Cotch: Helmsdale Harbour
In the winter, while I neglected to post on the blog, I spent some time out of the way to concentrate on work. Helmsdale in Sutherland was about as out of the way as I could find. Continue reading at cotch dot net…
Monthly Archives: February 2011
AWWTM: Cycling’s bogeyman
There was a bit of a monkey fight over the nascent Cycling Embassy of Great Britain recently thanks to an article by Carlton Reid on Road.cc (since rebutted by Jim). Given that the organisation in question has only had a preliminary meeting and has not even launched yet, I don’t […]
Simple rules
This is another archival repost, originally written for the old blog in november 2007. The main driving force for creationists is not science, but ethics. Their trump card is that “evolution is immoral”: they cite “might makes right” and eugenics, quote Darwin’s supposedly racist terminology in The Origin and Voyage, […]
AWWTM: Street Talks
I’ve been working on organising monthly pub gatherings for people who are interested in the past, present and most importantly, future of London’s transport, streets, built environment and public spaces. It’s basically a rip-off of the Skeptics In The Pub format for cycling and street design nerds. The first one […]
Cotch: Night Bus
A young smartly dressed woman gets on, concentrating on her phone call. The bus pulls out before she has time to mount the stairs, and the motion throws her to the side, her bag swinging and bashing the passenger behind her. Fifty. Nine. To. Streatham Hill. She climbs slowly, letting […]
Review: Extreme Pilgrim
This is another archival repost originally written for my old blog a few years ago. I caught the last couple of minutes of Extreme Pilgrim (BBC 2, Friday 9pm) and was intrigued, so fired up the iPlayer to watch the whole thing. It’s Vicar of Dibley meets Ray Mears’ Extreme […]
Cotch: White Christmas
At Christmas it snowed in Dorset. It’s rare that it snows in Dorset, and I’ve not previously photographed the area in the snow. So here’s a quick photo essay of the Blackmore Vale at Christmas.
AWWTM: “Britain pays more for fuel than anywhere else”
It’s another frequently raised fact in comment threads and pub agreements. Everybody knows it’s true. If it wasn’t true, why would everybody know it and repeat it all the time? They can’t all be wrong. You would think though that such a fact, with all of the resources of the […]
AWWTM: “Driving has never cost more”
“End to the war on the motorists? No, driving’s never cost more,” declares Mark King, Money Editor, in The Observer today. To be fair to King, he doesn’t actually say anything as absurd as that driving has “never cost more” in his article — but newspaper headline writers have never […]
AWWTM: Say what you like about Top Gear…
Apparently Steve Coogan is a huge fan of Top Gear. I’m told by many that, whatever you think of the presenters’ contributions to xenophobia and misogyny, you have to admit that the show is funny and entertaining. Continue reading at At War With The Motorist…
AWWTM: Fast, direct, uninterrupted and comprehensive
Boris Johnson thinks that he can solve all of the barriers to cycling just by splashing some paint on one or two roads. As anybody who does not cycle could tell him, what is needed if we are to achieve mass cycling is infrastructure that is complete, conspicuously safe, enjoyable […]
AWWTM: Where do all the hire bikes go?
So much of our understanding of the city — its areas and their relationships and divisions — have been determined by the traditional motorist’s road map. (London is luckier than many cities because its river and tube lines also help define its structure in people’s minds.) Continue reading at At […]