There are two kinds of people pedalling those ungainly bikes you see everywhere – and only one can afford the price tag
Some time in the early years of this century a new kind of bicycle, or rather tricycle, appeared on the roads around me. They were big, heavy things with open wooden boxes bolted on the front. In these boxes sat a small child or two being transported to or from nursery or primary or prep school. In the saddle perched a pedalling parent, red of cheek and heavy of breath. The determined look on their faces conveyed something along the muttered lines of: “This is a good idea, the right thing to do – good for the kids and good for me,” repeated with every revolution of the pedals.
To my mind, though undoubtedly noble in purpose, these machines were a worry. They looked a bit Heath Robinson to me, like something my dad might have cobbled together for my brother and me to lark about with. The kids in the box always looked so vulnerable, sitting there at white-van exhaust-pipe height. And unless the parent was super-fit, pedalling miles every morning, I couldn’t see how they were an alternative to car use. More likely they were an alternative to walking. Not for me.
Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist
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