Jun-04.pd - Local History Archives

IllUSTRATION
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better facilities. This was especially true in
Holland where we spent a week cycling around
the country on paths both broad and narrow
reserved entirely for cyclists.
Fmally, in our personal experience, OU! family
continues to ride bicycles, although more in the
country where we have a small place at Harvard,
Massachusetts, 35 miles outside Boston. During
recent summers, my son and I have cycled around
Martha's Vineyard. We put our bicycles on the
train leaving Boston for Woods Hole, transport
them across a short bit of water by boat to Vineyard
Haven, and after a good night's sleep, we
start off and cycle via Tisbury, Squibnocket, and
Gay Head to Edgartown, where we spend the
second night. One day's ride covers about 3S miles.
It is easy and pleasant and because we are not
accustomed to cycling very much, it leaves us
pleasantly tired at the ~nd of the day.
Which brings me to the vital issue. How do we
get such trips? How can this wonderful means of
transportation and exercise be made safe today
and tomorrow?
OBVIOUSLY,
we need many more bicycle paths.
We need them in every town, in every park,
municipal or national, and in every state. When
my father was a young man, he and his friends
~nce rode from Boston to Albany to New York
and back to Bos~on, completing a triangular journey
of hundreds of miles. It is impossible to conceive
of such a trip today, with trucks and motor-
ClUS roaring along at 70 miles per hour. But a
similar opportunity should be re-established,
though on the lesS'-traveled ways.
It can be done and it is being done in small ~
ginnings in many places. A case in point is Homestead,
Florida, where just one bicycle-riding couple
became imbued with the idea of establishing
safe routes through their town for exercise and
ContinW!d on page 30
Suburbia Today, June 1964 13
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