“Cycle tracks will abound in Utopia …”
– H.G. Wells, British futurist, 1866-1946
I came across a YouTube video of Bill Nye, the Science Guy, expounding on the cities of the future. Those future cities, says the guy in the bowtie, will make many more accommodations for cyclists than most American cities now do.
Bill Nye
And perhaps the most fanciful, one that he calls a “nutty, way-out-there idea”: enclosed bicycle thoroughfares protected from the weather. Some of them, he says, might even have louvers through which air currents could be directed so that cyclists always have a tailwind.
H.G. Wells’ predictions coming closer to fruition? Sounds good!
I have always been intrigued by devices that have proven to be such a perfect functional design that they deviate little from their elementary origin. The bow and arrow is an example, around for thousands of years but still used in its original form. I wonder if, in another thousand years, the bicycle will be recognized like that.
Reblogged this on RabbdReverie.
Enclosed bicycle thoroughfares that are protected from the weather … that also gave tail winds? Now THAT would be amazing.
Steve,
Thanks for looking at my blog. Are you the same Steve Garufi who rode across the United States from San Diego to Jekyll Island, Ga., in 2008? If so, I wrote about you in this blog:
http://jimsbikeblog.wordpress.com/2010/01/29/instructive-reading-for-transcons/
Jim