The upsurge in cycling in London has some fairly unexpected positive points. Not only are there the benefits that you expect, and which don’t need covering here as they’re all over the internet on worthy environmental sites and in the mainstream news on quiet days, but also it seems to be helping some people get a leg up in life.
The East London Advertiser is reporting that a scheme allowing homeless people to learn how to build a bike and then keep it once it’s put together. This then gives them the chance to ride to a job and get qualified as a bike mechanic, using the skills they’ve picked up.
It seems to me that a scheme like this is a good outcome from a ride in cycling in the city, creating a demand for a service which can be easily learned with little or no background. It also, although the paper doesn’t specifically say, looks like it uses recovered parts and bike bits, at least bringing something good out of stolen bikes that are recovered by the police, and never claimed. Perhaps it’s just a shame that the bike they got out of the scheme was built around a Probike frame, but I guess you can’t be too picky at the start. With their new cycle mechanic skills the people involved can soon move on to something a bit more pleasant to ride about on.
On that note, the one who has rapidly morphed into the silent partner in FMFT has been inspired by something he might have read to look at buying a new bike.
This is exciting news, as it gives us the chance to open the debate about whether a Specialized Langster is a genuinely developed bike to fit a demand, or a big corporation jumping on a fashion bandwagon, or , indeed, mocking a fashionable trend by subverting it? While we’re undecided, it does seem like a decent £500 worth if it floats your boat.
It also opens the possibility that there’ll be more riding to work and maybe a less silent half to the partnership?
A
No comments:
Post a Comment