Found in Translation: TWOC Goes to Japan

The War on Cars

The War on Cars, LLC

Cars, Society & Culture, Culture, Bicycling, Politics, Urbanism, Walking, Transportation, Cities, Transit, News Commentary, News

4.9 • 937 Ratings

🗓️ 30 August 2019

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

When you’re used to the culture of streets in the United States of America — that is, variations on kill or be killed — traveling to countries that do it differently can be both a shock to the system and an inspiration. So it was when TWOC co-host Sarah Goodyear spent three weeks in Japan this summer, and heard exactly one car honk in that entire time. In this episode, we discuss the human infrastructure of mutual respect that makes Japanese cities so different from American ones; hear from Japanese street activists about how they’re inspired by their counterparts in the United States and Europe; and talk about what we can learn by leaving home. Also, members of a group called the Tokyo Picnic Club discuss “the right to picnic” as a basic human right for people in crowded cities.

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SHOW NOTES:

Bike ambassador Chad Feyen offers bicycle tours of Tokyo at Freewheeling Japan. You can also follow him on Twitter.

Connect with the network of Japanese public space activists called Sotonoba.

Learn about the Tokyo Picnic Club and their fight for better public space in Tokyo.

Plus, a cautionary tale from The Onion: Woman who ‘Loves Brazil’ Has Only Seen Four Square Miles of It

This episode was produced by Matt Cutler and recorded by Josh Wilcox at the Brooklyn Podcasting Studio.

Find us on Twitter: @TheWarOnCars, Sarah Goodyear @buttermilk1, Doug Gordon @BrooklynSpoke, Aaron Naparstek @Naparstek.

Email us: [email protected]

https://thewaroncars.org

Transcript

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0:00.0	Okay, so I want you guys to close your eyes and while you're listening to this, I want you to imagine riding a bicycle under these conditions.
0:10.0	This isn't going to be the sexy radio thing again, is it?
0:12.0	No, I promise, I'm not going to be the sexy radio thing again is it no I'm sorry
0:13.0	I'm not going to do that again never again okay listen to this every road
0:18.2	user kind of gives way to more vulnerable road users and there's a respect on the road that exists and I mean there
0:27.3	are certain cases where people will get upset with each other it's not completely
0:31.4	kumbaya out there, but in general when you see somebody who might be
0:36.7	struggling on the road or going a little bit slower, then you just wait. You patiently just
0:42.2	wait behind them until there's some free space to get around
0:45.8	and then doop scoot on through.
0:49.0	So he's not from New York City.
0:50.4	No that's not an American necessarily or not someone who's living in America, I should say.
0:55.0	Well, that's right. Was that like a guided imagery meditation for cyclists?
0:59.0	I want that. I'll listen to that every night.
1:02.0	Yeah. This will all make sense coming up.
1:09.0	Welcome to the war on cars where we'd like to imagine an entire world where people don't want to
1:14.9	crush each other with metal boxes they respect each other that much. I'm Sarah
1:19.9	Goodyear I'm here with my co-host Doug Gordon and Aaron Napaestack who are looking a little
1:25.9	confused right now. Well we know what you did on your summer vacation and so can you tell us
1:31.0	like who that was and where you went? So I did go to
1:34.7	to go to Japan and that was Chad Fion who runs a business called
1:39.3	Freewheeling Japan where he gives bike tours of Tokyo. he gave a bike tour of Tokyo to me and my
	...

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