised for it, and everything feels good in a very superficial, straightforward way. And I think that a lot of the mental health challenges that that sort of athletes confront after they’re done with their sport, is shedding that identity. Because it’s, it becomes so baked in, and sort of coming up with a new identity away from your sport is not an easy process.

Carlton Reid 1:36:49
So when you’re on that TV programme, but the Oprah Winfrey style TV programme of Trinidad and Tobago, and you were described as an American cyclist, and you got this big kick, yeah, I had been called an American cyclist it defined, what are you now if you are if you’re on the programme today, how would you describe yourself?

James Hibbard 1:37:11
I’d hope to be not easily defined other than by my relationships with the people that I’m closest to and care about. I think that sort of the moniker is like that. And this is perhaps where I show show some of my cards, I suppose, politically, or economically or something. But I think that that sort of monikers, like that, that are easy to categorise, are sort of always end up being reductive and dangerous and work real well if you’re trying to sell yourself as an identity in a sort of hyper capitalist system, but I think that they’re dangerous and dehumanising. So I think that perhaps writer I’m a little bit more comfortable with, but beyond that, I think that that it’s it’s dangerous territory,

Max Leonard 1:38:06
it’s, it’s tough, isn’t it? I think that, you know, you can invest? And I did and do and lots of people do, you can invest so much in the idea of being a cyclist with inverted commas, right. But then that can get back and get taken away from you in so many ways. Like, if you’re a pro, then then your career may, you know, come come to an end, I had a, you know, a pretty, like, long term injury, that meant I didn’t ride my bike for eight years. And so suddenly, okay, I’m not exactly just, what am I? It’s quite a, you know, it’s, there’s a hole to fill there. And it’s probably the same about being a writer because, you know, quite a lot of the time, the vast majority of the time being a writer, you’re not actually writing enough, right. A point Yeah. No, well, and and I think, you know, cite the idea of it’s the cyclist has been, you know, kind of embellished and garnished and it’s been marketed to us as well. And then you know, as as a kind of lifestyle, but it’s not, it’s not, it’s not an easy path to stay on, even if, you know, with everything going in your favour,

Carlton Reid 1:39:24
because we’re technically not cyclists right now. Where assets where we’re sitting, we are not cycling yet. I certainly me and Max, we would if somebody had to say what would you Yeah, I would say I’m a cyclist. But yeah, you’re not doing it right the second time. So why are you a cyclist? You’re not physically doing it now?

Max Leonard 1:39:45
No, I’ve never shown somebody to talk about as a party because you’re always the guy that you people can talk to about, you know, the, you know, what’s wrong with their breaks or what kind of like they want to buy or that kind of thing for us is, you know, is that the a foundation of the dangerous opposition between cyclists and motorists, because I bet that, you know, the majority of cyclists, a lot of cyclists anyway, know how to drive a car. And quite a lot of people who drive cars also ride bikes. And yet

Carlton Reid 1:40:15
somebody generally wouldn’t say they were like, if they’re away from the car, they wouldn’t say, I’m a motorist, it wouldn’t define wouldn’t define them, whereas cyclists, it defines them. Many, many signs.

James Hibbard 1:40:25
And I think what you raise Max is dead bang on. I think that that as potentially sort of banal as it sounds, the sort of people coming up to you at dinner party or cocktail hour and asking about your breaks or your training or whatever else. And I can certainly vouch that when one’s highly competitive cyclist or a pro that’s only exacerbated tenfold. So So that sort of whole sort of idea of this is, your entire identity is I think that the real danger for any, any elite athlete. And I think then

Carlton Reid 1:41:06
it is a philosophical problem, if you’re identifying as one thing is that something that the philosophers can talk to us about?

James Hibbard 1:41:15
I think it’s both a philosophical problem, and also a psychological one. from a philosophical perspective. I mean, I used I think I used the word a few sentences ago sort of reductive, where you can sort of say that you’re sort of this is a thread, particularly in in Sartre, but you can sort of think of any person sort of being defined by one character quality, or one aspect of their selfhood sort of working well to exploit them in some way, but not really fully grasping every element of their humanity. And I think that that certainly applies here. And I think that that Sartre was astute on that front, as were many of the existential, it’s this sort of idea of there being an essential quality about a particular person. So I think that that there is something philosophical to say, and it highlights some of the dangers that that existentialism points out to the previous 2500 years of philosophical thought,

Carlton Reid 1:42:31
James at that point, and that that seems like to be even though I want to carry on talking and I could certainly absolutely talk to both you and Max for many more hours. I think we have got to stop at some point we do. Thank you. First of all, Max, if you can tell me more tell the listeners where they can get hold of your books and then we’ll come to James and get the exact same so websites all that kind of stuff, where can we get your book

Max Leonard 1:42:58
you can get my books in the proverbial all good bookshops and also the big online ones that I would urge you not to buy from going buy from an independent bookshop. But if you want to buy direct from me which is brilliant because it means that a lot more of the money of the cover price goes into my deserving pocket. You my my publisher website is is an oppressed.com it is a Lowe’s I wish I’d chosen a company name that people knew how to pronounce or spell but i s o l a press.com. And on there you can find the books that I wrote for other publishers and plus the ones that I’ve published myself including the Yoast soon, and raster fellowships, stuff like that

Carlton Reid 1:43:45
brilliant and James where can we get the art of cycling philosophy?

