Not Just Bikes | Where the Bicycle was Invented (and Forgotten): Coventry [Guest Video] @NotJustBikes | Uploaded March 2021 | Updated October 2024, 1 week ago.
"Coventry - The City That Nearly Forgot The Bicycle"
This special guest video was produced by Adam Tranter, the Bicycle Mayor for Coventry, in the UK.
Coventry holds an important place in the history of the bicycle. It is the city where both the penny-farthing, as well as the safety bicycle - the template for almost all modern bicycles - was invented.
In this short documentary, Adam explains the history of cycling in Coventry, and about the realities of cycling in Coventry today. Comparisons to Amsterdam and the Netherlands are provided.
This film will be shown as part of the Coventry Transport Museum's new exhibition Gearing Up: From Saddle to Spoke online on Friday 12 March 2021. The exhibition (culturespacecoventry.com/gearing-up) – which it is hoped will open physically when the museum reopens – features over 80 cycles and celebrates the history, unique designs, and benefits of cycling.
You can find out more about Adam here: adamtranter.com or follow him on Twitter: twitter.com/adamtranter
00:00 Introduction
01:44 Coventry's Bicycle History
03:42 After The War
05:14 Carlton Reid Interview
06:46 People or cars?
07:29 The Safety Bicycle
10:43 The Netherlands with Orla Chennaoui
13:06 What's next for Coventry?
14:56 Summary and Credits
"Coventry - The City That Nearly Forgot The Bicycle"
This special guest video was produced by Adam Tranter, the Bicycle Mayor for Coventry, in the UK.
Coventry holds an important place in the history of the bicycle. It is the city where both the penny-farthing, as well as the safety bicycle - the template for almost all modern bicycles - was invented.
In this short documentary, Adam explains the history of cycling in Coventry, and about the realities of cycling in Coventry today. Comparisons to Amsterdam and the Netherlands are provided.
This film will be shown as part of the Coventry Transport Museum's new exhibition Gearing Up: From Saddle to Spoke online on Friday 12 March 2021. The exhibition (culturespacecoventry.com/gearing-up) – which it is hoped will open physically when the museum reopens – features over 80 cycles and celebrates the history, unique designs, and benefits of cycling.
You can find out more about Adam here: adamtranter.com or follow him on Twitter: twitter.com/adamtranter
00:00 Introduction
01:44 Coventry's Bicycle History
03:42 After The War
05:14 Carlton Reid Interview
06:46 People or cars?
07:29 The Safety Bicycle
10:43 The Netherlands with Orla Chennaoui
13:06 What's next for Coventry?
14:56 Summary and Credits
![Where the Bicycle was Invented (and Forgotten): Coventry [Guest Video]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Mxvk3KO8p20/hqdefault.jpg "Where the Bicycle was Invented (and Forgotten): Coventry [Guest Video]
Coventry - The City That Nearly Forgot The Bicycle
This special guest video was produced by Adam Tranter, the Bicycle Mayor for Coventry, in the UK.
Coventry holds an important place in the history of the bicycle. It is the city where both the penny-farthing, as well as the safety bicycle - the template for almost all modern bicycles - was invented.
In this short documentary, Adam explains the history of cycling in Coventry, and about the realities of cycling in Coventry today. Comparisons to Amsterdam and the Netherlands are provided.
This film will be shown as part of the Coventry Transport Museums new exhibition Gearing Up: From Saddle to Spoke online on Friday 12 March 2021. The exhibition (https://culturespacecoventry.com/gearing-up) – which it is hoped will open physically when the museum reopens – features over 80 cycles and celebrates the history, unique designs, and benefits of cycling.
You can find out more about Adam here: https://www.adamtranter.com or follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/adamtranter
00:00 Introduction
01:44 Coventrys Bicycle History
03:42 After The War
05:14 Carlton Reid Interview
06:46 People or cars?
07:29 The Safety Bicycle
10:43 The Netherlands with Orla Chennaoui
13:06 Whats next for Coventry?
