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Pedal On Parliament (@POPScotland)
07/03/2013 11:10
We can confirm #POP2 will be on Sunday 19th May at 3pm on closed roads. :-)
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CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Events, rides etc.
PoP it in your diary and PoP along
(61 posts)-
Posted 11 years ago #
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Given that even the might of the Sky Ride couldn't avoid being tucked away from the city centre, I think that counts as a result...
Now the really hard part begins: filling those roads with thousands of protesters.
Posted 11 years ago # -
"This year 5,000?"
http://cyclingschools.wordpress.com/2013/03/07/its-official-pop-goes-19th
Posted 11 years ago # -
blimey, that was quick - haven't even got it on the POP site yet!
Posted 11 years ago # -
Good luck with the colourful annual celebration of cycling culture, which Scotland can be rightly proud of.
But sunday on closed roads is no protest, and far more easily co-opted by transport leaders.
Posted 11 years ago # -
A very traditional view of the world o_O.. Sunday is the second biggest day of the week for commercial Edinburgh shop sales... As you can tell by the volume of parked cars on the streets that PoP will be celebrating on, this will cause significant disruption to the city, and you will see many complaints when word gets out . The key is that the route is now safe for families and children, which is key to making the right impact on our politicians to implement the changes that we're beginning to see elsewhere..
Posted 11 years ago # -
Surely the protest bit is demonstrating our numbers, and getting policy change, not about how many people we inconvenience?
Posted 11 years ago # -
sure we can agree to disagree on the political effectiveness of sunday demonstrations..
alas i'll be here on the day, anyroads:
Posted 11 years ago # -
last year POP got lots of pre-press, but disappointingly little coverage of the main event. we're assured by journalists that a Sunday is more likely to generate coverage.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Make sure that you point out to all journos, politicos etc, that the ride has been moved to Sunday because of the danger to cyclists - which shows just how much needs to be done, if 3000+ cyclists in a group aren't safe.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Horseburger!! Have had to shift my hair-washing day now! But rest assured I'll be there to PoP one off in the general direction of the politicos! Think I'll also hitch up the triple trailer long rig to the rear skewer, and ride the crown of the road for the hell of it! Hey ho! Looking forward to carnage with the Sunday shoppers and touroids!
Posted 11 years ago # -
Looking forward to it!
Posted 11 years ago # -
Wow, getting bombed on Facebook, Twitter, email and here about this! Well done :-)
Posted 11 years ago # -
If you're in or near Porty (and on Facebook) there's an event for the feeder ride too: https://www.facebook.com/events/447672315300588/?fref=ts
Posted 11 years ago # -
Sunday is the new Saturday! Yeah. I don't do many protests and it looks like I won't be doing another. I'll check the Jockey Club rules and see what it says about attending a cycling EVENT? Do you have to paint your face and tie balloons to your handlebars to take part in this EVENT. I am still inclined to do the Saturday, or is it the Sunday...?
Posted 11 years ago # -
Sunday is a day when much of the cycle infrastructure is parked on. The fact that this event is non-commercial and will be seen using roads in centre of town is maybe a good thing.
But... I can understand it's maybe all a bit too happy and seeking consensus for some. It would be great to just close the streets for the whole day to allow people the freedom to walk and cycle. Instead these events are compressed into a time slot.... so drivers have the 'freedom' to sit in queues of traffic in the old town the rest of the year.
Edinburgh has always been timid about events like 'In town without my (what) car'. POP though should be able to encourage this idea by showing a centre of town that's actually worth cycling in. Just now the cycling experience gets worse the closer to the centre you get!
Posted 11 years ago # -
@TarmacJockeyPants
I think you are being a bit harsh, oh Little One! The High Street is a big enough hill to get inclined upon! I'm now looking forward to the Spring pandechaos of bunging up the HS and Forrest Road etc on a Shopper's Sunday. Listen to LaidBack, you know it makes sense! Come along, join in the spirit of protest, paint your sharries, and lickspittle up to the politicos, rogues and ne'erdowells of Dunedin! Feel the presence, use the Force, and bring your sturdy Rudge Roadster and Raleigh Bell!
Of more import, bring all your mates, and make it a Day at the Races!Posted 11 years ago # -
@Laidback, The orgs told me POP2 is a 'protest' not an 'event'! I'm having trouble with this mixed message myself!
Posted 11 years ago # -
Not really fussed about semantics.
Was there last year. Will be there again this year.
If it achieves the desired effect then it's a good thing.
Besides last year was good fun!
Hope the angry taxi driver is there again :/Posted 11 years ago # -
What happened with the angry taxi driver?
(Aren't they all angry?)