James Hibbard 1:43:48
So the art of cycling is available. As Max said, all good book shops in the United States is published, will be published on May 2 by Pegasus books, and is already available in both hardback and softcover in the United Kingdom, Ireland and Australia from Quercus books,

Carlton Reid 1:44:06
thanks to James Haven and Max Lennar there and thanks to you for listening to Episode 326 of the spokesman podcast. Show Notes and more can be found at the hyphen spokesman.in the next episode, I talk with BBC journalists, Kate Vandy, and Anna poligon. Meanwhile, get out there and ride

31st March 2023

The Spokesmen Cycling Podcast

EPISODE 324: Bike lanes empty? Prove gibe wrong with this €199 window-mounted traffic counting camera

SPONSOR: Tern Bicycles

HOST: Carlton Reid

GUEST: Kris Vanherle of Telraam

TOPICS: The Telraam traffic counting system uses a camera and AI to work out exactly what’s going by on the road. And it’s not just for professionals, you can buy one for your window and start measuring traffic 24/7, perhaps to prove that your road suffers from excessive speeding. Telraam’s developer Kris Vanherle of Belgium here describes his neat new system and whether it could be used to counter those tabloid newspaper columnists and others who claim that bike lanes are empty.

MACHINE TRANSCRIPT

Carlton Reid 0:12
Welcome to Episode 324 of the spokesmen cycling podcast. This show was recorded on Friday the 31st of March 2023.

David Bernstein 0:28
The Spokesmen cycling roundtable podcast is brought to you by Tern bicycles. The good people at Tern are committed to building bikes that are useful enough to ride every day, and dependable enough to carry the people you love. In other words, they make the kind of bikes that they want to ride. Tern has e bikes for every type of rider. Whether you’re commuting, taking your kids to school or even carrying another adult, visit www.ternbicycles.com. That’s t e r n bicycles.com to learn more.

Carlton Reid 1:04
If counting sheep makes you sleepy, imagine how difficult it must be to count cars and cyclists. Boring Yes, but such traffic surveys provide essential data. I’m Carlton Reid, and today I’d like to introduce you to a different way of measuring road use. away that’s more accurate than the pneumatic tubes, you’ll often see stretched across carriageways, but which don’t measure very slow moving, or static motor traffic and aren’t even so hot on recognising bikes. The tell ramp system uses cameras and of course, a AI to work out exactly what’s going by on the road. And it’s not just for professionals, you can buy one for your window and start measuring traffic 24/7 Perhaps to prove that your road suffers from excessive speeding. This morning, I talked with tal rams developer Kris Vanherle of Leuven in Belgium. And I started by asking him to describe his neat system. And whether it could be used to counter those tabloid newspaper columnist and others who claim that bike lanes are empty. Kris there’s a there’s a today there’s a report in a in a British tabloid newspaper. And it’s very frequent kind of complaint. But it’s about empty bicycle lanes. So this particular right wing commentator is basically banging on about bicycle lanes being empty. Now you’ve got a product there that that might help to either prove or disprove that. So what’s your product?

Kris Vanherle 3:08
So our point is called Telraam. It’s it’s a small IoT traffic counting device. Actually, Telraam is a Dutch word. Funny word of play of words, because tell means counting. And is window and it’s the device what you put on the window. It’s you make your window Accounting window, but also telling them as a word in itself in Dutch is abacus. So it’s a nice play of words. So that’s, that’s our, what we do. So basically telling them is a small, low cost, traffic counting device which is owned and hosted by private citizens. So typically, traffic counting devices are used and deployed by professionals and so industry professional but also policymakers, local authorities, just to monitor traffic, what we’ve made first with the Raspberry Pi system, and now with a with a new custom made, hardware and software is a commoditized, let’s say cheap or affordable traffic counting device to also allow anybody to just start counting with with a very simple device. And indeed, like you said, that helps to objectify any discussions on traffic flows are either on there’s too much car traffic in my street, they’re speeding. Bike lanes are not being used, like this example. With data it’s just there so you can have you can at least have a discussion about data rather than gut feeling.

Carlton Reid 4:32
It’s that private citizens but that really interested me when I looked at your product information because yeah, this is not some is you there is like a professional version. You know, you can you municipalities can can get this from their own uses. But this is very much you could you might have a road that you’d quite like to your municipality to close off. You can put this in your window and then you can save that municipality. Look, we’ve got you and X number of cars coming through X number of bicycles coming through why don’t we do this? Is that the idea because because many bicycle advocacy groups already go out there manually counting this stuff. So you’re basically bringing something that that would manually counted and you’re doing this with, with AI in effect.

Kris Vanherle 5:20
Yeah, that that’s partly the objective. So just for some background, so I’ve been working as a traffic engineer over 15 years. And why we started with this project, because out of the frustration of lack of data, so we are either the technical data is lacking, and you basically need data to give property advice, or it’s usually expensive. So we started with this project to make it affordable. And our angle was to work with citizens because like you mentioned, local debt is a very hot topic, and local residents are very much willing to contribute time voluntarily to collect this type of data. Like you said, people can’t manually I’ve even seen people who have done origin destination studies with licence plates. It’s also I mean, people invest time are gorgeous, we should give them the tools to do it properly. So that so that the default so that the data which is being generated is actually useful for policy advice. We offer the device for private citizens, but we do want to work in a collaborative way. So actually, our model is to work with local authorities, and citizens together. So the most common model that we basically have is that we have a discussion with a local authority, they want to do something in their, in their jurisdiction on traffic, like closing a street, low traffic neighbourhood, for example, slow street, but they want to monitor before and after. So they buy devices from us. And we support the local authority to deploy these devices with citizens. So you get the dialogue immediately between the policymakers and the citizens. But apart from that, it’s also possible to just for a parameters to buy a sensor and start this discussion with with the local authority based on their data. So it’s a bit double. So we’re still professional with local authorities, but also enabling directly to towards citizens.

