By Tom Marshall, Guadalajara Reporter
http://www.guadalajarareporter.com/news-mainmenu-82/guadalajara/25682-urban-activists-cry-foul.html
A cleaner city, less reliant on private cars, more bicycles, increased public transport and open spaces to bring the community together?
Sounds perfect, yes? The biggest obstacle, says urban activist Felipe Reyes, is getting the mother driving her kids to school in her gas-guzzling SUV to read off the same script.
“There are 1.8 million cars in the city and 50,000 new cars being added every year,” Reyes continues. “Guadalajara is already number three is Latin America for car density. And these aren’t small cars we’re talking about; they’re pick-up trucks, U.S.A. style. Increased infrastructure is only going to lead to more cars. We need to send out a clear message.”
Reyes and other activists have taken that message to a small green area right in the heart of the construction zone of the new Matute Remus suspension bridge at Lopez Mateos and Lazaro Cardenas.
As work got underway Monday, members of the group Ciudad para Todos (City for Everyone) set up tents, unveiled banners and settled down to protest a multi-million-dollar project they see as unnecessary and only incentivizing the use of the automobile.
“Lazy bastards,” shouts one motorist driving past the encampment on his commute into work.
“We get insults like that quite a lot,” explains Paula Reyes, a 22-year-old graduate of the ITESO university. “But if they come closer and talk to us they usually understand. It’s just a lack of awareness.”
Felipe Reyes (no relative) is the coordinator of Ciudad para Todos, formed in 2007 on the back of protests against the building of a tunnel near Plaza del Sol. He heads a small and dedicated group that aims to keep the government on its toes when it comes to transport policy by protesting construction that favors use of the car and coming up with ideas to improve mobility in the city.
“The money being spent on infrastructure for cars would be better spent on other projects,” says Reyes, a graduate in architecture. “We need incentives to not use cars, not more infrastructure.”
Ciudad para Todos has been active in criticizing the new Lazaro Cardenas bridge, organizing open-air film screenings on Friday evenings at the project site and holding discussions on the issue.
“We’ve done all we can and this is the last straw,” says one activist at the camp. “If more people turn up then we’ll stay for another week but it’s difficult while working and studying.”
During the course of an hour at the camp, two neighbors come up and ask why a camp site has been set up on a green traffic island. After a short chat with the young activists, one resident, Salvador, offers his house for them to shower in and the other promises to come to Friday’s free movie screening.
Salvador then asks why the protesters don’t climb the trees so they can’t be cut down.
“Then people will just say we’re tree-huggers and hippies,” replies Paula Reyes. “They’ll think we want the city to become like a ranch. That’s how Tapatios think.”
It’s easy to sympathize with protestors’ frustration at the often patronizing attitude of authorities to groups like theirs.
“It’d be better if they just went home,” says one traffic cop, patrolling nearby road diversions.
“I don’t know what all the fuss is about,” says a woman waiting in her car. “All we want is a modern city with less traffic jams.”
The obvious problem for the group is coming up with a viable alternative for transport in the city. Both Felipe Reyes and Paula Reyes point to the Mobility Plan that has been put together by experts in city planning and local community groups. The plan includes building bicycle lanes, more open spaces in the city and looking into ideas such as London’s congestion charge for entering the city center or Mexico City’s rotation of vehicles on different days of the week.
Felipe Reyes admits the new bridge is part of a wider, sociological problem. Suburban housing developments (fraccionamientos, literally translated as “partitions”) – especially in the municipality of Tlajomulco – have increased people’s reliance on automobiles and shut off communities.“
People don’t live in these neighborhoods, they just sleep there,” says Reyes. “They are like a reflection of our society: enclosed, distant and prohibitive.”
The website for the activists is www.pasalomejor.com
plans for the Matute Remus bridge and other projects can be found at www.pasalomejor.jalisco.gob.mx
