Health Hack 2020 has been released and here are the details so far. Expect a few more posts about Heath Hack as we get closer to kick-off.
And yes, that is me on the YouTube promo video cover shot below. And yes, I am wearing a ‘WOW – women on wheels’ T-shirt – spreading the biking love!
HealthHack is a product-building event.
Teams work on problems that have been submitted by Problem Owners – typically medical researchers, medical organisations, hospitals or government— but they could come from anyone who has a health-related problem they want to solve.
Everything made at HealthHack is open source and made available for anyone else to use. You can find every project from every HealthHack at our GitHub.
Normally the event is run in person but due to COVID-19 it is running entirely remote this year. The exact plans for this year will be confirmed, but here are the basic so far:
Run out of (sponsor) IBM’s Cloudtheater virtual event space
Run across two weekends (but not during the week in between)
Organisers will still be assisting problem owners and teams to form so there’s no need to have formed a team prior to HealthHack
Same basic format as previous HealthHacks will be kept, but there will be tweaks to allow for the changed circumstances
Organisers will still be available to help teams work together just like every other HealthHack to date
Now more than ever it’s important to support the work of healthcare professionals both in front line services and in medical research and the event is committed to supporting problem owners and hackers solve important problems.
While looking at some pacific community bike projects, I came across the Pedal4PNG Bike Ride.
It sparked my interest as it was relatively small and specific and offered a unique riding opportunity through Papua New Guinea. It also provides some ideas for other organisations (like Village Bicycle Project in Lunsar, Sierra Leone who I have just returned home from) might consider as a way to increase exposure, contacts and fundraising.
Pedal4PNG Bike Ride
The Pedal4PNG Bike Ride was a 6-day event held in 2018 and run by Australian Doctors International (ADI) to raise funds for PNG‘s Healthy Mums and Healthy Babies programs.
ADI provide support in PNG which is only five km north of Queensland. But unlike Aussie kids, 6% of Papuan children won’t live to reach the age of five. ADI explain this in simple terms: for every soccer team of kids, that’s one not making it as far as kindy age.
Children die in PNG every day from preventable diseases such as diarrhoea, measles and pneumonia. Meanwhile, their mothers face a mortality rate of 250 mums per 100,000 live births, with under 50% of births medically supervised.
Proceeds of the ADI Pedal4PNGBike Ridewent to supporting the critical work Australian Doctors International carries out in PNG to provide better health outcomes for young children and mums.
This is locally sustainable health care in action – prevention and treatment in the isolated communities where over 85% of the PNG population lives.
ADI teams provide a mix of skills and staff to deliver hands-on health care and save lives.
ADI doctors deliver clinical capacity building for front line PNG health workers to improve health service delivery in the areas of child and maternal health, malaria, TB and lifestyle diseases.
The Bike Trip
This bike trip was from Namatanai (in the north) down to Kavieng (in the South) covering a total of 260kms on roads throughout the New Ireland Province.
The trip was advertised as a ‘bike adventure’ and given the tropical heat (30C +) and physical challenge of riding through some varied terrain including some hills and it was best the riders knew about the conditions. But the riding was mostly on sealed roads, so the actual surface was not that difficult. There were a couple of longer days (up to 100 km), so doing some training was advised.
As with any international in-country charity bike ride, built into the itinerary was time for cultural events, meeting locals, time to explore local surrounds, have R&R and opportunities to surf, relax and visit some handi/craftsmiths.
This ride had a few other perks I hadn’t seen before, particular to only PNG of course, which was the option to go and watch chocolate making at Rubios as well as do some local scuba diving and fishing and explore the WWII sites and history along the island.
What I appreciated is that the trip number was capped at ten which is a good number for an adventure ride – enough to have some diversity in personalities, but not too much that the group is so large that it takes hours to get ready or do anything.
Trip Details
Sunday 13 May: arrive in Kavieng, welcome dinner and overnight at Nusa Island Retreat
Monday 14 May: transit to Namatanai, with visits to several different health clinics, afternoon visit to hospitals, unpacking of bikes and overnight at Namatanai Lodge
Thursday 17 May: 100km ride into Kavieng, visit giant eels, final dinner Nusa Island Retreat
Friday 18 May: depart (although we recommend staying the weekend for some diving!)