Carlton Reid 7:11
And how much is the product for one product for one person, one private citizen, how much they’re going to pay?

Kris Vanherle 7:16
Yeah, so we’re trying to distinguish. So if, because we really much in favour of grassroots organisations. So if you just want to buy a device that says no strings attached and simple, it’s one at 199 euro, which is still expensive, but if you compare to other ethical techniques, it’s like, three, four times more cheaper compared to limited use, for example. But if you work for a local authority, we set up a full project, we do engagements, we do, we have much more analytics in the dashboard. And then we’ve got the model, right? Where we are more or less, I think, maybe two to 400 euros per device all in. And that’s basically a model how we tend to survive. So provide professional services to local authorities, but give the devices for free via these local authorities. So they can contribute to the to the ethicality. And it works

Carlton Reid 8:06
as well for their for the telecom. So yeah, like a connection. Yeah,

Kris Vanherle 8:11
yeah. So the old device used Wi Fi for data connectivity, but the new device is using a SIM card. But that’s, that’s included. So for the private citizens, we want to make this one of cheap and we’re basically subsidising and because we’re the one off cost just for grassroots organisation. So the 199 is, it’s actually less than what we want, it’s costing us but we want to support these girls with initiatives are revenue models more from the project that we do with the local authorities, and provide more support and ethics and so on. And this is the model that we tried to build also trying to bridge this gap between citizens and local authorities because local traffic very antagonistic.

Carlton Reid 8:53
A minute ago, you mentioned pneumatic tubes, which are, which is often how, you know these these rubber strips that are laid across the road. There’s a bit of a box next to them, which is counting traffic. Now that’s been relatively controversial in the UK recently, in that somebody discovered that for a low traffic neighbourhood, it was in London, the traffic counts potentially could be out, because the pneumatic tubes don’t measure static traffic and effects of it if a traffic jam, you know, the cars are not going anymore, whatever, like I’d know five kilometres an hour, they don’t get counted. So it’s clearly a problem. So your product is solving that problem.

Kris Vanherle 9:39
Yes, in part. So I mean, again, this is technology. So it’s got limitations, but like you mentioned Dometic tubes. It’s been, let’s say the industry standard for a long time. I mean, I’ve I’ve bought this type of data many, many times and I know the limitations like you mentioned, slogan in traffic is an issue and because it depends on timing of signals, so if it’s really slow Although it cannot distinguish between a car passing by or it’s like a single pulse. By counting as an issue as well, I mean, there are two tubes which include by counting, but because they are less heavy, the signal which you get from the kinetic poses is less, so the accuracy is lower. So, these are all issues with pneumatic tubes and there are more, we’re trying to solve this indeed without without garlic, so its chemical based system. But that doesn’t mean it will be 100% accurate. Still, there’s still a trade off between cost and accuracy. But slow, slow going into effect for sure it’s not an issue because it’s taking objects and it is going faster, the objects are going very slow. But the object will be recognised. In fact, I think actually accuracy will be higher, if the traffic is slow, because there’s more frames where the object is, is in the view.

Carlton Reid 10:47
So the accuracy of this, you can track this just by setting your your product up on a window, and then at the same time, at a fraction of a moment in time, you then physically count. And then you tally the turn, and you say, you know how genuinely accurate this is, and you found that it is accurate.

Kris Vanherle 11:10
You can so what we have with, especially without a new device, there’s a screen on top of it. So and it gives you life counts. So if some some when some object passes by, so a car that skin cycle or glass vehicle, you will see the counter increasing. So and that’s also I think, for us important to have this transparency. So we are expecting an accuracy of 90 95% for cars and 80% ish, maybe a bit more for for bikes, it will depend on the locations we’ve tested in length on different sites. But it’s also useful for people in the field to have a device to can just validate and cross check, okay? The device on this period of time is indeed counting on a typical day, and you can do some manual validation. So this type of conspiracy for us is really important because it’s often lacking with with other technologies. So primitive tubes, we know that in some cases, it doesn’t work. In some cases it doesn’t. So you don’t know if you can rely on the data. In some cases, yes or no. In our case, what you see is what you get them and if you don’t work on your site, you will at least see it on the on the screen.

Carlton Reid 12:15
Now the advantage, I’m guessing of it, and we discussed the disadvantages of pneumatic use. But the advantage of it is, you know, their lateral there on the ground, and nothing can really obscure them. But presumably your product has its camera based things could obscure them so that there must be an optimum placement. style. So if you had it in somebody’s window, and say the bike lane that you’re trying to measure is frequently blocked by you know, traffic, car traffic and buses, and you can’t actually see the cyclists See you then that’s where your product isn’t quite so good. So how, what is the optimum placement of your product?

Kris Vanherle 12:58
That’s a good point. I mean, like you said, metal cubes. And basically you can assault anywhere where there’s where there’s room. In our case, you have to indeed, you’re limited by like a free field of view of the street. So there’s a few rules of thumb. So what we always recommend is, first of all, your first or second floor window, so not the ground floor, so you’ve got a bit of a downward angle. So that that that negates or avoids having blocking objects passing by. So that’s that’s one thing very clear, need to have a clear field of view. So no trees, preferably no parked cars in front. And not to this bit not too short, not too distant. So I mean, the houses which have like a small garden in front, like five metres or something perfect, because then you’ve got like a very nice view of the street. Now, we are very much aware that this is a limitation. So when we do a project with a local authority we have we’ve got a full onboarding mechanism candidates applying, and they upload a picture where they would instal the device, you’ve got clear instructions on what suitable sites? And then we evaluate if this is a suitable site. Yes, no, and be allowed to inform them? Yes, I mean, it will work on your site. So you can you you’re eligible for a device so so at least we have some control where the device is installed on locations where the count should work. Now, based on our experience, now we are working for two, three years now, I would say that about two thirds of the candidates that we get that probably eligible. So in most cases, if you have a clear view view of the street, the device should work

