Different Communities in Southern California-Corin

   I lived in two pretty different communities in Southern California while growing up that are near each other. To me, a community is a group of people that have something in common that brings them together to interact with one another and communicate. These two communities had their similarities and differences that affected me while I was growing up there. One was more suburban, but definitely not big city-like while the other was almost in a rural setting.

   The first place I lived in was the more suburban one. There were not many families living around us with kids our age and nobody rode their bikes or scooters anywhere to get around except maybe the park down the street. The riding of the skateboard or the bike or whatever was the an activity or an event in it by itself. The only place one got to interact with kids your own age was at school or church in an organized setting. Hanging out besides that took organization because parents had to drive friends across town. The streets were wide and without bike lanes and filled with cars moving at pretty high speeds usually. 

   The second place I lived was much different from a child's perspective on getting around. Smaller roads and indeed a much smaller town meant walking and sometimes some other forms of transport were much more feasible. Both communities however, had a lot of community events where people would get together because of something in common. Where I lived at first had more gatherings based on specific activities like sports or music or whatever. The second, smaller community had more things based on living in the same geographical location. Neighbors actually knew each other and people didn't just interact based on specific things. People knew each other from multiple places across a more connected web of community members. Communities like these and ones in between them have  existed in California for a long time.

   On one hand, the first community I lived in has changed significantly in the last few years. It now offers more bike lanes and has finally recognized that it needs to repave it's roads. The second community remains pretty much the same, but has expanded to a degree. It is not as bike able as there are many hills and not any more room for bike lanes (people could try, but the lanes would not get used enough to be worth it). One needs a car to get there and so people just use them to get around too. These communities are structured very differently, physically. My project really only applies to the first, more suburban place where it is more relevant because people ride for (a little) different reasons. There are so many more people and they have other options to get around besides just the car. A project about rail or other options is really the only thing you could apply to try and minimize the use of the cars by the second community as the first is on it's (albeit slow) way to cutting back on it's car-dependency.

   I guess the types of bike riding that one could do in these communities reflects these traits. Living in the suburban area, cycling could be more involve commuting, and sport cyclists would ride away from where they live and go somewhere more rural. The rural areas are where more people would go to ride for sport and very few would ever really ride to commute.

A road bike shoe specifically designed to be used with a special pedal for efficiency next to a sneaker as just kind of an example of the difference between sport and transport cycling in different communities.