A tale of Bicycle and Cities

The evenings at Adyar in late 1970's would be buzzing with activity at the arrival of Mobile Post Office Van stationed for a limited time under the canopy of huge trees near the then Udipi Hotel Vani Vihar (evening special menu always contained newly launched sensation the Chola Poori colloquial of Chaana Bhatura) this red color van with counters and bright interior lights would usher in many people on bicycles thronging this place some rushing and in the melee jumping the queue or few creating ruckus to make last minute changes in the letters to be posted by placing them to write on the bicycle saddle/seat before the Van finally disappearing into darkness to reach another part of the city, languishing on memories of those unforgettable days lets get on with our story. In his article "Social Movements and the Bicycle" by Dave Horton one gets to know that across many cities in Britain following First World War (1914-18) bicycle became means by which vast number of ordinary people conducted their ordinary lives and by 1930's exploring countryside became a popular leisure pursuit, in 1930's over 1.5 million bicycles were sold annually and in 1936 there were 10 million regular cyclist compared to 6 million in 1929. He concludes by mentioning about how the decades following the Second World War (1939-45) the massive popular embrace of automobile led to huge fall in fortunes of bicycle across cities and in 70-80's witnessed the rising environmental concerns across Europe and aftermath of Rio Earth Summit (1992) bringing in new wave of direct actions towards the cause of cycling. Thus getting to know the high's and low's of cycling in West and skipping Copenhagen and Amsterdam the best bicycle friendly cities on the globe for another occasion let us proceed with the Indian scenario, though not much information is available before 1950's we get to know that in 1960-61 bicycle production in India was 10.71 lakhs and during 1960's bicycle accounted for 60% of all commuting trips in New Delhi which had drastically fallen to 4% in the recent past.To Dr.Sreenivas Kulkarni the owner of one of the oldest bicycle shops in India at Pune and the first Ph.D holder in the country to take up Bicycle as his thesis mentions how in Pune the city of his study there were 53,886 bicycles to only 56 motorcycles in 1959 and how in 1980's there were around 2000 cycle repair shops which later shrunk to 200 shops. According to CMDA in Chennai there has been a steep decline of people who opted to use bicycle as transport from 21.3% in 1970 to 12.8% in 2005. Looking into these figures would deter many of our passionate cyclist hearts but indeed there is ray of hope one such hope according to TI Cycles Ltd being the demand for premium bicycles had grown by 50-70% in 2010 and they sold 3.6 million units in that fiscal year, there could be many more hopes to pen down but having had phobia for numbers since my childhood I am ending this rhetoric and eagerly awaiting the start to the event of the year which all the cycling maniacs like me look forward especially being in its 100th edition ... till next time.

Bicycle's in Mount Road, Chennai (1905)