Along the way, riders stopped to visit healthcare clinics and hospitals that were supported by ADI, so they got to see first-hand some of the health issues and programs that were underway to meet the needs of locals.
Overall is looks like a great adventure ride to do. What appeals to me most is the small group number and how riders can go and visit clinics to better appreciate local health issues. ADI noted in their Annual Report 2018 that the ride had been a success.
It might take a lot of work to organise and I know these rides are not for everyone, but it is good to some diversity in charity bike ride offerings beyond the (dare I say ‘stale’) mass rides for cancer research events.
For 2019, we are heading to Lismore in QLD, where for the past few years the local City Council has provided a public recycled art Christmas Tree. This very successful initiative all started with recycled bikes.
The Lismore Council public art Christmas tree initiative stemmed after the local ‘leaning tree’ that had previously been decorated for Christmases was (unduly and harshly) dubbed ‘the world’s most pathetic’ Christmas tree. (Note: Personally, I think the leaning tree was awesome. Such a pity that we don’t celebrate diversity and difference and the wonderful uniqueness in nature. As Gaudi stated ‘there are no straight lines in nature’ – I think it is the very twists, turns, messiness and curves that makes life so engaging and grand. The very thing that made that tree unique and special to some, others considered to be a flawed and an eyesore. I don’t agree that ‘perfection’ i.e. a straight tree (or a or a ‘pretty blonde female’ as an extrapolation) is necessarily beautiful. Perhaps we need to check in with our cultural value criteria – anyhow..back to Lismore).
So, in 2015, Lismore Council looked to change their tree and started a recycled public art initative.
Image: Cathy Bowen Northern Star
Lismore’s Bicycle Christmas Trees
The recycled bicycle tree was the first of these instalments. In 2015, the Lismore Bike Christmas Tree was erected as a centrepiece for the main roundabout on the corner of Keen and Magellan Streets.
This intuitive is to celebrate the festive holiday season as
well as Lismore’s commitment to recycling and sustainability.
A local bike shop, Revolve, supplied the 90 old bicycles (which otherwise would have gone to scrap), 50 litres of paint, almost half a tonne of steel for the frame and $30 of donated rainbow mis-tints from the local paint shop. GOLD!
Lismore’s council metal workshop welded the bicycle frames
were welded onto the steel frame they had created as the base structure.
The final ‘tree’ was then painted in rainbow mis-tint colours by the council staff and their families in their own time.
The tree was then gifted by the council to Lismore residents.
Lismore’s tree for Christmas 2019 was a 7-metre ‘living’, growing structure. It has more than 300 potted plants, 100 metres of tinsel, 250 metres of solar-powered LEDs, 16 pairs of work trousers and matching boots. At the top instead of a star, council staff made a Planta (plant ‘Santa’).
The 2018 Lismore Christmas tree was made out discarded umbrellas.
In 2017 it was recycled road signs.
In 2016 it was recycled car tyres.
The 2015 Bicycle Christmas Tree has been the most popular instalment by far to date. In acknowledgement of this, the council is in discussion for a possible future tree that has sculptural bikes that produce power so that when visitors ride them, the generated power will light up the tree. Sounds similar to Brisbane’s Bicycle-powered Christmas Tree.
A big round of applause for Lismore Council for installing the recycled bike Christmas tree. An inspiring public project that brings community and council together to celebrate sustainability, recycling, community and creativity.
Sometimes after a busy week like the one I’ve just had, all I want is a quick happy bike story fix.
This week, I revisited Luis, the local Colombian farmer who effortlessly overtook a group of ‘pro’ road cyclists up a hill while they were attempting a world record.
It a simple
story that many cyclists love.
Here’s what
happened: Two road cyclists, Axel Carion
(French) and Andres Fabricius (Swedish) were trying to break the current world record
(58 days) to ride the whole length of South America (7,450 miles in total).
While in Antioquia (Colombia), they were struggling up a particularly steep hill, when local farmer Luis rode up behind them and then continued to sail past them on his old clunker wearing only a shirt and denim jeans.
The pro cyclists in full lycra and on high-end bikes couldn’t believe their eyes!
He gives them a friendly nod as he overtakes them and just keeps going about his business – GOLD!
Apparently,
Luis rides 62 miles every day around his hilly surrounds – which explains why
he is so fit and could so effortlessly overtake them.
