56 min listen
S2E18: 200% Happier with Mia Birk
ratings:
Length:
55 minutes
Released:
Nov 10, 2012
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
Colin Marshall sits down in southeast Portland with Mia Birk, author of Joyride: Pedaling Toward a Healthier Future and President of Alta Planning + Design, which strives to make biking, walking, and mass transit an integral part of daily life. The discuss exactly how much happier he would have been riding a bicycle to the interview than riding a bus; the way Portland "got the ball rolling" for its cycling infrastructure development in the nineties; the moments of surprising hostility she found upon first pedaling down Portland streets; bicycle infrastructure as a facilitator of cooperation; how to extend enthusiasm for cycling beyond the guys in Lance Armstrong spandex to those who simply need to get somewhere; the ill effects of America's having spent decades incentivizing driving, and exactly how European cities like Copenhagen pulled so far ahead; how she gauges the cycling in a new town, asking first to see "the good, the bad, and the ugly"; the importance of creating conditions of delight for riding in a city, and the need to re-teach the occasional public official how to use a bike before doing so; how the declared identity of a city affects the implementation of cycling within it; how she finds you can fit "a little party" into every day; and what, exactly, to do when you turn up in Portland yourself, jonesing to ride.
Released:
Nov 10, 2012
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
Litblogger and novelist Mark Sarvas: A conversation about book criticism, the Los Angeles Literary scene and Michiko Kakutani with Mark Sarvas, author of popular weblog The Elegant Variation. Harry, Revised, his first novel, hits shelves in May 2008. by Notebook on Cities and Culture