Carlton Reid 14:33
the product that you’ve got there 199 euros for the consumer, I’m assuming a bit more for local authorities, but when you when you place them either by the private citizen or the local authority, buying a bunch of them, and you place them in a window. I’m assuming there’s some sort of algorithm that you’ve got, which in This prevents double counting. If you’ve got a street and you’ve placed five of these counters next to the street, you’re not going to get you know, the counting the bike bicyclist five times the motorist five times, it kind of knows where it is where the device knows where it is. And it knows if there’s another device 500 metres away, it doesn’t doesn’t count those. So how do you how do you square that?

Kris Vanherle 15:26
Okay, that’s important, because the way we’ve set up our system is that you’ve got one device with a single code segment, what we call a code segment is not the full state, but the street, which is divided by the next intersection. So in principle, the road ethic on the street segment is the same on the full street segment, except for people who should be somewhere on the street segments or incidents, or anybody who’s not transit, basically. So we, we don’t really deploy multiple devices on a single segment, we just take one device, or if we have a volunteer as one device in a seat next segment, and we report the volume of this segment segment on a map public map for this segment, so we don’t really do this, for five devices on a single segment, it’s been done for validation purposes. So then you can take an average, for example, or you can make some small distinctions between a location a bit further up the segment and put it down. But they should be very, very much similar in terms of volume. So yeah, there’s no way of double counting in that sense. If we have to segment two devices on the same segment, we report the average of the of the of both devices on the segment. I think I didn’t mention this explicitly, but we tell them is on one part, this traffic counting device, the sensor, but it’s also an open data platform. So if you sign up with with Telecom, you are also sharing your data and we reporting that on on our website. Landing Page is basically a map with all this data.

Carlton Reid 16:58
So where where have you had your product placed in internationally where where has been counted so far? So

Kris Vanherle 17:08
we started three years ago, but earlier and mostly belted, because we live a Belgium based but gradually we have done some studies internationally. So we had we had a big European project in 2019 to 2021. That was in Dublin, Cardiff, Barcelona, Madrid and Ljubljana we’ve had a nice project in Berlin as well with with across with organisations like I can biking advocacy group, we’re deploying about I think, 100, it’s in the Berlin area. in Utrecht, Netherlands, we’re working with a governance. So again, it’s about 150 200 orders of magnitude. So gradually, also reaching the highest of of Europe, not just Belgium,

Carlton Reid 17:56
how have the results been used? Do you know how they’ve been used?

Kris Vanherle 17:59
It depends, it really depends on the use case. So I can give a few examples. So in some cases, it’s it’s really about monitoring the impact of an intervention, so an intervention low traffic neighbourhood, or whatnot. So anything which is changed, which would expect some fundamental changes to the traffic flows, and then you’d mentioned three, four months before the intervention, three, four months after you direct typical traffic before intervention, typical tactic after the intervention, you could just make comparisons. And that’s super useful. And because what’s typically be done is the stopgap measures have been dealt with the main roads, but for the small underlying roads, like the most smaller essential roads, that really being assessed when you have a change in the circulation plan or installation of a low traffic neighbourhood. And you want to understand if there’s not to say, spillover effects to adjacent streets and so on. So with this, because it’s cheap, you can you can really blanket an area with these devices. And you can do typical perfect pre intervention and typical African post intervention. So that’s, that’s one case. Another case is speeds, that’s also a good one, we have had a very nice case in Louisville, but there’s more which are similar. Where there was an issue of compliance to speed limit of 30 kilometre per hour. So you could really see from the telecom data that compliance was like 50%, half of the cars were driving faster. And there were two interventions. So one intervention was this this digital sign with your speed when you’re passing by, so you could really see when this intervention was done, because compliance increased from I think, 50% to 60%. So these things actually work, apparently. But then you could see a second adventure it was installation speed bump, and then you could see compliance with the speed limit, go to 95%. So, those are examples of how the data is being used to demonstrate the effects, impact of off interventions.

Carlton Reid 19:57
You know, one of the complaints from, from people Is the surveillance society we have here. And you know it capturing numberplate. It’s not what you are. But you’re not capturing numberplates here, you’re literally just there’s a lump going past at a certain velocity. And you are statistically measuring that. So there’s, there’s no, there’s no arguments here. Nobody can say this is surveillance society, you’re just counting numbers and the speed of the things that you’re counting. Yeah,

Kris Vanherle 20:23
exactly. And I mean, that’s really important. I mean, everybody says it, but it’s really genuine. And privacy is important for us. So it’s really, it’s really a thing. So we deliberately don’t do tracking, we deliberately don’t do number plate commissioning. We just do counts. So basically, what’s what’s coming out of the of the traffic counting device is the same type of data you would get from a pretty metric tube, a manual count, whatever, it’s just automatic, long, long duration, and there’s just much more data. But that’s the type of data which is being spit out of the device. And this is enough to do any quite some useful impact analysis of transformation. So yeah, obviously, when you would, when you do something with Ghana based systems, and especially if you give them citizens, you’ll get into controversies we’ve had our share of controversy has been every time we explain how the other device works. So it’s an example of edge computing. So the images which are being collected from the from the camera system, I instantly process on the device itself. And it’s just count data, which is going to our cloud. So you still images leaving the device, it just count data. So these types of things are very important to reassure users and stakeholders nearby. That text, no surveillance,

Carlton Reid 21:45
the objects that you are capturing, and you know, just just counting immediately and not sending anywhere else. And can you differentiate between a car, a van, a lorry and HGV a large truck, a bicyclist, a pedestrian, maybe even a cargo bike user? How how granular is your data?

