Speaking up for cyclists — at age 11
Matty Grossman backs plan for added bike lanes in speech at Silver Lake town hall.
All Matty Grossman wants is a safe route to ride his bike.
That basic desire is why the 11-year-old boy gave a much-circulated speech about behavior at a Silver Lake town hall meeting this month.
Matty waded into a debate that has long been the province of adults squabbling about city planning and traffic. His presence has put pressure on Los Angeles cycling rights conversations to include a population that is directly affected by Angelenos’ attitudes toward bicyclists, but that is rarely considered in high-level policy: kids.
“Motorists who don’t like bicyclists are acting like children,” Matty said in an interview. “And if a child, me, is the only voice of reason in the room, then it kind of makes others think about what they’re saying.”
Children are citizens who can’t drive, who rely on walking or cycling to get around without — and sometimes with — their parents. Matty rides the five-mile route from his Los Feliz home to his school in Glendale about once a week with his dad, and uses the Rowena Avenue bike lane to get to the library.
Matty spoke at the meeting about the controversial “Rowena Road diet,” which reduced the number of car lanes and added bike lanes after a pedestrian was killed three years ago.
Now officials are taking that model citywide in their Mobility Plan, a move plenty of people are unhappy about it. It’s been dubbed the “Immobility Plan” by some, and the Westside’s city councilman, Paul Koretz, tried to get Westwood out of it, saying it would increase traffic and cut off access to turn lanes. Matty sees it differently. “I have lost track of the number of cars who have purposely violated my legal right to three feet of safety or shouted obscenities at me,” he said at the town hall.
And Matty, a sixthgrader, is over it.
“It’s whiny, entitled behavior you wouldn’t tolerate from a kid,” he told the room. “Why should I tolerate it from adults?”
Valid as Matty’s experience may be, said road diet opponent Joseph Mailander, a child’s run-ins with road rage don’t have a place in conversations about “adult issues” such as bike lanes and transportation policy.
Mailander said promoting Matty’s voice paints the picture of cyclists as more innocent and civil than many other cycling advocates actually are. (After the meeting, video of his comments was circulated through YouTube, LAist and other local sites.)
If an adult had made the comments that Matty did, it’s unlikely that they would have attracted as much attention or been received as well. There’s something striking about a kid telling adults to grow up.
Bike policies affect kids, so including their perspective is important — but only if they, like Matty, are speaking up voluntarily, said cycling advocate Sean Meredith, who taped the town hall and posted the video of Matty on YouTube.
“I don’t think that we need to start mobilizing children’s voices for political purposes,” he said.
Matty denies any charge that he was somehow manipulated into making his comments, as does his mother, graphic designer Debra Matlock.
She found out about the town hall from a friend and bicyclist, but he is the one who decided to go, who wrote his comments and practiced them for a week before the town hall, he said in an interview.
Matty vowed to stay involved in the road diet fight. And after that? He says he wants to become an astrophysicist or the mayor of Los Angeles.