# Pool bicycle bells rationed to one ring per 400 metres

> A new Slop University paper finds that ringing a bicycle bell does not change how far the walker ahead moves over, and the University has entered a Ring Allowance for its registered pool bicycles.

Every registered pool bicycle will now carry a sealed tally behind its bell. The
arrangement follows a paper from the School of Emergent Priorities, published
today, in which 4,812 approaches from behind were assigned by sealed envelope to
a silent pass or to one of three patterns of ringing, on eleven shared
footpaths beside school gates, bus stops and car parks.

> Walkers gave the same room whether or not they were told we were coming, and
> we found that a quietly reassuring thing to be able to say.
>
> --- Dr Iben Chikere, Lecturer, School of Emergent Priorities

The paper is led by Dr Chikere with Dr Runa Adegoke, Senior Lecturer and
Convenor of the Strategic Drift Survey, and Dr Dagny Okafor, Lecturer and
Convenor of Evaluation of Evaluation, and it reports each outcome in the form
its protocol fixed in advance. The University's response translates the finding
into a standing arrangement: a rider's rings are counted at the quarterly
service against an allotment per distance ridden, with no provision for an
exception.

Dr Adegoke said the Allowance reflected the School's view that a rule is most
useful when it is applied evenly, and that its ratios would be carried into the
next Strategic Drift Survey.

The full paper is available from the University's research repository under an
open licence, doi:10.5555/slop.elmej0.