Unknown Speaker 22:07
Yeah, very good question. So we’ve been working up to now with the Raspberry Pi based systems, we’re not the new flashy device you see now. And the old device categorises in four categories, so pedestrians, bikes, and cars and large vehicles, that classification is quite rudimentary and simple. So basically, it’s using Object properties. So for example, axis he have an object, so pedestrians are very narrow and very tall. So x axis ratio of the object is four. So it’s likely pedestrian while cars wide and not at all. So axis ratio is 0.5. We use a few other parameters to then classify that those objects but there is there is a clear risk of misclassification. So for example, the motorcycles and bikes there would likely be in the same category with the new device, it’s different. So it’s it’s immediate AI commission. So when you see an object and an object is associated, okay, this is clearly a bike or a pedestrian. So while we were now still bundling them in the same four categories, in fact, the device can see more categories. So you’ve got car, you’ve got no longer two wheelers. With the old device, the bikes and motorcycles with the distinction has already added. There’s pedestrians and then what we have now as large vehicles will be categorised in lorry so trucks and tailors, buses, and light light trucks. There’s still a risk of misclassifying cars and vans because yeah, sometimes they just look physically the same. But in terms of

Carlton Reid 23:39
like, what do you call an SUV? I mean, that’s that could be a van.

Kris Vanherle 23:44
So that actually actually the risk of misclassification with a new device is the same as a human would have. So if you’re counting manually, you would say, Well, is this event of an SUV? It’s the same time type of doubt that this device, but other than that there would be no clear misclassification?

Carlton Reid 24:00
And what about a scooter? Because that’s clearly a use scenario that many cities either want to clamp down on, or increase. So do you measure scooters, so these these push scooters,

Kris Vanherle 24:10
motorcycles, so for sure, but again, speed pedelec it’s a good example. So you’ll get to see the the blurrier area of very high end and fast electric bikes speed pedelecs which almost look like it’s good and you’ve got these electric scooters as well, which are more coming down from the scooter towards the bike as they insulate the grey area. I can’t tell for sure how the device will look or counters because sometimes they’re really physically look look quite the same, but anything which looks like a scooter will be counted as a motorcycle. So

Carlton Reid 24:48
the terminology I should I should I should I should have clarified that so when I meant scooters, I mean, the stand on things, steps that propelled you.

Kris Vanherle 24:58
So how would you what would you call them just apps like these small, small wheels, and basically walking on driving on pedestrian walkways, right, or

Carlton Reid 25:11
when you measure them, and you spot them tricky.

Kris Vanherle 25:15
Again, you don’t, it will be difficult to make a distinction between pedestrian and bike in that sense because they are small. So you might get missed out to the to the bulk of an object which is passing by is there is a person which is on the step, and the step itself is quite small. So, if the device misses the step, it will not see it, and it will go to this as a pedestrian. I think it’s a bit too early to make any definite statements on that we’ll have to see we just launched a new sensor. And we’ve tested extensively before, but these are specific cases which we have not had any definite validation on. So we’ll have to see.

Carlton Reid 25:53
So you mentioned a few times the old raspberry pi version, and the new version. So talk me through the history of this when when you first had this idea, your first product, what year was it? Was it for instance, crowdfunded Kickstarter, whatever, to your, your current product. So So talk me through the history of your product,

Kris Vanherle 26:15
the origin, the needs of why we started with this project was was because of relaxed data, affordable data. So we started with that from within the company where I work, which is a spinoff from the University of K Leuven, with a research can’t like, not too big. And we basically said, let’s try this, let’s let’s try to make something with it as a pie and see if it works, what studies and we did a small pilot here in Louisville. And, to our surprise, I mean, there was two key outcomes there. So to our surprise, it worked fairly well, because we made something very simple, with actually available off the shelf hardware and software. So we were wondering, why isn’t this being done before. So that was one. And the second thing is that we had no issue whatsoever, finding people who wanted to host the sensor and do some debugging and developing with us. Now, I appreciate live is a bit of a special university town. But still, I mean, we had I think 250 candidates for 100 devices, and it was like this to find them. So that made us think, Okay, this is a model which could work. So if we can further debug and improve this device, we will definitely find people to host something like this. So that was 2019 2020, I would still call this a proof of concept, we have a bi based system over time, and we did support it and also did the European project and Dublin guidance and so on, we basically came to the conclusion that if you want to reach a large audience, we have to detect the sensor. So they have a bio based system is nice for techie, tech lovers and enthusiasts who want to go to the pain of installing this because it does require some, some technical, know how Wi Fi configuration installation. So pretty soon, we have chosen to go down the path of making a dedicated sense of hardware for for this purpose, which is focused on ease of installation, to also be able to reach anybody who just want to count ethic and I mean, prefers not to go to the pain of installing it has been a buy. And so that’s been done for the past two and a half years. And it’s been a long road. We have also had research funds to do that and some development funds. And we only just launched, I think two months ago with with the new sensor. And now we really ready to scale up with this new device. So we’ll still support the Gatsby by base system because we also tech lovers and we’ve got a nice community of tech lovers and we really want to support them. But for the future, we will definitely look at the new sensor because it’s simpler, user friendly, and we will be able to reach a much larger audience for the public.

