The typical London cyclist is male, wealthy and white – and he’s naked at the annual World Naked Bike Ride.
Image: Martyn Wheatley/Eyevine/Laif
In the British capital, the class struggle on the streets is escalating: cycling is considered a privilege of the ruthless and rich middle class who can afford life in the city. The rest are stuck in traffic.
Eon a summer morning in a pretty pedestrianized area of south London. Deciduous trees line the street, brick facades built in the times of Edward VII, blooming front gardens, well-tended hedges. From time to time you can even hear the chirping of the birds, when suddenly a car driver suddenly explodes without a break and a cyclist yells out of the open window in the most vulgar way: “You fucking idiot, this is all because of you, you dumb shit.” Twenty meters further he has to turn his van around. A new roadblock denies everyone, even fire engines, taxis, buses, ambulances, the disabled, the passage. Only bicycles are allowed to travel freely.
“More divisive than Brexit”
Even in cramped, overcrowded London, politicians are promoting the bicycle as the preferred means of transport. As in many major European cities, the corona pandemic was also used here to set up traffic-calmed zones and block numerous streets for cars. Here, too, more and more residents are said to be cycling longer and longer distances. And here, too, the advantages seem obvious: cycling is cheap, good for the environment, good for your health, prevents road congestion and reduces noise pollution. The common theory is that cycling is good for everyone. But the magic formula of transport policy probably nowhere meets with such fierce resistance from reality as in the British capital.
