Read the given passage and answer the questions that follow.

The Victorians were wedded to the development of the railways and steam power. The steam locomotives and ships had mobilised several generations of people who, in the previous era, would have had little opportunity to travel. 1900 was to mark the return of road transport both two wheeled and four wheeled. The bicycle would have an impact and liberate both men and women, empowering them with freedom of movement. Under their own steam people from working class backgrounds who could never have afforded the luxury of coach travel were able to go where they pleased, expanding their horizons under their own power. For women, the bicycle gave them independence to travel on their own, it gave them freedom. It changed fashions for women. To ride a bike in a long skirt proved tricky, by wearing trousers or shortening the skirt, anything was possible. It allowed women to meet with each other, find work, join groups, it was in every sense liberating. To point to a singularity in time when daily life for women shifted would be illogical but the Edwardian period for women was a significant change in role and attitude.