{"id":32927,"date":"2016-09-22T09:09:08","date_gmt":"2016-09-22T12:09:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=32927"},"modified":"2024-09-05T11:19:57","modified_gmt":"2024-09-05T14:19:57","slug":"interstate-cyclist-from-queimados-calls-for-equality-of-transport-infrastructure-in-the-baixada","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=32927","title":{"rendered":"Interstate Cyclist from Queimados Calls for Equality of Transport Infrastructure in the Baixada"},"content":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Cycling activist Carlos Leandro de Oliveira, 35, says his interest in cycling\u00a0began during a moment of financial struggle. \u201cI had gone three days without receiving my salary,\u201d he says. \u201cI didn\u2019t have money to pay the bus fare to go to work, so I began cycling from Queimados<\/a> to Rio. That\u2019s when I saw I didn\u2019t need to depend on public transport<\/a>.\u201d Leandro has since dedicated himself to promoting cycling as a cheaper and more sustainable method of transportation for his community in Queimados and Japeri<\/a>, municipalities located in the <\/span>Baixada Fluminense<\/a>\u00a0region of Greater Rio<\/a><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Leandro was born and raised in Queimados and studied environmental management at the Carlos Branco University.\u00a0His current environmental consultancy aims to \u201cstimulate, through the engagement of government, civil society, places of learning and private initiatives, the adoption of bicycles as methods of transport so we can have a more humane and less motorized city.\u201d Under his activist pseudonym Carlos GreenBike<\/a>, Leandro plans to cycle the Rio Doce area in Minas Gerais in November in recognition of the tragic gigantic toxic mudslide that occurred at the Samarco mining site in Mariana<\/a> last year. \u201cThe goal is to see what really happened, and to see how residents are doing one year later,\u201d he says, noting that it is easy for the public to forget about such incidents once the first wave of press has passed.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Carlos<\/a><\/p>\n

Leandro\u00a0recently participated in the <\/span>Casa Fluminense bicycle tour<\/span><\/a> of metropolitan Rio, as part of their #Rio2017 campaign. The campaign aims to draw attention to Rio\u2019s development goals post-Olympics, and to promote a more unified concept of Rio as inclusive of its greater metropolitan area, which is\u00a0<\/span>home to 74% of the state population<\/span><\/a>. According to Casa Fluminense<\/a>, more than half the residents of Japeri spend <\/span>more than an hour<\/span><\/a> commuting\u00a0to work each day, contributing to a life expectancy for Japeri residents that is two years <\/span>shorter<\/span> than for residents of Rio city. As Leandro points out:<\/span><\/p>\n

“<\/span><\/em>The Rio de Janeiro city government always claims\u00a0that Rio has the largest bike path system of Latin America. But bike paths for whom? Because the majority of the bike paths in Rio are in the South Zone<\/a>. If you are coming from the Baixada Fluminense and you disembark at the Central Station, you have no way to make the connection between the station and the South Zone bike path system without passing through streets which are dangerous for cyclists.”<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Leandro describes a number of hurdles to commuting by bike posed to those who live outside Rio\u2019s city center. Bikes are only allowed on Rio\u2019s metro and train systems after 9pm\u00a0on weekdays and on weekends. \u201cThere\u2019s no structure on the train where you can leave your bike,\u201d he says, \u201cand people look at you like you\u2019re an extraterrestrial.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Leandro also highlights the lack of places to lock bikes: “In Queimados, many people ride their bikes to\u00a0the station, but there\u2019s nowhere to lock your bike, and bike robbery rates are very high. You can\u2019t take your bike to go shopping and leave it outside the store with peace of mind, you have to constantly keep\u00a0an eye on it.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Most<\/a>
Most maps of bike paths in Rio do not even include the Baixada Fluminense<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mayor Eduardo Paes<\/a>\u00a0promised\u00a0to build 450 kilometers of new bike paths before the Rio 2016 Games<\/a> to deliver on the City\u2019s promise that the <\/span>Olympics would bring urban renewal, sustainable development and inclusivity<\/a>.<\/span>\u00a0Neighborhoods in the Baixada might have benefitted especially, as Leandro says there are no bike paths on the margins of Rio. Yet according to geographer Hugo Costa, paths that were constructed have been <\/span>built almost exclusively<\/span><\/a> in South<\/a> and West Zone<\/a> neighborhoods which already have the most leisure space and lowest population density, respectively. <\/span>Residents found<\/span><\/a> the 22km of bike paths promised to the Mar\u00e9<\/a> favela complex in the North Zone<\/a> left incomplete and shoddily constructed.<\/span><\/p>\n

In addition, a special policy<\/a> adopted specifically for the Olympics rendered commuting by bike nearly impossible\u00a0to Rio\u2019s residents during the Games. \u201cDuring the Olympics and Paralympics\u2013which supposedly promote sports, accessibility and inclusivity\u2013no one could enter the metro or train with a bicycle,\u201d Leandro describes. \u201cIt was a form of exclusion<\/a>.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Yet\u00a0<\/span>Leandro remains hopeful that while the Rio 2016 Olympics did not succeed as a \u201clanding point\u201d for legacies, they can be used as a \u201cjumping off point\u201d for new improvements. <\/span><\/p>\n

Donations to Carlos Greenbike\u2019s ecocycle trip along Rio Doce can be made at on his Kickante crowdfunding campaign<\/a><\/span>\u00a0until October\u00a022, or by contacting him at +55 21 97511 3860 or through the Carlos GreenBike Facebook page<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas Cycling activist Carlos Leandro de Oliveira, 35, says his interest in cycling\u00a0began during a moment of financial struggle. \u201cI had gone three days without receiving my salary,\u201d he says. \u201cI didn\u2019t […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":125,"featured_media":32946,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1736,335,329,452,1869,1329],"tags":[9,460,522,986,1685,1713,1261,756,258,280,272,474,1197,107,203,755,1709,327,1259,996,673,5,1292,409,1698,1402,156,207,471,200,21],"writer":[2121],"translator":[],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-32927","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-1736","8":"category-policies","9":"category-solutions","10":"category-rio20","11":"category-transit","12":"category-by-international-observers","13":"tag-9","14":"tag-baixada-fluminense","15":"tag-bicycle-friendly","16":"tag-bicycle-use","17":"tag-bike-path","18":"tag-casa-fluminense","19":"tag-central-rio","20":"tag-community-organizing","21":"tag-community-solution","22":"tag-complexo-da-mare","23":"tag-mayor-eduardo-paes","24":"tag-environment","25":"tag-greater-rio","26":"tag-health","27":"tag-inequality","28":"tag-infrastructure","29":"tag-japeri","30":"tag-legacy-myth","31":"tag-mega-events","32":"tag-metropolitan-region","33":"tag-misplaced-public-priorities","34":"tag-olympics","35":"tag-organizing","36":"tag-public-transportation","37":"tag-queimados","38":"tag-legacy","39":"tag-south-zone","40":"tag-sports","41":"tag-sustainability","42":"tag-transportation","43":"tag-west-zone","44":"writer-sophia-zaia"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/125"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=32927"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32927\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79398,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32927\/revisions\/79398"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/32946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=32927"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=32927"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=32927"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=32927"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=32927"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=32927"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=32927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}