Image: The Daily Mail – CEN/Biking Man
I know it is a clique, but I still love the idea of a local on a clapped-out bike creaming professional cyclists all decked out in lycra on high-end bikes. It just makes me happy.
It totally speaks to my it-doesn’t-matter-who-you-are-just-get-on-a-bike-and-ride approach to biking.
It’s also a good reminder for all riders not to take themselves too seriously.
Rohingya refugee childrens waiting for food at Hakimpara refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar. With children making up around 60 percent of the Rohingya that have fled into Bangladesh, many below 18 years old arrived into the makeshift tents highly traumatized after seeing family members killed and homes set on fire. Image: @ugurgallen. Photo: K.M. Asad @kmasad
Regular readers of this blog know that my PhD research explores how bicycles feature in rural African girls’ access to education. This means mobility, education, in/equity, gender justice and children’s rights are central to much of the work I do. They are also reoccurring themes for this blog. I regularly post articles that showcase how bicycles create more positive social, environmental and educational change for all – and in many cases for children specifically.
A few previous
BCC posts that feature bikes and kids are:
This year, I wanted to acknowledge this date in a different way.
Instead of sharing a project where children benefit from bikes, I wanted to highlight the juxtapositions of cultural experiences of children around the world.
In this photograph taken on April 28, 2018, Afghan children work at a coal yard on the outskirts of Jalalabad. Image: @ugurgallen. Photo: @noorulah_shirzada
Expand your cultural competency
This week in my Griffith Uni 1205MED Health Challenges for the 21st Century class, we discussed cultural competency and cultural safety. I challenged my students to set themselves a cultural competency experiment/activity for homework – something that they needed to do that would push them outside their own cultural box.
It is too easy for us to think that our experience of life is how it is everywhere.
In Western countries, we are very privileged and sheltered. The experiences of being a child in Australia, the US, Europe, Scandinavia or the UK is vastly different than those in less advantaged countries.
To more broadly consider how culture and environment impact children’s lives differently, look no further than artist Uğur Gallenkuş (@ugrgallen) – his work does this uncompromisingly.
In October 2018, the United Nations warned that 13 million people face starvation in what could be “the worst famine in the world in 100 years. In November 2018, according to the New York Times report, 1.8 million children in Yemen are extremely subject to malnutrition. Image: @ugurgallen.
Global Childhood Juxtapositions: The work of Uğur Gallenkuş.
To honour 2019 World Children’s Day, I’m sharing some of Turkish artist Uğur Gallenkuş work. Uğur is a digital artist who collages images to highlight binaries, juxtapositions and contrasts in human experience. His work comments on conflicts, political issues and social disparities. Some pieces can be quite confronting, others heartfelt, but all have a clear message and are thought-providing.
Uğur’s work forces us to rethink our privilege and remind us that we need to think, feel and act beyond our own immediate cultural experience.
And that many children worldwide need a voice, recognition and help.
A man holds a wounded Syrian baby at a makeshift clinic in the rebel-held town of Douma, on the eastern outskirts of Damascus, on September 26, 2017 following reported air strikes by Syrian government forces. Air strikes killed at least four civilians in a truce zone outside the Syrian capital, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said. Image: @ugurgallen. Photo: Abdullah Hammam @abdullah_hm88 @afpphoto
Nine year old Alladin collects used ammunition to sell as metal in Aleppo, Syria. Image: @ugurgallen. Photo: @niclashammarstrom
Volunteers help a refugee man and baby as refugees hoping to cross into Europe, arrive on the shore of Greece‘s Lesbos Island after crossing the Aegean sea from Turkey on November, 2015. Image: @ugurgallen. Photo: Özge Elif Kızıl @oekizil @anadoluajansi
Yemeni children attend class on the first day of the new academic year in the country’s third-city of Taez on September 3, 2019, at a school that was damaged last year in an air strike during fighting between the Saudi-backed government forces and the Huthi rebels. Image: @ugurgallen. Photo: Ahmad Al-Basha @afpphoto
A child fighter with poses with a gun at a military training facility during the Liberian Civil War. Image: @ugurgallen. Photo: Patrick Robert @gettyimages
Children of displaced Syrian refugee family use paving stones as pillows at Erbil, Iraq in 2013. Image: @ugurgallen. Photo: Emrah Yorulmaz @emrahyorulmaz04 @anadoluajansi
Yelena Shevel, 10, who dreams of becoming a vet, learns to put on a gas mask during training at LIDER, a summer camp in the outskirts of Kiev, Ukraine. She believes that “it is important to defend our homeland because if we don’t do it, then Russia will capture Ukraine and we will become Russia,”. Hundreds of children play war games while they are getting trained in military disciplines and in firing tactics. The armed conflict between Ukraine and Russian-backed separatists is entering its fifth year; the conflict is still festering. Time for playing with toys is gone. Education, living in dreams. Schools are destroyed by indiscriminate shelling or deliberately turned into military posts. Children and teachers stay at home, afraid to step on a landmine or be caught in the crossfire of warring parties. The house of learning, envisioned as a safe haven, becomes a target. Image: @ugurgallen. Photo: Diego Ibarra Sanchez @diego.ibarra.sanchez @natgeo
Included among the delegates attending are Australian and international
keynote speakers, advocacy groups, researchers, practitioners, businesses and
policymakers.
