Critical Mass, Mardrid style

The Davis Enterprise: October 16, 2009

Davis Bicycles! column #29
Author: Tom Burton

photo caption:
Tom Burton found a Critical Mass experience in Madrid “intoxicating.”

Madrid, May 28

Sounds swirl around me, out of control, the drumbeats of a bad hangover, unstopping ... the threat of machinery, whirling ... horns on each side, only 6, 5, 4 feet away, an angry, ugly sound that advances and retreats as I roll by, evoking the rasping of an emphysemic patient, amplified by the cement and steel canyon pinning us in.

Welcome to la Crítica, Critical Mass in Madrid.

The noise is simply the machinery of a world metropolis, now only burnished by the smooth quiet continuous comforting clicking of ratcheting freewheels, and the sweet twinkling sounds — sonic pixie dust, really — of gentle bike bells rung as the bikers cross intersections...

The drummers in front have stopped the parade and with tambores — bass drums topped with cow skin, coarse short brown and white hair still attached — and accompanied by a ghetto blaster duct-taped to handlebars blaring reggae, they face each other, blocking an intersection on one of Madrid's toniest streets, Acalá, dreds flying, heads thrown back mouths open grinning big brilliant white teeth, beautiful tanned hippy chicks, flared hips swaying seductively...

Oh, but the horns!: Taxi drivers stand perpendicular to our street, protected by the crease between door and car, hunkered over, right hands pressing the center of steering wheels, faces flush, mouths wide open, red in rage, some with fists raised in the air.

The procession restarts. Standing on top of a city bench, I scan the passing crowd. Out of curiosity I count the passing bicycles and give up at 300. Eighteen minutes later the three police riot vans with flashing blue lights, escorting the cyclists, pass by. Eighteen minutes of bicyclists at 2 to 3 mph!

Thousands: skinny twenty-something guys on muddied mountain bikes, commuters in neon orange vests, white haired Brits on three speeds (natch!), the occasional fixie (not as much a trend here as in the U.S.), downhillers with kneepads and massive helmets, kids perched on bike seats (no helmets), couples holding hands as they ride, roadies in full kit, girls in skirts, department store bikes, beater bikes, tallbike freaks, unicycles, recumbents, Rollerbladers, BMXers, suits, shorts, dresses, jeans, high heels, boots, grandparents, kids, parents, singles, gay, straight, sons, daughters, all are here in support of bikes and thus in defiance of a car culture embossed on a 600-year-old city…

Each day for the past month I have seen the solo bike commuter, a single ant pivoting its way up Madrid's shallow hills, a tiny insect, ignored by all the larger more powerful vulgar animals going by unawares. But here, here we are in the center of an ant colony and from sheer numbers does power arise, power to stymie the larger animals, if only for a few minutes.

And it's intoxicating. For the first time I get Critical Mass. I now recognize that Critical Mass in Davis as an indulgent luxury, an extravagance incongruent with the comparative limitless access the city and its citizens provide for its bicyclists. But even here in Madrid, where righteous celebration and righteous indignation collide, I am still ambivalent about la Crítica ...

The police vans pass. I hop on my bike, squeeze by the cops and move through the crowd. Then I see her — a stylish thirtysomething business woman in a powder blue BMW sedan, phone to ear talking animatedly. Like a sandbar with a human river flowing by on all sides, she is stuck, perhaps too courteous — or too intimidated — to push her way through the intersection.

Her grip is white-knuckled on the top of the steering wheel and it is obvious she is frustrated, tears about to spill onto her cheeks: Is she late picking the kids up from the ex, (oh, the arguments that will cause!)? Does she need to get to the hospital to see her mother before visiting hours end? Or is this simply the end of a crappy work week and on this hot ... summer ... Friday ... evening, does she simply want to get home? Who knows?

I glide by her, feeling a little diminished ...

We live in a society, where in our own closed-spaced existence, a lot of what we do will impact somebody else, more so in a densely populated city like Madrid. Yes, we want to make our cities and towns and streets more livable and we happen to think promoting bicycling will help.

But the question becomes this: Given basic human nature, is it realistic to expect that any individual, or any group, can advance their cause by making everyone else angry?

Postscript. In defense of Madrileños, I found them to be extremely courteous and safe drivers, consistently giving me plenty of room for me and my bicycle.

— Tom Burton rides an insufferably trendy fixed gear bike. He can be reached at 2gandc@gmail.com.