{"id":2525,"date":"2020-11-03T11:58:45","date_gmt":"2020-11-03T11:58:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.happycyclist.org\/?p=2525"},"modified":"2020-11-03T11:58:45","modified_gmt":"2020-11-03T11:58:45","slug":"myth-we-need-to-get-the-right-balance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/?p=2525","title":{"rendered":"Myth: &#8220;We need to get the right balance.&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Taken literally, this is not actually a myth; but it is a <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Platitude\" target=\"_blank\">platitude<\/a>, and as such adds nothing to the conversation. The myth arises in the way it is used as an excuse for keeping the status quo &#8211; in the implied assertion that anything that reduces the capacity for motoring in any way is &#8220;the wrong balance&#8221;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The real issue is in what constitutes &#8220;the right balance&#8221;, and it is clear that the balance is currently grotesquely skewed towards providing for motoring at the expense of all else. This is evident in the consequences: according to the <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/tfgm.com\/trads\" target=\"_blank\">TfGM Travel Diary Survey<\/a>, more than a third of all car or van journeys in Bolton are 2km (1.24 miles) or less, and over 60% are 5km (3.1 miles) or less. This is despite the fact that over <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nomisweb.co.uk\/census\/2011\/KS404EW\/view\/1946157081?cols=measures\" target=\"_blank\">26% of households in Bolton<\/a> do not have access to a car or van.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/BlackburnRoadTraffic-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2527\"\/><figcaption>A typical scene on Blackburn Road at Astley Bridge.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Taken literally, this is not actually a myth; but it is a platitude, and as such adds nothing to the conversation. The myth arises in the way it is used as an excuse for keeping the status quo &#8211; in &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/?p=2525\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2527,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-myths"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2525\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/happycyclist.grahamecooper.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}