This conference includes research presentations, workshops, technical tours, poster presentations, networking opportunities and other social events.
The conference goes for 3 days and is jam-packed full of sessions.
The program also boasts a host of international guests, with delegates coming in from the Netherlands, New Zealand, Denmark, Japan, Norway, USA, Sweden, Canada and as the host country – Australia has a very strong representation from pretty much every University nationwide.
Presentation sessions are discussing ideas such as: obstacle avoidance manoeuvres, e-scooters/e-bikes, infrastructure challenges, rider/pedestrian conflicts, traffic control, crash data, bikeshare data and social media interfaces, and lane marking/intersection analysis, bicycle delivery modalities, and studies using agent-based modelling – and more!
I ‘m not attending this conference because I prefer to focus on the positive aspects of bicycle riding – which of course safety is part of…I just don’t want to be constantly working with ‘negatives’ such as crash figures, injuries and traffic hot zones and contestations – also crunching quantitative data is not my strongest research skill. But I appreciate that this is super interesting to many cycling researchers and policymakers. Such conversations and information sharing is critical to progressing more innovative solutions to cycling dilemmas and to increase the take up of biking universally.
Meet the posters authors event. Tuesday 19th Nov. ICSC 2019.
Daily synopsis
Monday is the first conference day. The day is split into four sessions under two main streams: Workshops and Technical Tours. The two workshops offered are: Low-cost infrastructure for low cycling countries and Using bikes for all kinds of deliveries. Concurrently there are 5 technical tours: Inner City (x 2), Riverside, Bicentennial Bikeway and Connecting the infrastructure. The evening is the Welcome Reception and Stakeholder Dinner.
Tuesday before morning tea is official registrations, Introduction and Opening Keynote Trends and innovation research in cycling safety by Prof Christopher Cheery (Uni of Tennessee, USA).
Then there
are 2 rooms running concurrent 20 min presentation sessions all the way up to afternoon
tea except for a Conference Plenary and another Keynote Cycling Infrastructure:
if you build it, will come? (and will they be safe?) by Dr Glen Koorey (ViaStrada,
NZ) after lunch.
Tuesday
afternoon session has two 1-hour Rapid Oral Presentation sessions followed by
Meet the Poster Author’s Function and then the official Conference Dinner.
Wednesday morning opens with a Conference Panel session entitled Arising trends & challenges: what, why & how. Then a full day of 1-hour and 20 min concurrent presentation sessions all the way up to 4.30pm… Phew – what a long day!
At 4.30 it is ICSC Awards and official conference close. The final official event is the Peoples’ Night from 5pm.
Then it’s party time!
Image: ICSC 2019
People’s Night
For the first time, the ICSC community is inviting the general public to attend the Cycling Conference free People’s Night.
I love the idea of a conference having a ‘People’s Night.’ Every conference should have one!
This is a unique opportunity to meet, discuss and network with conference delegates, check out the digital research poster, hear about some of the latest innovations, technology, infrastructure, developments, trends and findings in cycling safety research.
This event is offered in the spirit of the conference guiding principle to share cycling safety research with ALL stakeholders – which I think is a great move. Not everyone is interested or can afford the money or time to attend the whole conference, but to open up your doors and invite the local public an opportunity to interact with delegates is a very smart move – good for the conference, good for the locals!
I’ll be heading in
for this event, so if you are in Brisbane on Wednesday night, I might see you
there! If you would like to attend you can RSVP via the
ICSC FB page HERE. Details below.
