Civil Skies, Mean Streets

I'm fine flying a little plane up the Hudson; I'm terrified to bike down Pine.

by Bruce Schimmel

The first time I flew a small plane up the Hudson, I admit I was a tad tense. It was 1993; I was a student pilot. And as my instructor and I passed the Statue of Liberty and the Twin Towers, the sky seemed to teem with every sort of vehicle.

As we little planes trudged below on the river's divided skyway, jetliners shot up from Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark. All around us, helicopters darted in and out like dragonflies.

To my untrained eyes, it seemed so random. It wasn't. Flying is very orderly, because we all play by the same rules. And pilots generally play nicely. We're funny like that.

I've since flown the Hudson many times — which is why I got a call recently from WHYY's Tom MacDonald, after the collision of a helicopter and a small plane. (Listen at tr.im/loose_canon.)

"What's flying the Hudson like?" asked Tom. "Was it like getting through the Schuylkill Expressway at rush hour?"

"Frankly, no," I said. "Flying the Hudson is actually kind of like going down Spruce or Pine, where you have mixed modes of traffic. You have bicyclists, who are slower than cars, and pedestrians that are slower than those. It's the mixture of traffic that's difficult."

What I didn't say is that while I'm perfectly comfortable flying a little plane up the Hudson, I'm downright scared to take a bike down Pine. Really.

I think it's more dangerous to bike down a street where you can get slammed by a truck, smashed by a car door or crash into some pedestrian stumbling from a curb. Where everyone acts like they own the street.

In flying, the rules are remarkably clear. Pilots know who gets priority. So even when planes aren't under direct air traffic supervision, we know who gets to go where, and who goes first.

But the sky is a fast and complex place, and sometimes — as in the sad instance of this plane and helicopter — the right-of-way isn't clear. So pilots talk to one another, a lot. (Unfortunately, in this recent collision, the pilots had yet to establish contact.) 

And what's interesting about pilot talk — at least to many of my passengers — is how polite everyone is. The niceties of "Sir," "Ma'am," "May I?" and "Thank you" grace almost every exchange.

And if you should find yourself in an ambiguous situation, it's something of a mark of honor for one pilot to give way to another.

Imagine that kind of courtesy on Spruce or Pine. It could happen. Because the rules are about to change. They're about to get clearer. The city is trying out some dedicated bike lanes.

Adding bike lanes could return these old streets to their slower, safer and more courteous time. For Society Hill and other neighborhoods trying to preserve their historical character, a slower, more civil pace could bring great benefits. Some, unexpected.

Driving slower and more steadily, of course, is safer and less polluting. But there's also a multitude of traffic studies to suggest that going slower might actually get you there faster. Kind of like the tortoise and the hare.

So I'm excited to see how it goes. Because for one, I'd love to feel as safe peddling down Pine as I do flying the skies.

(bruce@schimmel.com)