grotesque wheelchairs

I was appalled on BBC World news this morning at seeing the grotesque joke of 'spouses' of world leaders testing some electric wheelchair-like vehicles at the G8 summit, in the name of ecologically sustainable transport. I despair about the developed world's contribution to transport contra climate change. These educated people with their little handbags should be capable of riding ordinary bicycles. But rather, it is their built environment that is often ill-suited to their journeys (even for shopping). More Segway-like devices will only superficially (and very expensively) 'green' the environment, while cheap individual means of human powered transport are plentiful, but unfashionable.

Leaving work yesterday, I saw a man sprawled face down in the mud outside the college, whom at first I thought may be dead. The slow writhing of his limbs at very odd angles, suggested to me at first they might have been broken in an accident. After a few minutes' close observation (at a distance) I could see he was breathing, probably paraletic, and might survive. This morning there was no trace of him, the entire area was flooded and inaccessible after heavy rain. I had to access the college by climbing a fence and clambering through our building site.