Pedalling’s past
From emancipation to ecology, bikes have changed our gears
BY Lynn Cunningham
1890s The introduction of the pneumatic-wheeled “safety bicycle” sets off a bicycle craze. Many of the enthusiasts are women (at least those who can afford the roughly $100 cost). They shed chaperones and their confining clothing and experience a freedom that will propel the rational dress and suffragette movements. As American feminist Susan B. Anthony declares: “The bicycle has done more for the emancipation of women than anything else in the world.”
1904 Bike users and manufacturers encourage the construction of better roads to improve cycling. Unfortunately, these make cars all the more appealing when they’re introduced. The first 114 Model Cs putt away from the Canadian Ford plant this year. Within two decades there are 40,000 “horseless carriages” in Toronto alone.
1930s With more than a quarter of adults unemployed, the Dirty Thirties force many to revert to cheaper transportation than automobiles. Bikes are back, for those not getting around in Bennett buggies: horse-drawn cars named for deeply unpopular Prime Minister R.B. Bennett.
1950s One of the iconic symbols of the post-war dream is fresh-faced (white) kids pedalling their CCMs through orderly suburbs. An adult riding a bike is either poor or highly eccentric, while an adolescent who dares take a bike to high school is marked for social death.
1979 The first Canadian bike courier company, Sunwheel, spins into business in Toronto with a delivery staff of three students. Founder Hilda Tiessen believes fervently in bikes as an antidote to traffic tie-ups. Now we have worse traffic tie-ups punctuated by apparently overstimulated and under-cautious bike messengers.
2007 It’s the revenge of those highschool nerds as global warming tops the enviro-concerns charts. Bike commuters enjoy, at least in some cities, special lanes, bike racks on public buses and the warm glow of satisfaction that comes from reducing their carbon footprint. Cottage industries turn out cargo-bikes, the two-wheeled equivalent of SUVs. Scientists begin to worry about the impact of the smugness footprint.