Date: Wednesday 20
November Time: 5pm-6.30pm Venue: The Cube, P Block, QUT Gardens Point Campus, Brisbane Cost: Free Inclusions: Complimentary food and non-alcoholic beverages
If you are riding your bike in and around Brisbane this
week, check out the ICSC. Always good to get the latest intel of what is
happening in the cycling world!
Hopefully, the safer it is to ride a bike, the more people will
ride.
If that is the case, get ya conference on ICSC 2019!!
November 11th is Remembrance Day. Along with many others around the world, each year on this day Australians observe one minute’s silence at 11 am in memory of those who died or suffered in all wars and armed conflicts. Here is a guest blog post by UK former professional cyclist (postman) and now freelance writer Trevor Ward. This article was first published in The Guardian. In this account, Trevor provides an often unknown UK historical context to the tens of thousands who signed up and served in dedicated cycling units during 20th-century conflicts. Many thanks to Trevor for his research and insights tracing British bicycle use and cycling soldiers through the wars right up to the start of modern-day MTB. Lest we forget. NG.
Image: Fine Art American. Jenelle McCarrick
My regular bike ride takes me past a couple of village war
memorials, but to the best of my knowledge, none of the names engraved in the
stone was ever a member of Britain’s specialist cycling corps.
Tens of thousands of “cyclist soldiers” signed up to serve
during both world wars and other conflicts. Recruitment
posters in Britain on the eve of war declared: “Are you fond of
cycling? If so, why not cycle for the King? Bad teeth no bar.”
The origins of cycling soldiers can be traced back to the
second Boer war in South Africa at the end of the 19th century. Historian
Colin Stevens, who curates an online
museum dedicated to vintage and military bicycles, says:
Remember that the messenger pigeon was one of the most advanced communication methods of the time so this was a logical step, especially as automobiles and motorcycles were still far and few between. And did not require the constant care and feeding that horses did.”
The cyclist soldiers weren’t merely confined to scouting
and messenger duties. Plenty of them saw frontline action. When a Boer position
was attacked, “a cyclist or two would be with the leading rank,” according to
Jim Fitzpatrick, author of The
Bicycle In Wartime. “By the end of the war, Lord Kitchener was asking for
several more cyclist battalions,” says Fitzpatrick.
And during the early weeks of the first world war, before
the fighting became trench-bound in northern France, several cycling units were
involved in daring raids on German ammunition wagons, according to breathless
reports in the weekly “military
cyclists’ journal”, Cycling.
As an example of what the cycling corps could achieve,
Fitzpatrick quotes the case of the 2nd Anzac
cyclist battalion – comprised mainly of New Zealanders – that earned
72 medals despite suffering 59 fatalities during its 32 months fighting on the
western front. It was also honoured by the town of Epernay for its role in
repelling a German attack.
The cyclist does not suffer from sore feet, nor does his
mount ever get out of condition. The longer a campaign lasts the fitter the
cyclist becomes. When on the move the cyclist offers a much smaller and at the
same time more difficult target to hit than even the infantryman. He can ride
behind hedges with body bent low and remain invisible…It may also perhaps be of
interest to note that the great majority of cyclists are practically
teetotallers.”
Image: Morten Fredberg-Holm. 1941 Truppenfahrrad
After the first world war, Britain disbanded its specialist
cycling battalions, partly because of the difficulties of riders steering and
firing their rifles at the same time, and also because the bicycle had proved
useless at transporting heavy loads such as machine guns. A 1932 history of the London Cyclist Battalion noted
that though “it was the ambition of every hardy cyclist to get posted to the
Gun Section … only the hardiest enjoyed it.”
The Germans and Italians, however, commissioned extensive
studies into the effectiveness of their cyclist-soldiers. As a result, German Radfahrtruppen were
involved in the blitzkriegs of world war two – “several hundred thousand, right
behind the Stukas and Panzers,” according to Fitzpatrick – while units of
cyclists riding folding Bianchi bicycles with optional machine gun mounts were
added to Italy’s elite regiments of Bersaglieri (marksmen).
Image: Karen Ifert
In Britain, though, soldiers on bikes were largely limited to home defence duties, until BSA designed its folding “Airborne” bike for paratroopers jumping from gliders. However, by the time of the D-day landings, much larger gliders – big enough to accommodate jeeps – had been produced, so instead the “airborne” bikes were carried by infantry soldiers arriving by sea.
