New Urbanism

"New Urbanism"

"City riding is not a good way to live a long and peaceful life. Its ecstasies are the sort that soldiers know after battle when they have danced with the beast. To ride through the congested heart of Manhattan at rush hour is to dance with the beast. You compass extremes of terror and exhilaration. You are initiated into an occult world no passenger of buses, cabs, and trains can know. At its deepest, riding in the city becomes a way of seeing, a form of self-expression, a consciousness."

-Chip Brown, from the article "A Bike and a Prayer"

Brown, Chip. "A Bike and a Prayer." Transalt.org. Web. 26 Aug. 2009.

I chose this article due to the fact that it expresses the culture what it deals with on an everyday basis. It puts into word the risks and rewards of a bike centric culture of New York City, arguably one of the most congested and populated areas of the modern world. It outlines a cultural appeal to the bike culture of America and what draws people to its ways.

I felt that the word "New Urbanism" is a good descriptor for what the cultural youth of America is coming to. It's a movement that started in the 1990s that believes that cities should take a new approach to the design and maintenance of cities these days, instead of focusing on car-centric on developments, that cities should focus their energies on to more pedestrian and non vehicle modes of transportation to reduce the costly effects of emissions of autos and rely on a more positive way of transport.