“Share and share alike….”

That’s a weird phrase isn’t it “Share and share alike”? Did you know that the phrase was first known as “share and share like”, from Richard Edwards’ comedy “Damon and Pithias”, 1566?

Me neither. And, come to think of it, I’ve never heard of Richard Edwards.

I remember when I was young, I didn’t share anything. Not my sweets, my toys, nothing. But these days, I’m all about sharing. So when I came across these two fantastic websites, my urge to share with you good people overwhelmed me like stink on a pig.

As some of you may know, I’m a big advocate for bike sharing and a few of my blog posts have been calling for this for Birmingham for a while now. And since the powers that be (looking at you here Sir Albert) seem to be dragging their  feet on the matter, I have been searching – nay trawling – this here internet for any nuggets of ammunition that could help my quest to see bike sharing come to Brum.

Well praise be and Hallelujah my bike riding flock – I have found a website that gives the reader all the information they could EVER need about bike sharing. Let me tell you a little about it. It’s called the Bike Share Map. It’s been developed by a guy called Oliver O’Brien at The Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis (CASA) at University College London. The site gives the viewer a look at bike sharing on a GLOBAL scale. The information is collated to show just how many people are using bike sharing worldwide at any one time. For example, you can click on one of the circles in New York City and you can see how many people hired a bike from the stand in the last 24 hours or even find out how many bikes there are at the stand right now.

Now before I go on, let me just say that some of you may find this a little “nerdy” and may be asking “what has this got to do with Birmingham?”. Well, let me answer by saying yes, it may be a little bit nerdy but it has a lot to do with Birmingham. The idea of the map gives you a sense of just how popular bike sharing is and it is that kind of information that is GOLD in the hands of those who will decide whether Birmingham gets a bike sharing scheme or not.

Ok. Rant over.

So for my next bit of “sharing is caring”, let me introduce you to Cyclodeo. This website is a little like YouTube meets Google Maps. Well, in fact, that’s exactly what it is. But for cyclists! Cyclodeo  allows you to cycle around the world from the comfort of your own home. And before you say “why would I want to do that?”, let me say that some of us don’t have bottomless pits of money we can go travelling with to cycle around these places which is why this website is not only fun but informative too. And if you do make it to some of the places on the maps, at least you can say you are familiar with the traffic!

You know, I feel better for sharing this with you. Maybe I should start sharing a bit more. Coffee anyone?