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Sarah 🍓 Profile picture
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27 Oct, 8 tweets, 2 min read
An able bodied person like Keir Starmer just shouldn't be driving in Kentish Town.

There are too many cars on our roads and this is the consequence.

bbc.co.uk/news/uk-547013…
To me, the Labour Party should represent a group striving for the collective good.

Driving an SUV in central London means prioritising your personal comfort and convenience over the collective good.

Driving it in such a way that you collide with a cyclist? I’m so disappointed.
Maybe @Keir_Starmer should have a read of my open letter to dangerous drivers before he gets back behind the wheel of a car
And maybe he should consider the climate before putting another SUV on our roads in the future theguardian.com/environment/ng…
This isn’t political. I’m not a Corbynite taking my chance to jab at Starmer.

But I am a progressive person, and I want the leader of the UK’s progressive party to live progressive values.
And that means taking climate change and the environment seriously.

It means taking the health and safety of pedestrians and cyclists seriously.

It means striving to end car dependency that has been punishing for our most vulnerable, not contributing to it.
A child from the lowest socioeconomic bracket is 28 times more likely to be killed by a driver than someone from the highest.

It’s just not okay.
To all those in my mentions saying Starmer probably had a good reason to be driving an SUV in central London — is this the kind of thing you were thinking? thetimes.co.uk/article/cyclis…

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More from @SarahJ_Berry

Sarah 🍓 Profile picture
28 Oct
One thing I think drivers don't get is that the inconvenience they're experiencing from school streets, LTNs and cycle lanes is miniscule in comparison to the inconvenience other road users have been asked to take for the benefit of drivers over the years.
Your journey is five minutes longer? I feel you! As a cyclist, I'm often forced to take longer routes because the quickest path from A to B doesn't have adequate infrastructure or isn't safe for someone on a bike.
You have to wait at traffic lights on main roads instead of breezing through residential back streets? I feel you! As a pedestrian my journey is frequently interrupted by trying to find a safe place to cross a road, and waiting at lights that prioritise cars over me.
Read 8 tweets
Sarah 🍓 Profile picture
23 Sep
I don't know who needs to hear this but creating pro-LTN petitions to counteract the anti ones isn't a strategic use of your time.

Here's why:
Opponents are sharing their petitions all around the country. They're getting signed by motorist groups, taxi drivers, and other interest groups in an attempt to boost the numbers.

But all that does is make them irrelevant for local authorities trying to gauge local opinon.
That's good news and bad news for supporters.

Because unless you take on the same tactic of sharing the petitions beyond local boundaries (and hence making them irrelevant) you'll never be able to get an equivalent number of signatures.
Read 8 tweets
Sarah 🍓 Profile picture
21 Sep
I think we make a mistake when we focus on where people live in low traffic neighbourhoods.

People's home life will be impacted by low traffic neighbourhoods -- but it's about so much more than that.
The street I live on currently was a notorious rat run before @RailtonLTN was introduced, now it's much quieter.

My new home will be on a main road where an LTN is about to be introduced. That LTN probably won't reduce traffic outside my home.

BUT...
@RailtonLTN It will reduce the traffic on the surrounding streets where I commute by foot or by bike.

It will reduce the traffic on the route I take to get to local shops, cafes, restaurants, libraries, schools, services.
Read 9 tweets
Sarah 🍓 Profile picture
20 Sep
I’ll be on @BBCPoliticsLDN in just a few minutes talking about @RailtonLTN and the freedoms it’s given me as a new cyclist.
Also for the record I do try and dress to coordinate with all journalists I speak to Image
To Theresa Villiers and others who are like ”why do they need a bike lane on park lane when there’s already one on Hyde Park”. Imagine applying that argument to cars — why should we build a second road? They already have one over there!
Read 4 tweets
Sarah 🍓 Profile picture
18 Sep
Earlier this week, I asked drivers what it would take for them to give up their cars. The answers were *fascinating*.

Here’s what they told me:

greenpeace.org.uk/news/going-car…
1) We still don’t have enough cycle infrastructure — we’re moving in the right direction, but councils haven’t done enough to show you can get by without a car -- especially to parents of young kids and those who move cargo
2) The trains cost too damn much! Beyond that, public transport is unreliable, unconnected and uncomfortable. Drivers think they might save by giving up their car, but not enough to justify the hassle
Read 7 tweets
Sarah 🍓 Profile picture
17 Sep
Here's me in 2016 -- joking about wanting to learn how to ride a bike. It's an ambition I didn't achieve until 2017, and it took until June of this year for me to actually to it around London.

But if I'm completely honest, riding a bike is never something I thought I could do.
There were lots of reasons why I didn't think cycling was for me. Partly it was fear -- of drivers, of failure, of falling.

Partly it was because I didn't see myself represented in the lycra clad, male dominated cycle culture.

But partly, it was because of my body.
I've always been bigger than I want to be, and I've always been too self-conscious about it.

Over the past few years it's something I've tried to overcome -- trying diets, calorie counting, and all kinds of exercise to try and build a body I was comfortable with.
Read 20 tweets

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