{"id":2296,"date":"2017-09-21T14:55:14","date_gmt":"2017-09-21T13:55:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/cemore\/?p=2296"},"modified":"2022-08-01T14:57:41","modified_gmt":"2022-08-01T13:57:41","slug":"cycling-and-society-symposium-whose-biketopias","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/cemore\/cycling-and-society-symposium-whose-biketopias\/","title":{"rendered":"Cycling and Society Symposium: Whose biketopias?"},"content":{"rendered":"

This year Cycling and Society Symposium<\/a> has returned to London for two days of what I consider to be the most exciting conference on cycling. I am saying this not only because I had the opportunity and honor to organize last year’s edition in Lancaster<\/a>, but also because CSS offers one of the few truly critical perspectives on cycling, what it can and ought to be.<\/h3>\n

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The first day started with a keynote by Rachel Aldred<\/a> (Westminster University), who offered a\u00a0much-needed perspective on why social sciences can make a difference\u00a0in cycling. Her presentation dispelled the myth of a ‘white canvas’ that would make cycling ‘perfect’, while also dismissing the idea of a rational or, on the contrary, irrational cycling subject: ‘There’s objective and subjective safety, but there’s also experienced safety’. Rachel also argued against cycling seen is merely an individual choice. Instead, she says, cycling is equally shaped by\u00a0its materialities, meanings, and skills.<\/p>\n

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The first of the panels, on cycling planning, featured primarily research done in London, on a variety of topics and from a variety of presenters. One presentation from TfL (Claudia Pe\u00f1aranda and Alex Longdon) on the newly inaugurated Strategic Cycle Network for London (pdf<\/a>) was particularly exciting for its aim to prioritize spatial equity in the city. Similarly, another presentation on cycling in Outer London (Joe Croft, University of Westminster), focusing on the Mini-Hollands project, highlighted the investment gap between different areas in London, whereas Tim Warin (Aalborg University) tackled the topics of Quietways.<\/p>\n

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The first day ended with a movie projection: the documentary Mama Agatha, with a foreword by Angela van der Kloof (Radboud University, the Netherlands).\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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A second session was dedicated to Road Safety and Education, with presentations ranging from an analysis of online arguments about cycling safety (Al Baker, University of Leeds), to how the cycling knowledge is acquired in a bicycle bonanza such as the Netherlands, to cycling and HGV drivers training in the UK (Graeme Sherriff, University of Salford). The first day ended with a movie projection: the documentary Mama Agatha<\/a>, with a foreword by Angela van der Kloof (Radboud University, the Netherlands).<\/p>\n

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