Carlton Reid 28:58
I’m going to I’m going to cut to an ad break now I’m going to go across to my my colleague David in America but I will be right back with his I do hang on there for a second. Take it away, David.

David Bernstein 29:08
Hello, everyone. This is David from the Fredcast and of course the spokesmen. And I’m here once again to tell you that this podcast is brought to you by Tern bicycles. The good people at Tern build bikes that make it easier for you to replace car trips with bike trips. Part of that is being committed to designing useful bikes that are also fun to ride. But an even greater priority for Tern is to make sure that your ride is safe and worryfree and that’s why Tern works with industry leading third party testing labs like E FB E and builds its bikes around Bosch ebike systems which are UL certified for both electric and fire safety. So before you even zip off on your Tern, fully loaded and perhaps with the loved one behind it you can be sure that the bike has been tested to handle the extra stresses on the frame, and the rigours of the road. For more information, visit www.ternbicycles.com. To learn more. And now, back to the Spokesmen.

Carlton Reid 30:18
Thanks, David. And we are here still with Kris Vanherle. And Kris is from Leuven. And I want to dig into Kris, I want to dig into your because you mentioned a couple of times now that you are you’re, you’re a traffic engineer, basically. And I’m assuming that’s exactly now. So what does that job entail? What have you been doing? How does this improve maybe the life of fellow you know, the people who are who are doing your job now? And is that product taking you away from that job. So that’s three different questions.

Kris Vanherle 30:53
15 years I’ve been doing this, I’ve seen the the space of graphic data being evolving immensely over this last 15 years or so. Cell phone data, for example, let’s start with that. It’s been I mean, when I started my job, I think cell phones weren’t weren’t even that prevalent yet. And casually. Cellphone data was being recognised as something useful for doing origin destination tracking. So you know, where people are coming from where they are going to super useful to, to calibrate different models, for example, which then allow you to do an ex ante analysis and try to model on before and before we do an intervention, how traffic would behave, if you would do an intervention. Before that was all speculation and theoretical. That type of data has really, really evolved. And it’s like now the standard go back to Google traffic, for example, is a product which provides origin destination data, travel time data, which is usually usually interesting, and has really changed the environment of traffic engineering, allowing different models to be much, much better.

Carlton Reid 32:00
Now, basically, that that’s using the Bluetooth on a phone to basically measure where people are going to and from it knows probably where people are just by speed, you know, they’re on a bicycle or in a car. And then it’s the origin destination means, you know, are they genuinely doing one mile trips? Is that Is that what you mean?

Kris Vanherle 32:18
Or they live in this area and go to that area where they work. And it’s generating congestion in between? Because there’s so many people coming from there and who choices for example, why are people or why are people taking a restaurant, for example, those things you can all make visual. Now. I mean, at the beginning of of when this data was useful, there were sincere privacy concerns which completely justified but by now you have topped with data products, which all are hashed and anonymous, and non Nice. So it’s much safer and clearer now. But still, sometime, it’s a bit creepy. But this type of data are extremely useful to calibrate traffic models, which you really need to give to make corporate data and appropriate and policy advice. So we had the epic moments 50 years ago, still, but they were scarcely calibrated, and they were to get the best. But now, I mean, definitely much more performance much more accurate. Now, the point where I want to come to and my time is still important and useful is that this type of origin destination, which is floating garden is one super useful, but it’s still just a sample. So you still you will will not have all traffic, which is having a cell phone in the car, for example. So you will not it will not provide you absolute values on a specific site. So that’s still valuable to collect them to calibrate models. And secondly, this is still just cars. So we have achieved to calibrate effort models for cars properly now, in the traffic engineering world. But bikes, bike models, only scratching the surface at this point. And, and we already know that route choice behaviour and so on with bikes is completely different. The steepness of the hill, the quality of infrastructure, the perception, or the heel safety, those are all things which are influencing good choice of of bikes. And there’s there’s definitely a capsule to get that right. And we tell him, you know, we’ll have to have accounting data not just regarding also for bikes. So it will allow to get to make the next step, let’s say and also get good corporate traffic models with with bikes. So you can do also proper policy development, which is supported by data, not just for cars, but also bikes.

Carlton Reid 34:36
And then the one of the other parts of that question was are you still doing the traffic engineering? I’m always like, taking you away from that field.

Kris Vanherle 34:47
Yeah, yeah, I’m completely consumed now by Telraam development. So I mean, we so Telraam was started as a project from within TML we we did this epic engineering but because it’s that was consultancy, Telraam as a product, so we spin it off as a different company, because it’s completely different. And I would say we’re in our own startup life and trying to get this product as good as possible. So it’s a completely different focus, to a development firm with development, use management, and so on. So, yeah, I’m, unfortunately, I’m not really doing much anymore. When I when I, when I’m lucky, and I can do a workshop with data analysis, then I can dive into the, into the telecom data and do some good old data analysis, which is really fun. So if I get the chance I come to it, but it’s more for the colleagues from from TML, who were working with a data and third parties,

Carlton Reid 35:42
TML. What’s TML?

Kris Vanherle 35:45
TML that’s the agency where the traffic engineering Bureau where it was within the spinoff from the key. So the colleagues.

Carlton Reid 35:52
So you guys, because your background, as a traffic engineer, you know, this product is going to be incredibly useful around the world. You know, this is not something that you’ve come from the world of tech, and you’ve brought this to an alien world that you are from this world, you know, this product, it will be incredibly useful.

