On losing TEA21 Enhancements-- ripped out in House Committee.

[Fovea]

This is not the end of the world. Like all things in this administration, it seems, the States and Counties are going to be left to actually create good multi modal policy and projects. The way I see it, no one expected the forces of bloat to lie down and play dead. Bikes are about communities and districts, not big box stores one exit out of town.

The Big Box Store is about the efficiency in staffing, stocking, and POSing a bigger store over 5 little stores. But they really miss the point. The point is that the community is better served with less centralization and more small stores in neighborhoods and town squares. So we gave them tax abatements to wipe the local economy of small businesses.

There are urban families in my town that are living off the pickins at the local stop and rob. They do this because there is no local market left, indeed, there are dead zones; places so ripped apart by highways and rail that they are almost abandoned. We need to return to making the roads accomidate pedestrians, rail and cycles above the auto in the urban core.

Now we will see how many of our elected officials see the links between bad transportation policy, bad development practice, and bad foreign policy. **

The point is that you cannot only change one element of that cascade, and be safe. Something has to change on the homefront. We do have to conserve, and we should give up the land yachts, if only for Uncle Sam's old lung's sake. We should use the other modes when they travel in the city as much as possible, because the air is absolute crap out there. If we acted rationally, Kyoto would be irrelevant. Further, we will not have a youth fit enough for military service if we do not find ways for them to use their own bodies to get around.

Remember the ones who get it, fire the ones who don't.

I do feel that if we are losing quite a few, we are still winning. There are an awful lot more bikes out there on the streets
than before, even here in the depth of summer heat. And I live in a notoriously bad cycling town. The improvements that were made are still there, and will be a greater salesman for more in time.

There is a lot to accomplish in the battle for the hearts and minds of drivers and voters. But I think we are winning.