Transport as Sport

Provocative posting on Transport as Sport ( at where else?) Transport Blog.

One glancing reaction:

One of the problems faced by public ---i.e. group --- transport is that it must compete with the car as fun. So mant of our sports (as opposed to games) involve movement through space: skiing, sailing, horesback riding, cycling, rollerblading, walking, white water rafting, flying, soaring --- the list is endless.

We love to be in motion, to see the landscape unfold before us, especially when we can personally direct the path. That's tough ---but I am not saying insurmountable -- competition for communal travel.

Comments

[Murph]

Yes, but I think there's a disconnect between transport as travel and as sport. When people are on their way to work at 7 on a Tuesday morning, they're generally not thinking about sport (and the ones who are are the people who you curse out for weaving in and out of traffic and speeding like banshees).

I'd far prefer living in an area with good mass transit and mature carsharing, and not owning a car. Then, instead of having to make sport out of my morning commute, I could take a bus/train/bike to work and then come home and take out the shared TT for a spin.

And biking/walking to work in an urban area is, I think, far more sport than driving to work on the freeway. There's more to see and hear when you're not trapped in a car. (spoken like someone who likes his motorcycle...)