I was listening to Michael Palin going round the world in 80 days last night. In ’88 the rush hour in China was almost all bikes.
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Debate!
Keith Brown's reply to Kezia Dugdale
(96 posts)-
Posted 11 years ago #
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Does being Green automatically mean you should like bieks and be a member of cycling organisations? Obviously it's a green transport option, but is he listed as being a member of a bus users group? Or a train users group? Just because CTC isn't listed does that mean he doesn't like cycling or doesn't want to promote cycling?
In fairness you may be feeling more green than the Green Party because there are fewer people greener than yourself. Is the Green Party a dead duck just because some people are greener than its MSPs? Is the Tory party a dead duck because some people are even bigger bigots? Seem to be placing rather unrealistic expectations... IMHO.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Also a bit selective to judge entire party on one individual. Alison Johnstone carries much of the cycling remit at holy rood, and does it rather well. However, last few events I've been at, Harvie has also supported/attended.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Hmmm. There's a brusque dismissiveness in something along the lines of "I was on a plane in '86/I've never got a taxi on my own, only been in one a handful of times in my life and haven't been in one at all for more than 20 years" similar to "an official from transport office cycles up AND down Easter Road".
It's probably a lot easier to take a folding bike with you on the train and cycle from the station to your destination if you already have a folding bike (and decades of experience of multi-modal bus-and-taxi-avoiding travel). Someone who does not have a folding bike might find it temporarily quicker and much cheaper to get a taxi at the other end, even if there is a shop selling folding bikes near the station.
Posted 11 years ago # -
I liked the previous transport minister better but the BBC elected him minister for snow and he didn't deal with it well.
Yes that was all rather unfortunate. The hysteria over the weather has got a bit out of hand in this country in recent years. Stevenson was at least a keen rail user.
Posted 11 years ago # -
In fairness to Keith Brown, I have discovered he did actually get on a train on 11 January 2012, between Edinburgh and Glasgow (the only train he caught all month). So, in a technical sense he may have been truthful, although he definitely arrived at work that morning by limo. Let's say he opted out of "full disclosure" or was selective about the facts.
Furthermore, he currently appears to be a regular rail user (if not previously), commuting from Bridge of Allan by train some days. So presumably his mileage claim is the four mile drive each way from his home to Bridge of Allan station.
However, he wasn't always so conscientious. Back when he was in charge of Schools and Skills, he had a bit of a penchant for short taxi trips. So in the spirit of attention to detail which has been the hallmark of this thread of late:
Keith Brown MSP
Minister for Transport and Infrastructure (from 11/12/2010)
(Minister for Schools and Skills until 11/12/2010)Date Origin Destination Cost
15/12/2009 Scottish Parliament University of Edinburgh £5.35
15/12/2009 University of Edinburgh Scottish Parliament £4.90
19/01/2010 St Andrew’s House Scottish Parliament £4.70
26/01/2010 Regent Road Cannongate £4.70
23/02/2010 Scottish Parliament St Andrew’s House £4.50
03/03/2010 Scottish Parliament Victoria Quay £6.35
17/06/2010 Royal Scots Club Scottish Parliament £5.25
21/12/2010 Scottish Parliament St Andrew’s House £4.70Probably the weather was p1sh on those days, eh? Or maybe a heavy dossier of files to carry?
Posted 11 years ago # -
I don't know that it means you have to like bikes but I would have expected them to use them. I can't think of much greener than bikes. Once you have the thing it's got a lower CO2 output than walking.
No, he isn't listed as a bus user. Caroline Lucas sort of is but it's one of those bike busses.
I wasn't able to find evidence of much bike activity. He wrote about the Bridge to Nowhere and went for a ride on a Paperbike.
There are limits I suppose. I asked the memsahib to stop getting wee yoghurt drinks because the use of plastic seemed excessive. I have a family history of high blood cholesterol but the packaging was annoying me. On the other hand I'm probably going to order a Park SPK-1 spork from Brilliant and I don't really need one.
I suppose not all Tories have to be bigoted. I actually like Ken Clarke but his BAT thing annoys me. Diane Abbot used a private school. I understand why but I'm disappointed.
In 2006 I hoped that the new government would stop or change the Curriculum for Excellence. They had no political investment in it. They didn't stop it. I can understand why, they would have been hit with sunk cost arguments like they were on the Glasgow airport link but I'm still annoyed that it was just allowed to run.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Hmm, any time we have to go down to Holyrood from George Sq, it's either bike, or howf it if more than one person*.
