The election of a self-described “democratic socialist” as New York City mayor should not be a surprise.
Big cities are social creations. Modern cities are a lifestyle as much as a place to do business. Making sure they’re attractive and organized is a basic government function. Leaders who focus on the quality of city life must put government to work on its behalf.
In the 21st century this means organizing the E-Transport Revolution. Cities are too dense to be entirely managed by private cars. Cars are an expensive luxury in cities and must be treated as such. E-Transport makes this easier to manage, and managing E-Transport is an essential function of government.
New York may be the last of the world’s big cities to understand this. London and Paris have become “bike-friendly” in the last decade, because electricity makes cycling easy. Even Tokyo and Beijing support E-Transport. An e-bike to get to work. A cargo bike to get kids to school, or for shopping. Short trips are faster when there’s E-Transport to do the job. In a dense city it’s faster than driving.
But E-Transport eliminates the isolation cars create between people and the urban environment. This isolation creates both extreme comfort and an illusion of safety. Walking or cycling doesn’t give you that. You’re part of the world, its sounds and its smells. You can’t speed away from the world as you can in a car. You can’t separate yourself.
This places a new responsibility on government, to control the urban environment. All the space between buildings is public space, where in a car-dominated town most space is considered private. You’re in your car. You’re on your bike.
Personal Experience
For 40 years my life in Atlanta was dominated by the family car. I biked on the weekend, and watched the city wake up. But if I needed groceries, if I needed to see a doctor, and when the kids needed to go to school, we always used the car.
In the 1990s this was a Previa minivan. Despite living inside the city, I used 10 gallons of gas each week, often more, doing these daily chores. In 2004 I got our Scion XB and cut my gas use in half. An accident forced me into our hybrid Corolla a few years ago, which cut my gas use even more.
But I still had a driving lifestyle until I got my Edison e-bike for Christmas in 2023. I no longer need to “suit up” in spandex and clip-on shoes to go everywhere. The two-lane streets on the east side of Atlanta give me safety, and I realize now how close I was always was, to everything I needed. I’m just two miles from my doctor, three miles from my grocery, four miles from the Atlanta Beltline. Now I can stop, do my business, and know the e-bike’s motor will get me home as fast as I’d ridden over.
A problem with my Edison’s motor controller forced me back into the car recently, and I saw just how imprisoned I was by it. I had to worry about parking again. The world shrank. A mile long trip was 20 minutes on foot, 10 minutes using the car, just 5 minutes on the bike. I also felt lazy, and logy, physically more separate from everyone.
Bikes Need Government Protection
I also saw just how many of my neighbors were now on bikes, e-bikes, and cargo bikes. The safety that cargo bikes demand from drivers also benefits bikers without motors. With safer roads, and less expensive e-bikes, the city is changing.
It’s this demand from E-Transport that’s making cities friendlier toward bikers, forcing government to act on our behalf. You can run over an old guy in spandex. You don’t do that to a mother taking kids to school.
Over the last few years, New York City has become a war zone, cars against e-bikes, the wealthy and suburban commuters against the local middle class. The city administration handled this very badly.
Roads can’t grow in a densely populated place. The math doesn’t work. They must be shared, and when possible, turned into separate paths for cars and E-Transport. Speed must be controlled, again for safety.
By creating safety for E-Transport, you also create mobility for cars and buses. There’s enough room for everyone if government does its job properly. You can get the whole city moving this way for less than the cost of a single train line.
New York can be Paris. It just can’t be Allentown anymore.
