Friends of the Earth Birmingham Action Briefing Aug 98/Sep 98

Transport

Leave Your Car At Home (it’s a piece of cake!)

On a Saturday morning the delights of Birmingham’s inner ring road are not at their most obvious. The cars carve their way through the pouring rain, belching out fumes as they go. They might make life slightly more interesting for the inorganic chemist, but for most people Saturday morning on the inner ring road is not ‘the place to be’.

But this was the Saturday of Green Transport Week. Even in an abyss of tarmac and tyres such as this a spot of green should flourish. And on this Saturday 13th July 6 campaigners braved the elements to bring the envirmonmental message right into the bowels of Birmingham.

‘Leave Your Car At Home’ stated one enormous banner and then to add a more gastronomic note ‘Free Cake’ said another. Free Cake? Yes, assorted chocolate and carrot cake with and without icing. Our charming waiters and waitresses presented one as a gift to any sufficiently green traveller. Car sharers and bus drivers were rewarded. Unfortunately the man on rollerblades skated past unfed.

As the lights changed to red the plates were passed between the more deserving travellers. Occasionally cakes were passed through a whole bus. We stayed their two hours during which time a journalist from the Evening mail took some pictures.

The traffic flowed, the impatient drivers neared their destinations and the plates slowly diminished. And when the cakes disappeared, so did we. Personally I thought the chocolate was the best.

Steve Mackman

Restaurant Critic