According to Stevens: Going down the ramp of a landing craft carrying a rifle or Bren Gun, a heavy ruck sack, ammunition and a bicycle was very difficult and some soldiers drowned when they fell into the water and could not get rid of their load. Even once they were on shore, cyclists quickly ran into the problem of flat tires due to the broken glass, shell fragments etc. that littered the roads.”
Despite such shortcomings, the legacy of military bikes
lives on in today’s designs. A modern, US version of the BSA Airborne, the Montague Paratrooper Tactical
Folding Mountain Bike, was used during the invasions of Afghanistan and
Iraq. A civilian version – still in camouflage colour but minus the gun rack –
is available for $725.
And the 1912 model designed by Bianchi for Italian troops is widely regarded as the forefather of modern mountain bikes, thanks to its slightly smaller wheels, rear suspension and front shock absorbers.
Image: Dario Bartole. 1952 Condor Militarvelo MO5 | Military Bicycles
This article written by Trevor Ward was first published in The Guardian.
Brisbane, Fri 20th Sept. 2019. Nina and Leki joining 350,000 Australians protesting for Climate Action.
Last month, Leki and I joined 350,000 Australians nation-wide – and millions of people in over 150 countries worldwide – who hit the streets to rally for #ClimateAction. In Australia, there were mass rallies in 8 capital cities as well as 104 other centres. This day of action is known as ‘the student strikes for climate action’ and is led by Swedish Teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg.
8-year old Luca, who I had the pleasure of working with recently on a project, also went to the Climate Rally. I asked her if she could a guest blog post about what the event was like – and luckily she said yes. So here it is!
Thanks so much to Luca for putting this together!
Here is a few photos I took from the rally. See Luca’s review below.
Image: @courtwhip
Luca’s review of the Climate Action Rally (Brisbane).
On the weekend I went to the Climate Strike with my family.
We all made posters and marched in the city to fight climate change.
While we were marching we did lots of chants about global warming and saw some great posters that others had made.
My favourite said “It’s getting hot in here so take off all your coals”.
At the march I saw lots of people of all different ages. There were many kids there as well as adults.
At the beginning of the march we listened to talking and started a chant.
Then we started walking through the city. There were about 30,000 people at the protest.
I found the protest fun and exciting but my favourite part was marching around Brisbane.
First of all, it was Father’s Day in Australia and the weather in Brisbane this time of year is absolutely stunning.
This meant everyone was out and about.
There were two annual kick-ass Brisbane bike events to get this month off to a brilliant start: The Big Push and The Kurilpa Derby.
So much fun to be had on two wheels!
Image: Brisbane Bicycle Explorers
The Big Push
The Big Push is an annual slow roll around Brisbane CBD. It is hosted by Space4Cycling Brisbane and is held during QLD’s Road Safety Week. The aim was to bring the cycling community together and to call on the Brisbane City Council and the Queensland Government to improve riding conditions. At the top of community riding needs are three things: build more protected bike lanes, connect networks, and slower speeds in suburban streets. This is so riding in Brisbane will be safer, more comfortable and more convenient for people of all ages and abilities.
On the day, Leki and I headed down to Kurilpa Park to join a whole lot of other riders. It was an excellent turnout. I’d love to know how many people actually attended – it felt like a lot.
We did a slow roll around Brisbane on a designated route. Leki was in fine form and everyone was in a good mood. After a safety talk and a few speeches, we were off. As we rode, we chatted amongst ourselves, made new friends and waved to passer-bys.
I was very impressed with how many under 10-year olds rode the whole way with their parents. I also loved the dogs in trailers and baskets – nothing says bike safety like two pugs in a tandem bike trailer!
There were quite a few people around the city and the mass of red shirts on bikes drew a lot of attention. We also had a police escort and were waved through some traffic lights, but had to stop at others.
At specific points along the route, we all stopped so the whole group could re-form. I really liked these stops. It was great fun getting to a point and riding into the ever expanding swirling circle. It was cool watching the vortex grow in mass as more riders filtered into the loop.
Bells were ringing, speakers played happy tunes, people were laughing – a joyous mass of people on bikes!
At Parliament House we all stopped for a group photo.
Another great Big Push!
Then it was time to head over to Kurilpa Derby for the afternoon.
