Haven’t made use of this blog for a while, but after the ride last Friday night, I thought it would be a good moment to recognize the beautiful evening we had, and to make some remarks about routes, repetition, and opportunity…

San Francisco’s Critical Mass is, as Hugh put it some months ago, an untended garden. Overgrown with “weeds”, a possibly beautiful, flourishing experience seems to be languishing in an untended corner, lacking nourishment, TLC, and imaginative play. Instead, month after month the ride takes off, and before long we’re doing the same old thing AGAIN, whether it’s circling Union Square, heading into the Broadway Tunnel, or going down to the ballpark to get stuck among thousands of fans heading to a game. Maybe this repetition comes from the great resistance to any aforethought or planning, that no one ever shows up with a proposed route or destination that might highlight parts of the City that are not often blessed with a Critical Mass ride-through? Or maybe it’s because people who don’t really know the City well keep finding themselves in front making predictable decisions about where to go based on their limited experience of San Francisco? Or maybe it’s because those who DO surge to the front think the point of the ride is to stick to the most predictable and traffic-heavy thoroughfares because the reputation of Critical Mass is to fuck up traffic? and somehow that’s what we’re all supposed to go along with?

I don’t know why San Francisco’s Critical Mass gets so stuck in the rut of doing the same things over and over. I’m sure part of it is that we always have a lot of new riders every month, many from out of town, who are excited to do some of the things that long-timers like me are completely sick of. I don’t generally get involved with the front of the ride these days, preferring to follow whoever is up there, wherever they want to go. But once in a while, like this past Friday May 31, I just can’t stand it. This time we went up Market, turned west on Geary, straight out (thankfully skipping the circling of Union Square) to Polk, north on Polk to Broadway and the inevitable vortex of the Tunnel sucked us in, then everyone turned around and went back to the west through the tunnel, and when I got back to the Larkin Street end of the tunnel I couldn’t believe that people were turning back for a third pass! So a friend encouraged me to pull the ride away, and I did my best and voila! We ended up going up Russian Hill and down Lombard, followed by a nice ride to the north and west to get to the Wave Organ, one of our all-time favorite end points.

 

 

So I don’t know if pre-planning routes is the solution… it’s damn hard to get folks to go along with any suggested route these days. Spontaneous direction from people who know the City well usually does well, but it’s rare that experienced City dwellers go to the front and take that kind of responsibility… It’s a missed opportunity in my opinion–not just in terms of a better Critical Mass experience, but also in terms of expanding and extending the logic of reinhabiting public space, using our unique geography in ways that challenge ourselves as cyclists, but also challenge us to go outside of our familiar zones, see parts of the City we don’t normally see, and meet the huge population of San Franciscans who still think the private car is the only way to get around.

It’s also important to remember that the way we interact with people does leave a lasting impression. If you are taunting and yelling at people, no big surprise, they think you’re an asshole, and basically they’re right! I can’t count the number of times I’ve had to patiently explain to people that most Critical Mass riders are cool, that most people have a really great experience of the event, and that the few idiots who pound on postal vans or car hoods are just that, rare idiots. I don’t think we have to answer for every fool who joins the ride, since this society is overrun with fools and you can find them everywhere, from bars and restaurants to every kind of vehicle and public event… still, what makes Critical Mass special, fun, challenging, and a great ongoing experiment in self-management and self-teaching, is our ability to interact with each other in motion, to solve problems, to create an atmosphere that is attractive and welcoming and invitational to those we pass by…

 

Anyway, I had a great ride on Friday, and I hope we can keep it going this summer, extending ourselves into parts of town we don’t go to month after month, and not spending much time with the pointless circling around and tying up cars just for the hell of it… you wouldn’t like to be stuck in traffic, so there’s really no reason to go out of your way to delay anyone else either. Our presence is already a loud statement about many things, from the texture of urban life to the ecological/climate crisis, to oil wars and hyperdevelopment… people in cars are not the enemy! They might be our allies, but only if we figure out how to invite them to join us! Making our experience as deep and interesting and enjoyable as we can is our best approach, imho (ok, no so humble!)… (Chris Carlsson)

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