Kris Vanherle 36:13
Yeah, yeah, that’s correct. And, and that’s why, but I’ve grown to understand over time, that’s why I at first, I didn’t understand why tech world hadn’t already done this, because it’s not that hard. And the use case is very clear. So while we came in from the immediate the application side, and we had to learn the back, let’s say, so we had to learn how this technology works and work with partners, but the application for us was evident. And we also can see it and the development towards what we think is definitely the most applicable use case. So simple, cheap, and very specific on a very specific type of traffic, counting data. So on the specific sites, no intersections, no origin destination, because once you go down that route, you’ll get you’ll end up with high end system, which will cost you multiple 1000s of euros per device. And we think there’s definitely a use case for her first cervix, very simple, low cost epicanthic. device.

Carlton Reid 37:10
So talk me through it because you said it. This is like two months in which you’ve you’ve had this the the newest iteration of your product, where do you see your company going? How many devices do you think you’re going to be able to sell to a to private citizens and be to local authorities? So what’s what’s your Give me your business plan, so not just your business? Product history, your business plan? If you don’t mind, Kris,

Kris Vanherle 37:36
we’ve seen what the current has been by this system that we’ve gotten a lot of attention from Belgium. But we’ve also seen that it’s, it requires all support. So we were a bit reluctant and hesitating to go international with this, because we want to be closer to be able to provide support. So. So while we’ve been having a lot of questions, in the meantime, while we were still working with it has been a buy and developing the new system, we have been holding back a bit on international inquiries. Now we’ve got the new sensor ready. And it’s not, I would say 90% validated, we still need to check off a few things. But we just want to open the international tab, let’s say and want to roll out as fast as possible and as many as possible, because the need is there. So if you if you’re asking me for numbers, I am hoping to deploy at least 2000 a year but rather looking at several, I mean, five to 10,000 additional new devices per year being deployed worldwide. We’re having a focus because we’re based in Belgium on Benelux or Belgium or the Netherlands. But we have somebody who’s working for us already in London. So UK will be a focused market to expand. And we already also getting some inquiries from from the US. So hopefully, we can also quickly built on that and serve that market. Now in terms of the distinction between the private citizens and the local authorities. I think that’s really the crux that’s really important for us. So the way we have gained traction in Belgium is always via a single citizen citizen who bought the device and made a lot of noise about his device and his data for the local authority, which then initiated local authority to set up a project. And then we can help to local authority or a commercial client consultancies working with a local authority to set up a network of of devices. And that’s really crucial because we like I said, halfway, I think we are almost subsidising the individual ones we want to make make it really cheap for the enthusiasts for the cars, fruits initiatives. We want to keep them but our sustainability is dependent on projects. So networks of, of devices for it’s for these commercial clients, consultancies and local authorities. So we really hope to go in, find that we’re looking for partnerships for example, large organisations who have have access to a big community who would buy these devices from us, we provide them a management platform and management tool to, to basically manage the fleet of devices in the community. But give them device for free towards volunteers. So that’s a bit the model that we were hoping for to achieve.

Carlton Reid 40:19
Took me through your dashboards, I know, tech people get really excited by their dashboards. So when you instal this, or when you when you when you when you upload the data when you’re not you, but when the device uploads the data to the cloud, and then it’s all graphed and mapped, and what have you, what do you see? So can you see not just numbers, this is the number of people who’ve cycled walked, driven past your window, we also get like peaks. So there’s a graph there showing you at 5pm you’ve got a massive amount of car traffic, bum, bum, um. So what what is your what are your stats show?

Kris Vanherle 40:57
Good question. So I invite you and your listeners to go to our website, because basically those things are all open. Also, there’s a private dashboard, but there’s also a very big public website. So I’ll just go over what’s what’s there. So we report the total numbers by day and by hour. So just to sum up of the cars pedestrians and, and the four categories. But like you mentioned, there’s also an interface where you can select a time interval, for example, three months, four months or four year, and then it calculates a typical traffic volume for this period, a typical traffic volume for a weekday or a weekend. And that, like you said, that will demonstrate these these typical patterns. So the short morning peak and a bit more prolonged evening peak. So those are interfaces, what’s also reporting on speeds and so we report the speeds of passing cars in bins of 10 kilometre per hour, we’ve also changed it to miles per hour for UK. So that’s also possible. So that will give you an idea on what what they share, or what are the speed profiles, let’s say of cars in your street. And finally, the VAT five. And speed is like a traffic engineering concept, which I have to explain. So if you would have 100 cars, and you would sort them by fastest to the slowest. It’s the 85th fastest car. So there’s 15 cars driving faster and 84 driving slower. So the V 85 gives you a good indication of what we call free flow speed. So how fast you guys drive when there’s no congestion. So on a disagree indication of how our streets are typically used by cars in terms of speed. So those are all in the open dashboard and in the private dashboard. So the telecom user has got a bit more extra analytics, for example, a monthly report with big peak hours last month has to have to increase last month to the to the to the previous month. So a bit more extra gimmicks, which are useful for the individual use of it, the core thing is that everything is open. So that also if you’re not at a telecom device owner, you can still interact with the data, you can do analysis yourself if if you want and we encourage that.

Carlton Reid 43:05
So traffic census as has been carried out since the dawn of motoring, you know I’ve I’ve, I’ve looked at various statistics down down the years of, you know, the usage of roads, and even of 1920s and 1930s, bike paths, etc. So censuses have been carried out since the dot. But they’ve always been this, you know, they pick a date, they pick up probably a 24 hour period. And that can be very, very misleading because it you know, do you do it in the winter? Do you do it in the spring, do it in the summer, or you tend not to do it, you know, loads of times, because it’s just so expensive, because it’s manual. Counting is phenomenally expensive and complicated to do, what you’ve got is a system that is 20 477 days a week, every single week of the year, blah, blah, blah, it’s just constant. So you’ve got much, much more robust data there that will build up. And I know, like, folks is the the Bicycle Advocacy Group for Edinburgh, has been doing traffic counts and traffic sensors for a long time. And they do it manually. This is going to I’m sure would excite them because it will be an adjunct to the database built up over many years. But instead of just doing it on a certain day, they’ve now got it every single day.

