the gtveloce.com-munity of interests

alfa romeos, bikes, comment and communities

Monday

Alfas, images, bicycles and sustainable communities?

First up, why is this site called 'gtveloce.com'?

I do enjoy driving, but I hate our maddening cultural obsession with cars. I much prefer bicycles, but if I must have a car it should be Italian, and an Alfa Romeo. But my story doesn't start there. The first car that caught my eye, as it were, was a Datsun 120Y coupe... weird, I know. It had a sensible 1200cc motor and a swoopy, sporty body (kind of). It wasn't the 'normal' stuff of dreams but I wasn't like most kids: I was into aeroplanes, cameras and bicycles, not cars; so I knew no better. And then at the age of about 19 I decided to actually get a driving licence - and began researching my affordable car options.

Now the guy at the Ansett flying boat base told me to steer clear of cars as they would empty my wallet, and of course he was right. But they were interesting mechanical things with practical advantages over bicycles, especially in terms of carrying more cameras over longer distances, more securely. Trust me, an SLR and a few lenses in a bag on your back changes a bike's centre of gravity rather to the worse... so I decided, I'll get a car. Just to get my cameras around safely.

Which brings me to the Mini, a real one, not a pseudo-BMW one. It was small, like the 120Y, but better looking. I wanted one, I thought. However I didn't get a Mini. Instead I encountered a fellow pilot (OK, I was only a learner, but anyway) with an Alfa Romeo GT junior. It was 1300cc, I think, or maybe 1600... whatever. It went and sounded like nothing else I'd ever encountered, and looked like it had fallen from the sky in a blaze of light (this is a good thing). So I forgot the Mini idea and started looking at Alfas!

But first of all I needed a licence. And guess what, my driving instructor knew my flying instructor, and my flying instructor had managed to roll a VW Beetle on an access road at Bankstown Airport. This driving stuff is getting interesting and a touch sportif; exciting like bicycle racing - but with a motor. And so I learned to drive... in a 120Y sedan. But saved up to buy an Alfa.

Alas, although my father was enthusiastic about cars, and took me around the yards to check out what was available, the Alfas were pricey, had dropped doors and rust. As my dad kindly pointed out, repeatedly. He was keen on me getting a Beetle, but I had seen an Alfasud and decided 'if I can't have that, I'll have the next best thing - a VW Golf'. A bit pricier than the Beetle, but 1600cc, a hatch for the bike and sporty. And you know what, although I set off on a Golfing adventure (I ended up with 2 plus a friend with a 3rd) I actually had already stumbled over the first car I really, really wanted: The Alfa Romeo Alfetta GTV. As in "GT Veloce". And eventually, years later, I bought one. And still have it.

Now do you understand why this is GTVeloce.com? But hey, to paraphrase Lance Armstrong, it's not about the car.

And it's not easy justifying the eclectic nature of this collection of blogs, either - but here goes.

First up, I got into books, art and mythology at a very young age. I think everyone is into self-education and art as kids - we want to paint and draw, and we want to know stuff, especially creepy old archaeological stuff (or is that just me?). I just never lost that urge, anyway. I just changed it a little as I grew up, earned money and bought cameras and computers
But it was hard work walking or bus-ing around, so I got into bikes as transport. I remain addicted to bikes and bike racing, and to getting around my neck of the woods with the least impact on my environment as I can muster
However it was increasingly difficult lugging my cameras around on the bike, so I got into cars. Not just any old cars, they had to be small, nimble, economic, stylish and... Italian? Well, I've varied from that theme a little in that I've shared my garage with Japanese and Korean as well as other non-Italian makes of automobile. But I remain committed to small footprint cars, even if they may be verging on the impractical at times. (Admission: I've never owned a fat Aussie 6 cylinder car, nor wanted to.)
Sustainable communities? Well I don't like big, soul-less shopping malls. Never have. Sure the first ones were impressive in a big, collective airline terminal sort of way, but it soon dawned on me that the characterful villages within our cities - the communities within our communities - were being destroyed by malls. Simply, malls are built on cheap land, and cheap land is either rural or far from infrastructure, like railways. In that way we disengage from traditional shopping centres and corner stores; and we become committed to using cars to get to these new far-distant locations. We lose our local shops and services and get centralised "bargain" shops and big, cold, concrete meeting places instead. Great for lowering costs per unit sold, bad for our lives
Bad for our lives? The car-domination is great for personal freedom, but has led to communities cut in two by busy roads too wide to cross. Roads that kids can't safely play on. Roads we don't want to walk alongside or ride our bikes on. We have piled on the pounds because we don't exercise and live fearful, isolated lives because our suburban streets are now almost empty of pedestrian traffic
I could go on, but the essence of it all is restoring a balance to our communities... by all means capturing the economic value in centralised, higher-volume production and consumption whilst simulataneously reducing the waste and over-consumption; and setting about rebuilding some of the 'people-friendly' village community that we have lost. Before oil prices force us to do it anyway!
Oh yeah, I also do some online stuff to keep the Fortianistas, AKA The Class of 75, in touch.