Image: Space4Cycling (BNE)
Image: @Spaces4Cycling BNE
The Kurilpa Derby
The Kurilpa Derby is an annual community celebration of life on wheels and happens once a year in West End (Brisbane, Australia).
The Kurilpa Derby began as an expression of community celebration and inclusivity.
Each year there is a parade (bicycles are central to this) and novelty races run at the heart of Boundary St, West End (Brisbane, Queensland). The whole street is closed off and the locals take over. This event was first run in 2007. So this year is the Derby’s 12th anniversary.
The Derby is a community event owned and organised by the @WestEndCommunityAssociation. WECA is the residents not-for-profit community based, member-led association.
The Kurilpa Derby officially started at 2pm, but locals and visitors were already out in force well before that.
There is so much to do at the Derby. The locals block off the main street and take it over. One of the main events is a massive street parade.
The Kurilpa Derby parade goes down Boundary Street (from the Dornoch Terrace Bridge to the intersection of Boundary Street and Jane Street. The street is lined with hundreds of appreciative visitors cheering the parade on.
It is an incredible showcase of the range of skills, creativity, spirit and dreams of those who enter – it truly is a spectacle to behold!
Image: @West End Community
There were parade bicycles representing lots of different perspectives such as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, community and music groups, environmental issues like the ocean, plastic, global warming, representations of animals, birds, reptiles and insects, school groups, and heaps of others!
And the bikes! Tall bikes, penny-farthings, home-made bikes, tandems, trailers, trikes and more!
Bikes are a central feature of the street parade – and the colour, thought and effort put into the floats is phenomenal.
After the main street parade, there are heaps of sports and skill demonstrations, fun games and races – some novelty (like the go-cart and kids running races), some more serious (like the scooter races).
Local shops, bars and cafes are packed to capacity and there is music, dancing, eating and laughing emanating from everywhere.
I love the energy and community of The Kuripla Derby – so many kids, families, friends, locals and visitors coming together to celebrate the diversity and vibrancy of this beautiful local community. What an event!
It was a busy, fun-filled, community-centred, bicycle-related day – Phew!
Reference: Kirkpatrick, S. J. B. (2018). Pedaling disaster: Citizen bicyclists in disaster response—Innovative solution or unnecessary effort? Natural Hazards, 90(1), 365-389. doi:10.1007/s11069-017-3048-3
Image: CBC.com
Citizen bicyclists in disaster response
This post looks at the 2018 academic publication by Sarah Kirkpatrick from North Dakota State University. In this article, Kirkpatrick explores how citizen bicyclists might be used in times of disasters. A very interesting topic!
In this article, natural events where bicycles could be used is focused on the US context, so includes tornadoes, hurricanes, and severe storms. However, bicycle response to events like travel hazards, flooding, blizzards, and wildfire events was almost universally rejected.
The post-impact disaster actions Kirkpatrick says local bicyclists can do include: conducting search and rescue, evacuating survivors, giving medical care, consoling survivors, providing needed supplies, directing traffic, extinguishing fires, and removing debris.
This paper suggests that the involvement of citizen bicyclists in disaster response, the outcome could be very beneficial for both bicycling and emergency management communities.
The idea of citizen bicycle response stems from the growing popularity in the USA of Disaster Relief Trials (DRTs). DRTs are community events organised by local bicycling enthusiasts that demonstrate how bicycles can be used in disaster situations. Community emergency response team (CERT) programs were also highlighted as possible sources of training for bicyclists, as well as a means for bicyclists to be integrated into disaster response operations.
The article discusses current DRTs and how bicycles have been used in relief efforts, including:
USA During the response to the September 11th attacks in 2001, bicycle couriers could be found riding along the secured perimeter and delivering food (Kendra & Wachtendorf, 2003).
Japan In the immediate aftermath of the 2011 To ̄hoku earthquake, the combination of traffic gridlock and the shutdown of train services in the Tokyo metropolitan area compelled stranded commuters to mount bicycles—included ones purchased in the immediate aftermath of the event—to make the commute home (Takahara, 2011).
USA In the days following Superstorm Sandy in 2012, a group of bicyclists strapped a variety of donated goods ranging from diapers to blankets to their backs and bikes before pedaling the 15 or so miles through debris-laden streets from Brooklyn to the Rockaways to deposit their commodities (Goodyear, 2012).