Kris Vanherle 44:31
Yeah, that’s correct. Yeah. What’s important is to know that because people think of data accounting data and data candidates in traffic counting today, but that’s not the case. So you’ve got different types of traffic counting. So for starters, you’ve got this floating Carta, which I explained from the cell phone site, but also the point location so and maybe supplies do what you would expect, would expect but all All these different types of traffic entered into on a single site are valuable. So even manual counts are still valuable. Although they are fragmented to show they’re very scarce. So either it’s expensive, or it’s or it’s very one off. But it’s still valuable because in some use cases, you really need it. So for example, if you want to optimise traffic lights, to want to know which site needs to have the green light alarms, and so on. For that type of thing, you need queue lengths, for example, to monitor queue lengths, is usually difficult, even with high end optical systems. So for those type of applications, you still need manual counts. But that being said, for two traffic counts for for for a long period. What well, we used to work with, like you said, every Tuesday of every Tuesday, every two or every two weeks, do a manual count, that’s gone, those times are gone. And either weapon or metric tubes or in the future with Telecom, that just the sheer volume of data will will will blow away even the bit more accurate manual counting data, which is much more fragmented. So yeah, it’s indeed, it’s indeed, the potential of a big change in mental mental change of evolution in terms of how we collect difficulty data on specific sites.

Carlton Reid 46:20
And @fietsprofessor, the on Twitter, he had a very, I think he did a an academic study on this, but he also did it on Twitter, and he kind of like, showed the video of this. So he had a camera above a promise intersection in Amsterdam. And then he talked about swarms, and flogging, and he showed how, you know, bicyclists just flock through this particular intersection, whereas cars are very regimented. You know, in narrow trails, bicyclists were going everywhere. So what that suggests is, as we know, there are an awful lot of bicyclists in Amsterdam. So does your system cope with high use bicycling city, where if there’s 10,000 cyclists going through an intersection, it can count that even though they’re flocking together? How do you count the ants?

Kris Vanherle 47:20
Yeah, that’s a very good question. And it’s very important to realise how you should tackle those issues. So in short Telecom, the sensor is low cost device, it’s not made for counts on intersections, because like you said, You’ve got you got flux, you’ve got everything, which is going, one going left going, right. I mean, if you do anything with it’s just impossible, I mean, it’s not impossible. But if you want to do those counts, right, you need the high end camera system, which will cost you five to 10,000 euros just for a single site. So we’ve deliberately chosen for, let’s not, let’s not try to fix that problem, because it’s just too complex. But you can fix the problem. If you focus on a bit more simpler sites, which are just seat segments where you have bikes passing by left, right, left, right. So it’s very clear that object is passing to one side and exiting the other side. And if you’ve got a bit of a downward angle, you can just basically see all object passing by. And that’s a face a much more simpler setup where AI systems can much easier more easily cope with. So if you would have such a situation, what we would do is not monitored the intersection, because it’s too difficult, but just take the branches, so maybe even a few sights on the branches. So you know, the absolute volumes on on, on the branches. As long as you don’t have like, I would say, a big cycling haze or something where you have like 567 people, not side to side, and maybe even swapping positions. I mean, that’s a nightmare. But just one or two side by side, as long as they’re clearly segmented. So like different objects, and it will go it will count those devices. Again, I just want to point back out about some technology choices that we’ve made. Our core focus is it has to be simple, simple to instal and, and cheap so it’s affordable. I mean, anything that you describe now it’s all solvable with technology that will just cost you a tremendous amount of money so you can indeed make a camera system and we should to an online image conditioning system and then will you have to pay for every object that you I mean, it’s all possible but will just cost you a lot of money.

Carlton Reid 49:47
Yes, now I think that’s what @fietsprofessor did. They basically tracked it and then they used AI to count every individual and in that and it was it was a highly complex and probably expensive thing to do. So, Kris, thank you ever so much for taking the time today to talk about this system. So give us the where can people buy these from, your social media stuff get? Give us all your information of how we can find you.

Kris Vanherle 50:14
Yeah. So first of all, first up our website. So www.telraam.net, I think if you go to the website, things will become very apparent, you can also engage with the data. There’s much more two links on what the device is like. And there’s a webshop. So you can if you want to devise yourself, I mean, that’s the way to go. If you want to push for that, let’s say you do this with my local authority. I’ve got to reach out to us via the website, and we’ll see if we’ll see if of course it is possible. So that’s our website. I think that’s the first place to go. We’re active on Twitter. Our handle is telraamtelraam two times next to each other. So that’s the probably the social media that we’re using the most. We’re not on Facebook, not on Instagram, and LinkedIn obviously, if you want also telraam. So that yeah, that’s how to find anybody interested, reach out to us via our web form. We are ready to go with our new sensor.

Carlton Reid 51:16
Thanks to Kris Vanherle there and thanks to you for listening to episode 324 of the Spokesmen podcast. Show notes and more can be found at the-spokesmen.com. I’m still waiting to with BBC journalists Anna Holligan and Kate Vandy who have yet to take delivery of a rather special outside broadcast unit: a tricked-out cargo bike. This will be the bike bureau, a mobile news gathering studio like no other. I’m hoping that chat can happen some time next month, meanwhile get out there and ride.