Critical Mass, the activist cyclist group that aims to edge motorists off Vancouver streets, plans to hold another ride tonight.
As it does on every final Friday of the month, the group will gather at the Vancouver Art Gallery at about 5:30 p.m. and take to the streets at 6 p.m., and by clogging up rush-hour traffic make the point that biking is a more sustainable mode of transportation than motoring.
As usual, no route plan has been disclosed by organizers. If the rain continues, a few hundred riders are expected, organizer Andrea Curtis said.
“The ride will go – as usual – where it’s led,” Curtis said, in response to a query on the planned route. “Whoever is at the front makes the turns . . . just like one big huge leisurely bike ride.”
A message on the group’s Vancouver Facebook pages says, “Reclaim the streets! We aren’t blocking traffic . . . We are traffic.”
Not everyone posting messages on the group’s Facebook page supports the riders’ tactics.
“For those of you who choose to defy the law and ride in the Mass anyway, please remember to be courteous to everyone you encounter. Violence and harassment has nothing to do with cycling and certainly doesn’t help the reputation of cyclists,” one person writes.
Another writes: “I’m a visitor to Vancouver . . . if we were to investigate the members of this farce . . . it would be amusing and slightly disturbing how many of these people (idiots) actually own cars themselves.”
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