Posted 11 years ago # -
You do get nice ones too! I had a really nice taxi driver yesterday give way to me and give me a big cheery grin when I waved thank you to him.
Posted 11 years ago # -
“You cling so tightly to your purity, my lad! How terrified you are of sullying your hands. Well, go ahead then, stay pure! What good will it do, and why even bother coming here among us? Purity is a concept of fakirs and friars.
But you, the intellectuals, the bourgeois anarchists, you invoke purity as your rationalization for doing nothing. Do nothing, don’t move, wrap your arms tight around your body, put on your gloves. As for myself, my hands are dirty. I have plunged my arms up to the elbows in excrement and blood. And what else should one do? Do you suppose that it is possible to govern innocently?”
John-Paul Sartre - couldn't have said it better myself. I will be going to PoP2.
Posted 11 years ago # -
So will I. But I'm not sticking my arms in anything yucky!
Posted 11 years ago # -
Coxy: from memory, a taxi trying to make a cross-traffic turn at the Royal Mile/Bridges crossroad was giving the passing column of cyclists a bit of lip. He got shouted down pretty quickly by more than one cyclist, myself included.
I did a quick search but can't find the thread that mentioned it. You may have more time to trawl through search results!
Posted 11 years ago # -
Oh, and an "aye" from me for POP2. Mr MeepMeep will be duly dragged along for the outing. :o)
Posted 11 years ago # -
@Morningsider – presuming that you’re POP was at my posts? You are right about one thing in your post, you “couldn’t have said it better….”. This is a forum for news/comments? That’s why I bother. I think I will still do the Saturday though.
Posted 11 years ago # -
What I like about Morningsider's Quote is that it applies equally well to both sides of the argument. If you see 'purity' as protest then it declaims the people who dont want to capitulate to the state. However if you see 'purity' as concern for families and doing things in concert with the authorities then it is the anachists who are up to their elbows in excrement and blood, getting on with it whilst the pure worry about getting their children dirty.
Personally I think billing this as an event is a mistake, I don't do sky rides, but I do campaign for better infrastructure. Semantics are very important and by removing the word protest you are taking the message from the event, now its 'oh isn't jolly how many cyclists we have' as opposed to 'gosh look how angry the cyclists are'.
I think we were foolish to surrender half our strength, the whole reason negotiations happened is because we got 3k people there last time at a grass roots level, that sort of thing scares politcos witless, its easily enough people power to ride roughshod over the wishes of the cooncil, I mean its not like they really listen to ours (QBC case in point) and as mentioned before the child safety point is pretty moot, anyone who doesn't see a cloud of cyclists that big shouldn't be on the road anyway. This is 'wrap your arms tight around your body, put on your gloves'. We had hundreds of children last time and 5 police officers, not at any point did I feel unsafe, quite the opposite, it was a very empowering experience.
PoP for me worked so beautifully because it was a self organizing genuine popular protest, and I think we should resist the sanitizing of the event into a authority run advertisement for Edinburgh cycling. You can say 'its run by cyclists' but its not them who sets the tune, that is immediately obvious, the organizing committee become the puppet of the 'compromises' engineered by thoes in power, the protest is subverted and Bang! no more popular uprising.
I certainly wont go for an Event, only if the campaigning nature of PoP is clearly stated on all its materials would I come, I can have a nice sunny ride with my friends any day.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Hi all, just to say we've never called it anything but a protest, anywhere on the website, we've always emphasised our manifesto and our demands - I don't know where the idea has come from that just because we want families (and older people and unicyclists and roadies and pandas and just plain old people on bikes) to come along it's suddenly an 'event' or a 'celebration'. As we've said from the start it's a light hearted ride for a serious purpose - this year's POP is largely the same people and the same idea as last year's POP, it's just we can no longer operate under the radar. BUT you don't get kids along if it's going to be shouty or if there's a danger people will be kettled. Plus whoever said protests can't be fun is going to the wrong sorts of protest, in my opinion.
Posted 11 years ago # -
I luv a tomcat on the rugg when it has its claws out!
resist the sanitizing of the event into a authority run advertisement for Edinburgh cycling... is what we have to watch out for! That's fine if the Politicos genuinely turn up and support by partaking with the masses! We need a Lord Provost like 'Boris the Cat', and dump the feckless lackies that inhabit the Chambers the noo! Boris gets things done! Long live Boris!Posted 11 years ago # -
We had hundreds of children last time and 5 police officers, not at any point did I feel unsafe, quite the opposite, it was a very empowering experience.
POP was—and should remain—safety in numbers.
Skyride et al. is numbers in safety.
Posted 11 years ago #
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