Planning for Pedal Power

My journey to Amritsar, deep within the heart of Northern India, started out a bit wet. 

No sooner had I stepped out of the train station than the sky opened up, engulfing the city with fountains of warm rain.  And this was no ordinary rain; you couldn’t just throw up your umbrella and forget about it. This was the sort of rain that eats umbrellas for lunch.  This was monsoon season in India.  This was as wet as it gets.

The streets of Amritsar proved to be no match for nature’s stormy horde.   In no time at all, the entire city was buried in water, with an average depth of two to three feet.  Driving a car through Amritsar’s drowned roads would have been absolutely impossible.

And yet, in spite of this diluvian madness, I was quickly able to find a hotel room in the center of town, more than two miles away from the train station, without even getting my feet wet.  How was I able to perform such a miraculous feat, defying Mother Nature herself?  Well, stay tuned.

Last week the School of Architecture hosted Turning Urban: Innovation in Megacities, a symposium on the modern urban world.

Today, urbanized areas capture over 50% of the world’s population, and this percentage is expected to grow by leaps and bounds over the course of the 21^st century.  Tomorrow, our children will be waking up in a global city.

Nowhere are these pressures of urbanization stronger than in the country of Bangladesh.  At the symposium, Sarwar Jahan, Professor and Head of the Department of Urban and Regional Planning at the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, spoke of the trials and tribulations facing his country.  Bangladesh is threatened by a cornucopia of issues, ranging from poverty, rising sea levels, and a catastrophic loss of wetlands.  Many of these problems can be attributed to poor planning and land use patterns.

But there are a few things that Bangladesh is doing right.  One of the country’s best strengths is its transportation system: Bangladesh is a country built upon hundreds of thousands of bicycle wheels.

In Bangladesh, as well as in many other South Asian countries, bicycles function as every imaginable form of transportation.   A bicycle is a ride to work, a taxi cab, a truck for carrying heavy loads.  A bicycle might even double as a school bus.

To this day, the bicycle remains as one of man’s most wondrous creations.  A bicycle takes up very little street space, is easy to operate and repair, and burns no fossil fuels.  And as South Asia has proven, it’s also extremely versatile.

By now, I’m sure you’ve figured out how I escaped the rain on that monsoon-drenched day in Amritsar.  That’s exactly right: I hitched a ride on a bicycle rickshaw.  Best taxicab ride I’ve ever taken.

Imagine what New York City might be like if the city’s cabbies traded in their aging, tooth-decay yellow Crown Victorias for a fleet of shiny new bicycles.  Who knows?  Perhaps one day the Big Apple will also be known as the Big Bicycle. 

Yikes.  I pity the future citizens of New York City, who will have to endure such a terrible nickname.  But you must agree – it’s a terrific dream.