Monday, May 21, 2012

NATO summit 2012– Chicago

Chicago has been on lock down since Friday to prepare for protests to the NATO 2012 summit.  Both police and protesters vehicle of choice: The Bike.



5 comments:

  1. I remember years and years ago being in New York when thousands of people marched on the UN on the eve of the Iraq War. A friend of mine and I brought our bikes and it was an amazing experience to be able to ride around Manhattan while most of the Upper East and Midtown where gridlocked by distributed protest actions

    ReplyDelete
  2. Chris, that sound amazing. I did a quick tour of NATO, but didn't really get in the shit. I can't believe its taken this long for the Police to realize its a great way to get around.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I've noticed the police have no uniformity to their bikes? Are they supplying their own using a department stipend or just buying their own. I would have thought the city would maintain a fleet just like they do with cars.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I wonder if the police being on bikes changes the interaction between protesters and the police at all? Cops I spoke to in Louisville said being on bikes made them more approachable, especially with kids and young people. I didn't have a chance to really follow the Nato protests but I hope they weren't a repeat of the Occupy Oakland protests, which seemed quite a police over-response.

    ReplyDelete
  5. The protest were mostly peaceful with a few exceptions being violence between the black bloc protesters and police.

    ReplyDelete