However we do 'bill' 15 mins time e/w against projects etc so the accounted for cost might actually be more than the taxi fare Mr B is paying when you consider 10mins against 30. Perhaps in some cases taxi could be considered a better use of time, and perhaps public money?
*Unless on the rare occasion our line manager is going, then it's taxi.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Dang. A cow-orker says I might need to get a taxi to the Uni with the advanced higher. I tried to claim there would be I room but they do 7 seaters.
Wing pig, it's not rocket science.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Jeezo, imagine the environmental impact of rocket science. Where do the Greens stand on that?
Posted 11 years ago # -
"I don't know that it means you have to like bikes but I would have expected them to use them"
I do hope there are no blind members of the Green Party....
Okay, flippant I know, but what about those people who are too scared to cycle (one of the things that started this whole thread). They don't cycle because they feel the roads are too dangerous, but want to make things better for people to use them.
"I asked the memsahib to stop getting wee yoghurt drinks because the use of plastic seemed excessive"
Like I said, there aren't many people as green as that, I'm certainly not. But then again I ride a bike, so am I greener than Patrick Harvie?
I do genuinely think you're being a little harsh, and a little unrealistic, in your expectations of Green Party members, and it's certainly worth bearing in mind that just because some people do different things than you (as in the general people 'you', not you personally) doesn't mean they are 'wrong' (just had a long conversation about 'tolerance' at lunchtime and I've pinko liberal coarsing through me just now).
Posted 11 years ago # -
There's no space in wingpig.
Rocketry could be sort of described as:
-confine some chemicals
-make them expand
-allow them to escape only in the direction you want something to be pushed away from
but it doesn't really do justice to the fine details. Similarly aerobic respiration is not really just oxygen + glucose = carbon dioxide + water, even if you balance the equation. Our biology teacher's favourite expression for having to tell us this sort of thing because the syllabus required it was "over-simplification to the point of lying". Similarly cycling is, at one level, rotating the crank on a bicycle to make the wheel push you along, but this omits to mention things like fast-moving motor vehicles, falling off or the cost of purchase, which might be relevant in a real-world application.Posted 11 years ago # -
There is a space when you write it on an i Pad.
I think the USSR used something particularly nasty as rocket propellant but I can't remember what it was.
I was told off at lunch time for being too mean about number 4 son who got wheeched into hospital with sore skin.
Posted 11 years ago # -
I think the USSR used something particularly nasty as rocket propellant but I can't remember what it was.
Plenty of contenders for that from having a read through this. Not that there's really such a thing as a friendly rocket fuel but some of them were the stuff of nightmares. The Russians also just had to build their own version of this delightful thing - I mean, if you have a rocket that is essentially one long tube of explosives waiting to go boom, you might as well go the full distance and try to put a nuclear reactor on top as well.
Apologies, I've not had the energy to get into the political debate here, but I have become obsessed with reading about various crazy spaceflight schemes over the years. If you ever need to leave the planet in a hurry you know who to call....
Posted 11 years ago # -
Eric Schlosser wrote a book about, in part, what happened when a fuelled Titan II in an Arkansas silo was punctured by a dropped spanner. (If you buy it I think you should do so through chdot's link on the left).
Posted 11 years ago # -
"number 4 son"
Somehow people don't consider making other people as not being green. Thats 4 little CO2 factories and 320 years of consuming right there at ~10 tonnes of greenhouse thingmies a year.
Of course it would be a perfectly valid response to tell someone their 'life choices' are nowt to do with anyone else but them.... ;-)
Posted 11 years ago # -
If I had to make a choice between beer and cycling, I would definitely choose the beer. Hmmm. Beeeeer.
I use taxis a fair bit. I never thought about it. If I'm going to VQ or Saughton House I can read the stuff I should have already read while I'm going or talk to the people who actually did the work that need to pretend to know more about when I get there. But I get the bus back because I'm never in that much of a hurry to get back behind my desk. Anyway, I'm not sure I'm following how there's something inherently not green about taxis but green about trains. And what's the position on buses? Green or not green? What about the car club? That's practically having a car and they seem to sit about as much as private cars.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Somehow people don't consider making other people as not being green.
One of those people might discover a cure for cancer, or crack fusion energy, or any other number of amazing and positive things.
Or they might end up head of an oil company, or leader of a global crime syndicate (obligatory lefty joke: aren't they the same thing!) so that's a bit of a risk.
Right, let's get this back on topic, to erm, rocketry? Help me out here!