Sri Lanka During disaster recovery, the period when activities are being undertaken to restore all stakeholders to self-sufficiency (Alesch et al. 2009), bicycles gifted to survivors of the 2005 tsunami in Sri Lanka proved a key element in assisting people with recovering their economic livelihood and social connections, as well as increasing their accessibility to service providers (World Bicycle Relief 2007).
Kirkpatrick argues that implementing citizen bicycle responders would be best suited to communities that already have an established bicycle-friendly locale. In these places, bicycle response take-up, use and engagement would be less resistant.
The discussion of citizen bicyclist disaster responders is also valuable in exploring alternatives to current approaches and in shifting attitudes of policy, organisational and emergency managers towards the use and engagement of citizen responders more broadly.
Citizen bicycle responders are identified as being particularly useful in specific tasks such as messaging/communication, commodities distribution, messaging, and casualty evacuation—as a ‘‘last mile’’ solution. The idea is that bicyclists can make short runs to create the final link between information hubs, centralised distribution points, or evacuation locations
I loved this quote from the article:
For bicycles to reach closer to their potential as a cure for urban maladies, they must advance beyond the dominions of mall-bound middle schoolers and lycra-clad weekend warriors to a broader ridership.
Gold!
Certain bicycle types or accessories are highlighted as serving as a sort of force multiplier for task execution, particularly related to commodities distribution or casualty evacuation. Specifically, the use of cargo bicycles, bicycles with attached trailers, and electric bicycles were mentioned as ways to enhance the ability of citizen bicyclists to move goods or other people through a disaster area.
The article also points out that there are some concerns about citizen bicyclists in disaster response. A principle example of this is that responses rely heavily on the actual person who is riding the bicycle—and the knowledge and skills that person brings—that matters to the response and dictates the bicyclists’ ultimate response value. Additionally, responders will need some sort of training (or have a base understanding) of bicycle maintenance, safe riding, how to communicate/coordinate/operate within the response network, general safety and first aid/CPR.
Some research participants further suggested that citizen bicyclists receive the full gamut of CERT training, with modules on disaster preparedness, disaster fire suppression, disaster medical, light search and rescue, disaster psychology, and disaster simulation exercise. The type of training frequency, responsibility, and depth would need to be formalised.
There have been several papers that have considered the safety aspect, weighing the costs of increased injury risk and exposure to pollution against the health and communal benefits of regular bicycling. The table below shows some examples of studiescoering a few of these factors.
Image: Kirkpatrick (2018).
Some essential tasks citizen bicycle responders can undertake are:
movement of needed commodities like food, water, medication, other supplies
delivery of messages within the impacted area
bicycles and their riders providing power generation
casualty evacuation
first aid
safety and wellness checks
search and rescue
damage assessment
Overall, this article opens up a meaningful conversation about considering bicycles use in disaster relief.
The most appealing aspect of this article is the focus on the citizen bicyclist – a largely untapped and little-discussed potential asset.
I love the idea of local riders and their bikes being integral to disaster responses efforts.
Just another way bicycles could create change!
Abstract
Citizens have historically become involved in response to disasters by helping both themselves and others. Recently, the idea has emerged of individuals providing this assistance in the response period using bicycles. Community events have been organised by bicycling enthusiasts in US cities to demonstrate how bicycles could potentially be of use in disaster situations. Yet, there has been no empirical research around the idea of citizen bicyclists in disaster response.
This study explored the potential use of bicycles and their citizen riders in disaster events in the USA—specifically considering what role, if any, citizen bicyclists could play in such scenarios. Data were initially collected through 21 in-depth, telephone interviews with emergency management officials and bicycling advocates from bicycle-friendly cities in ten different states. Grounded theory was used to conceptualise the overall research design and analyse the data.
Based on theoretical and snowball sampling, an additional six interviews were completed with individuals who had requisite knowledge and experiences applicable to the research question. Participants indicated that there are a variety of tasks and activities citizen bicyclists could undertake in disaster response; however, it would have to be an event of significant scope and magnitude for bicycle usage to be widespread—an unlikely occurrence for many jurisdictions.
Concerns about training and integration with the formal emergency management structure were also identified. Implications for potential citizen bicyclists—and citizen responders more broadly—are discussed.
Image: Little Rock Air Force Base News
Some content of this post is adapted from Kirkpatrick (2018).
