Days of future past
Today the politics of the bicycle challenges civic planners and lay users alike. Dedicated lanes, velodromes and BMX tracks are all part of the mix, with cyclists themselves actively involved in lobbying.
One hundred and thirty years ago things were not so very different. The uses and misuses of the bicycle in Hamilton were the subject of two letters to the editor of the Waikato Times.
On March 5, 1888, someone signing his or herself ‘Observer’ began with the assertion that ‘‘it was high time that our Borough Council took some steps to pass a by-law to prevent the running of bicycles on the footpaths in the townships’’.
A pair of specific incidents were then alluded to. In the first ‘‘ . . . a cyclist coming along Victoria Street at speed was the cause of a horse breaking a good bridle near Mr Horne’s store . . . ’’ Presumably, the horse was forced to stop in a hurry to avoid collision. Oblivious – or indifferent – to the resulting mayhem, the man on the bike, ‘‘ . . . sailed along, smiling simply at the accident and not having the common courtesy to pull up and apologise to the unfortunate owner’’. The cyclist ‘‘seemed to think it was a good joke’’.
The second example was drawn from a few evenings earlier: ‘‘ . . . one of these smart young men [on bicycles] narrowly escaped running over an infant on Collingwood Street, who was playing in the pathway’’.
With undisguised prejudice against the ‘‘sucking athletes’’ and their need to ‘‘show off’’, ‘Observer’ argued that Hamilton streets are ‘‘good enough and broad enough’’ to accommodate bicycles. As it stood their ‘‘trespassing on the sidewalks’’ was ‘‘endangering the limbs of our children’’. Police action was called for.
Two days later, ‘Bicyclist’ of Hamilton West, replied.
Mounting no defence for the behaviour of the offending riders, the state of Hamilton’s main road was nonetheless questioned. Victoria Street had ‘‘ . . . extraordinary excrescences and still more painful depressions that mark its course’’. Any bicyclist, ‘‘ . . . having due regard to the safety of himself and machine would naturally prefer the comparatively smooth footpaths, especially as no by-law is yet framed prohibiting it’’.