Globes and cyclists

Yesterday's Guardian featured a picture of a large globe which appeared to have been set up in Midsummer Common in Cambridge, very near the dental clinic at which my father used to work for a time, that is to say in Auckland Road. This outdoor art is getting everywhere.

So I try and track the picture down, without success. First stop, the Guardian itself. No joy there - one probably has to be a subscriber to get a decent search facility. Second stop, the owner of the picture, Bavmedia at reference 1. What appears to be a fairly fancy photographic operation run by one Geoff Robinson. No joy there.

Third stop, Bing. He turns up what appears to be a fairly fancy scaffolding contractor, Globe Scaffolding of Cambridge. Snapped above and to be found at reference 2 and a quite reasonable response to the query - but wrong again.

Start poking at sculpture trails, which are popping up all over the place. The three at reference 3 being all wrong. But then I get to reference 4 which is right. A peripatetic sculpture trail, some miles long, presently running along the river to the east of Cambridge town centre. See reference 5 and the arty video at reference 6. Clearly the right thing, but nothing as neat as the snap in the Guardian.

Two pluses. First, the art is educational. Second, the art is temporary. By the time you get fed up with it, it is gone.

All this next to a piece about doing something about inconsiderate cyclists, to which BH had drawn my attention in the first place. Inconsiderate cyclists who do things like cycle on pavements intended for possibly elderly pedestrians, jump red lights and cycle too fast. There is talk of license plates and insurance.

License plates big enough to read at 25m might be a bit of a nuisance, so I offer two less intrusive wheezes, wheezes which could co-exist.

First, require all cyclists to carry proof of identity, so that when stopped they can be fined, and if necessary chased up.

Second, require all cycles to carry a chip which broadcasts the number of the cycle, from which it must be possible to track down the owner, who if not the offender is responsible for the offender. Citizens who want to police cyclists could then put an app on their telephones. Point the telephone at the offending cycle and it comes up with name and  number. Report him or her to the nearest police station. Or maybe the app could do that too, at the push of a button.

I'm sure all this could be done, if rather expensive and intrusive, but cyclists are bringing it on themselves. Collectively, they only have themselves to blame. I associate to the way that in my day the civil service swung back and forth on checking claims for expenses while on official business. A lot of checking and a lot of receipts is tiresome and expensive, but then, if lots of officials work the system (aka theft), then you have to crack down for a while.

PS 1: if cycle registration comes in, I bags No.36, the elusive car number, noticed on many occasion in these pages.

PS 2: I wonder whether children still say 'I bags' such and such. Common enough when I was small.

PS 3: I remember now about that other No.36, in which I had two spells, actually owning it for the second spell. Front garden largely gravelled over, the crab apple tree right gone, the hedge front changed, but, overall, not a bad job at all. Not visible here, but the nut trees still seem to be present left, if a bit on the small side. Plus some other shrubs which look familiar. I wonder how cold what was the garage left gets in the winter? Flat, asbestos panel lined roof and no cavity walls to the outside. Although saying that, it can't have been that cold, despite Cambridge being a cold place in the winter, as we kept apples in boxes on high shelves all around. On which point, I now remember about the ice climbing up the inside of the windows and the ice in the basins.

References

Reference 1: https://www.bavmedia.com/.

Reference 2: http://www.globecambridge.co.uk/.

Reference 3: https://www.cambridgesculpturetrails.co.uk/.

Reference 4: https://ourplaceinspace.earth/.

Reference 5: https://ourplaceinspace.earth/trail/cambridge.

Reference 6: https://youtu.be/3e_KmIvbyLc.