14:56 Summary and Credits")
![Stroads are Ugly, Expensive, and Dangerous (and theyre everywhere) [ST05]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ORzNZUeUHAM/hqdefault.jpg "Stroads are Ugly, Expensive, and Dangerous (and theyre everywhere) [ST05]
Watch this video ad-free on Nebula: https://nebula.tv/videos/not-just-bikes-the-ugly-dangerous-and-inefficient-stroads-found-all-over-the-us-canada-st05
Stroads are streets that are designed like roads and in doing so, fail at being good at either one. They are too sprawling and hostile to be good streets, and they are too busy and complicated to be good roads. Stroads are inefficient, unsafe, expensive, and ugly.
This video introduces the concept of Stroads, and talks about why you will (almost) never find these kind of places in the Netherlands: because here all roads need to have a single purpose as either a motorway, connector road, or end-destination street.
The name stroad was invented by Strong Towns as a way to explain why road design in the US is fundamentally broken.
To donate to Strong Towns, visit: https://www.strongtowns.org/membership
Watch the rest of the Strong Towns series here:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJp5q-R0lZ0_FCUbeVWK6OGLN69ehUTVa
Sign up to Nebula and watch ad-free and sponsor-free: https://go.nebula.tv/notjustbikes
Patreon: https://patreon.com/notjustbikes
Twitter: https://twitter.com/notjustbikes
Reddit: https://reddit.com/r/notjustbikes
One-time donations: https://notjustbikes.com/donate
NJB Live (my bicycle livestream channel):
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9v57F4xz46KaDsvWfCv8yw
Thumbnail image by Edward Burtynsky (used with permission)
Check out the whole gallery of Oil photos:
https://www.edwardburtynsky.com/projects/photographs/oil
More reading
The Stroad
https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/10/30/the-stroad
The Stroad [2013]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6jFnOnjzrk&t=110s
What is a Stroad? [2018]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZ1HhLq-Huo
Example of a Stroad:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IK22JKFH5-8
References
Thumbnail image from Strong Towns:
https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2018/3/1/whats-a-stroad-and-why-does-it-matter
City streets safer than suburban roads, study finds
https://whyy.org/articles/study-city-driving-often-safer-than-the-burbs/
Do Denser Neighborhoods Have Safer Streets? Population Density and Traffic Safety in the Philadelphia Region
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0739456X19845043
Vital Signs: Motor Vehicle Injury Prevention — United States and 19 Comparison Countries
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/65/wr/mm6526e1.htm?s_cid=mm6526e1_w
U.S. car crash deaths increased in 2020 despite pandemic
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/u-s-car-crash-deaths-increased-in-2020-despite-pandemic/ar-BB1cJzOb
Early Estimate of Motor Vehicle Traffic Fatalities for the First 9 Months (Jan–Sep) of 2020
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/813053
60 Years of Urban Change
http://iqc.ou.edu/urbanchange
Designing to Move People
National Association of City Transportation Officials
https://nacto.org/publication/transit-street-design-guide/introduction/why/designing-move-people/
Principles of Sustainable Safety in the Netherlands
Vision Zero UK
https://visionzerouk.wordpress.com/2016/11/15/principles-of-sustainable-safety-in-the-netherlands/
More about the 3 types of street/road/highway in the Netherlands:
https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erftoegangsweg
https://www.wegenwiki.nl/Erftoegangsweg
https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gebiedsontsluitingsweg
https://www.wegenwiki.nl/Gebiedsontsluitingsweg
https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroomweg
https://www.wegenwiki.nl/Stroomweg
Chapters
0:00 Introduction to Stroads
0:41 What is a road?
1:31 What is a street?
2:30 What is a stroad?
2:50 Stroads are bad streets
3:08 Stroads are hostile
4:05 Stroads are ugly
4:26 Stroads are bad roads
4:38 Stroads are inefficient
5:26 Stroads are unsafe
6:41 Stroads are expensive
8:43 How to fix our stroads
8:55 Turn a stroad into a road
9:26 Turn a stroad into a street
9:47 The Netherlands does it properly (as usual)
10:17 Stroomweg
10:55 Gebiedsontsluitingsweg
11:24 Erftoegangsweg
11:40 Streets in the Netherlands
12:26 Dutch street and road examples
13:28 A street becomes a road - Amsterdam
14:37 A street becomes a road - Amstelveen
16:31 Conclusion
17:39 Patreon shout-out
17:50 Outro")