Posted 11 years ago # -
I did mention earlier that Mr H has the advantage on me by not having caused a number of little Harvies.
I don't see how taxis as more green than a car. Busses and trains might be carrying lots of people (or might not at some times of day).
I'm disappointed in the Greens because they're not more visibly on bikes. The transport minister wasn't elected on his greenness. They were. I've never been able to convince someone to ride a bike by telling them how fast, cheap and fun it is. I have sometimes convinced them by riding a bike to work every day and eventually they try it because they see it can be done.
I'm not feeling charitable just now. Number 4 is in the hospital over night so I had to take stuff there (yes, in a car grrrrrr) and while I was out the memsahib's pals tidied up the house. This involved throwing out a box which contained a card from number one son's girlfriend, hiding the oven gloves so I had to use a towel to take the bread tin out of the machine and scoffing the last half dozen of my christmas specially very dark chocolates which I'd got from number one son. I'd left the specially darkest ones to the end but they are all gone now.
Posted 11 years ago # -
@WFB: "Number 4 is in the hospital over night"
Sorry to hear that.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Thanks, it's nothing serious but they want to watch him for a day or two.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Wfb hope no 4 on the mend
I always eat my favourite chocs first. What size card can hide oven gloves? What sort of pals does your wife have?
The greens are vulnerable to criticism over taxis, solar panels, eating meat, not wearing sandals, shaving etc.
Mark Calcavechia who was a very good US golfer a while back, once caused a sensation by taking the train to the golf course, golf clubs and all. ,This was in Holland.
Posted 11 years ago # -
He's got infected eczema to the point where he can't walk so they've got him in for serious antibiotics.
She has pals from Coatbridge. I couldn't find the big bowls for my porridge this morning because they were in the book case… no, I have no idea why. They also put a box with toffee in it on top of the bread machine which was busy making a spicy fruit loaf for my dad.
I wear sandals much of the summer. I have been shaving my head but the need for even that has been decreasing. I do need more hats now of course.
Posted 11 years ago # -
wfb, the best thing I did for my eczema was to go to an event hosted by the eczema society. Basically I came away with a massive bag of various emollient samples. Some would work when others didn't and I eventually found one that kept working rather than eventually irritating my skin.
Now I rarely have to use steroid creams and can just get away with emollients - the exception to this is the change from autumn to winter when it seems to get a lot worse.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Taxis, solar panels, eating meat, not wearing sandals, shaving etc.
Never mind all that. What about beer? I assume beer's OK, in green terms, especially if I make it myself. Although not green beer obviously. Mind you, I have some cider fermenting in a demijohn. I've never made it in clear glass before and to see it fermenting, oxidising and flocculating makes you wonder who first decided that it looked like a nice thing to drink.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Wine sometimes isn't ok for vegans because they use isinglass which is a fish product. It seems that some beer uses it too.
The is no vegetarian Parmesan. There is Italian hard cheese
Posted 11 years ago # -
Public services are responsible for around 50% (or 5 tonnes annually) of an average individual's CO2 emissions, and another 30% (or 3 tonnes) is domestic energy usage.
Does this mean Green politicians must not use schools, local roads, bin collection services, the water supply, the sewage system, the police, the fire brigade, and not heat their home either...?
Posted 11 years ago # -
It's one thing to have to exist in a world that doesn't reflect your convictions and other to live in the world in active violation of them. I think wfb's point about taxis is that they are manky pollutants and easily avoided so for a green to be using them could be seen as a violation of the espoused green convictions in ways that sending your kids to school etc are not.
Still, even if I agreed with that (I'll volunteer that I make limited special efforts at green living and have never made any claims to be green but I do use Irish Moss to clear the beer) I'd grant dispensations for some uses although they would be unlikely to qualify as an allowable member's expense.
Posted 11 years ago # -
back on topic:
Riding into road cycling stooshie
THE cycling battle has moved to new ground for the new year. Haymarket problems rumble on but now the focus is on Easter Road thanks to a spat between MSPs Kezia Dugdale, above, who believes the road is too dangerous for cyclists, and Transport Minister Keith Brown, who appears to need just the word of a single civil servant to pronounce it safe.
I hope Mr Brown is the kind of politician who likes a challenge and we’ll see his bahookie on a bike seat sometime soon as he weaves between parked cars, islands, roadworks and, of course, rush-hour traffic.
Remember your helmet, minister.
Posted 11 years ago # -
@SRD that link appears to be to an article about school dinners...
Posted 11 years ago #
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