This past summer I took a trip to New York City and was surprised at the amount of Citi Bike Stations that I saw. There was about one every 4 blocks and at one time I could probably see 15 people using a Citi Bike. I really liked the idea of rentable bikes as an environmentally friendly alternative to cars and hoped that it would catch on.
In June of 2013, Chicago implemented a similar system into its own City: Divvy Bikes. I tried Divvy bikes out for the first time over this past long weekend. It's a little stressful to ride bikes through the busy streets of Chicago and I was pretty surprised that although they encourage you to wear a helmet, they don't require you to wear one nor do they have any for rent (you would have to bring your own). After going through the system, I found it would be very unlikely that someone would just happen to bring a helmet around with them.
So when I went home I googled what kind of training is required before you rent a Divvy bike, and found out there is none! At the posts where you rent the bikes they don't even have an introductory video of rules you must follow. They have online training you can check out, but basically anybody can pay $7 to rent a Divvy Bike to get around town. It's very unlikely that anyone's going to look up Divvy Bike training online. On an article from the Huffington Post website there was a video of a lady riding her Divvy bike in the middle Lake Shore Drive! Although this is not technically illegal because it is a Drive, not an Expressway, this is totally not safe. This woman could easily be killed because she is not wearing a helmet and is doing something unsafe, and I'm sure she isn't the only one out there.
Just about anyone has access to these bikes, as long as they have a credit card. Literally a 5 year old would be able to ride their bikes if they stole daddy's credit card. I read an article in the New York Times about people in New York using the Citi Bikes to ride home from bars to avoid getting pulled over for drunk driving. Although drunk biking is not as dangerous as drunk driving, it is still extremely unsafe. The biker could seriously injure themselves. These rentable bike station would have no idea that drunk people are using their bikes for unsafe reasons. Breathalyzers or some other way to make sure the customer is sober could be implemented, but they would surely be expensive. Would it be worth the money to install something like a breathalyzer into each station? Would people use the bikes as much if helmets were rented out with the bikes?
Sunday, November 24, 2013
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Duck Dynasty in the Dining Room?
Last Friday night my new neighbors called me to babysit for them. I had never met them before and when I got to their house I was taken aback by something I saw. In their dining room stood a life sized cardboard cut-out of one of the characters from Duck Dynasty. If that wasn't weird enough already, they had dressed him up by tying an American flag bandana around his neck. This reminded me of the family who displayed a KKK robe that Isabel talked about during class the other day and made me think about the kind of things different families value.
Of course there is a possibility that this is a leftover Halloween decoration, but Halloween was a couple weeks ago so that is a little unlikely. I wondered what the motivation was to display this cardboard cut-out. Were they proud of this Duck Dynasty character? Did they think he was "American"? Is this the kind of person they want to display for their kids? Or did they just think it was funny?
I hope that the family did not purchase this cut-out because they idolize the Duck Dynasty characters.
I saw this before I had officially met the family and this definitely conveyed a certain message to me. Without even knowing them well, I had already judged them... Like Isabel's friend judged the family that displayed the robes of the KKK.
What we choose to show others says a lot about us. It is so easy to make assumptions about a person just because of what we see. We judge people all the time. We like to think that only certain people live in the North Shore: wealthy, polite, classy people. When I saw the cardboard cut-out, I unconsciously categorized them as a different type of people than they actually are.
Luckily, they turned out to be a normal family.
Of course there is a possibility that this is a leftover Halloween decoration, but Halloween was a couple weeks ago so that is a little unlikely. I wondered what the motivation was to display this cardboard cut-out. Were they proud of this Duck Dynasty character? Did they think he was "American"? Is this the kind of person they want to display for their kids? Or did they just think it was funny?
I hope that the family did not purchase this cut-out because they idolize the Duck Dynasty characters.
I saw this before I had officially met the family and this definitely conveyed a certain message to me. Without even knowing them well, I had already judged them... Like Isabel's friend judged the family that displayed the robes of the KKK.
What we choose to show others says a lot about us. It is so easy to make assumptions about a person just because of what we see. We judge people all the time. We like to think that only certain people live in the North Shore: wealthy, polite, classy people. When I saw the cardboard cut-out, I unconsciously categorized them as a different type of people than they actually are.
Luckily, they turned out to be a normal family.
Tuesday, November 12, 2013
Is the "Dream Car" Really the Best Choice?
Everything seems to be becoming modern. New iPhones are coming out with fingerprint identification, people are using 3D printers to print objects, Google has even developed a "driverless car". All these new advances are great, but how are they going to change the way people normally act?
While reading an article by the BBC about the future of cars, all I could think about was the skills humans are going to lose by having a car that can basically do everything for them. Manufacturers predict that by 2050 people won't even need to touch the steering wheel. They say that new cars won'nt "even require [people] to take the controls". The word "require" really stood out to me and made it seem like taking the controls was such a hassle. "Require" implies that someone is being forced to do something against their will. This makes the cars of the future seem luxurious compared to the cars that "require" that we control it. At first, this sounded cool to me, but when I thought about it more, it started to alarm me. If driving becomes so effortless, what will happen to the number of people who bike or walk to their destinations? It will go down, a lot. People will hardly know their way around their neighborhood since they are now able to completely zone out while driving. In this picture featured in the article, the drivers are not even paying attention to the road because the car doesn't "require" them to. Driving this kind of car would not demand any sort of brain function.
Once these autonomous cars become common, people will have little desire to enjoy the outdoors anymore. It is likely that the legal driving age will go down because drivers literally need no knowledge or awareness in order to drive their car... they basically aren't even driving. Young teens who normally wouldn't be able to drive - due to not being old enough to have a license - now can. Instead of biking to their friends house, all they will need to do is program their car to take them there. They would rarely need to ride their bikes or walk places. Obviously this is bad regarding their physical health, but they will also be missing out on the beautiful nature and fresh air around them.
There are some definite upsides of having this new technology implemented into cars. There would be fewer accidents and traffic jams, but I am not looking forward to the new mindset people will adapt.
While reading an article by the BBC about the future of cars, all I could think about was the skills humans are going to lose by having a car that can basically do everything for them. Manufacturers predict that by 2050 people won't even need to touch the steering wheel. They say that new cars won'nt "even require [people] to take the controls". The word "require" really stood out to me and made it seem like taking the controls was such a hassle. "Require" implies that someone is being forced to do something against their will. This makes the cars of the future seem luxurious compared to the cars that "require" that we control it. At first, this sounded cool to me, but when I thought about it more, it started to alarm me. If driving becomes so effortless, what will happen to the number of people who bike or walk to their destinations? It will go down, a lot. People will hardly know their way around their neighborhood since they are now able to completely zone out while driving. In this picture featured in the article, the drivers are not even paying attention to the road because the car doesn't "require" them to. Driving this kind of car would not demand any sort of brain function.
Once these autonomous cars become common, people will have little desire to enjoy the outdoors anymore. It is likely that the legal driving age will go down because drivers literally need no knowledge or awareness in order to drive their car... they basically aren't even driving. Young teens who normally wouldn't be able to drive - due to not being old enough to have a license - now can. Instead of biking to their friends house, all they will need to do is program their car to take them there. They would rarely need to ride their bikes or walk places. Obviously this is bad regarding their physical health, but they will also be missing out on the beautiful nature and fresh air around them.
There are some definite upsides of having this new technology implemented into cars. There would be fewer accidents and traffic jams, but I am not looking forward to the new mindset people will adapt.
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