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The fundraising trio, A Family Affair, are continuously raising money for the MacMillan Cancer Support group. Starting June 15th they will be cycling from John O’Groats to Lands End, which is somewhere in the UK and we’ll trust is a very far ride. In addition to this ride, they have asked extended family and friends to create bike-themed posters to exhibit and sell May 23rd (today!). The posters are really something else and you can check ‘em all out here. If you hope to get one, or two, they will be available for a limited time through the site. Don’t miss out, these are some really striking posters (some very limited) and the money goes to a great cancer support group.
Archive for the 'News & Views' Category
Recently a reader sent in a link to a story in the San Mateo Patch, Bicycle Licensing in San Mateo, with the note “Is this the beginning?” More like the end—many communities have dated, unenforceable bicycle licensing or registration requirements on the books. I say unenforceable as in the case outlined in this story, in many of the places people have noticed such requirements the authorities themselves are typically ignorant of not only the regulations in the first place, but of any way to meet them even if you want. Financially speaking, running a bicycle registration program requires such an extensive administrative system that cities find them unfeasible to run.
We covered many of the issues around bicycle licensing way back in Urban Velo #6, License to Ride.
You too cool for slow-paced group rides, but still, there’s that eentsy weentsy part of you that wonders what it’s like? Well, my friend, retain your uber-urban street cred while getting a feel of riding en masse, slowly, via this time lapse video of the 5 boro bike tour that went down in New York earlier this month. Get a tour of all 5 boros in just 3 minutes, so in a way it’s not even like you’re going slow! It’s ludicrous speed!
As part of National Bike Month, The Morning News ran a piece How To Not Kill A Cyclist worth sharing with your driving, non-cycling friends. For most people on the internet, perhaps the last bit of advice is best.
Judge Us Not by Our Jerks
Just as some percentage of drivers are jerks, so too is some percentage of cyclists—I reckon about 15 percent in both cases. And I’m sure 15 percent of Segwayists are jerks, and 15 percent of jetpackists will be jerks at some point in the future. The Jerk Constant is as immutable and universal as π. The point here is to remember that the majority (85 percent!) of cyclists are not that punk you encountered last Tuesday, so don’t let that frustration get the better of you whenever you see a cyclists up ahead.
From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:
…in a former metal fabricating plant on an entire block, biking aficionado Harry Geyer is creating The Wheel Mill, the state’s first indoor park for bicyclists — mountain bikers, BMX racers and free-stylists and even cyclists who like to keep their wheels on the ground.
Mr. Geyer is leasing the building at 6815 Hamilton Ave., to which he also moved the office of his construction and remodeling business. He has access to 57,000 square feet; Global Links has 23,000 square feet of warehouse space on the eastern end.
The group Transportation Nation in New York has begun a mapping project where they’ve asked participants to send photos and locations of abandoned bikes around the city. To be qualified as an abandoned bike, they must meet a certain criteria, but once met they are to be removed by the city. Transportation Nation is submitting the images and locations to the city for removal and will be tracking them to see how many get taken away. This seems like quite an endeavor, but judging by some of the photos, a much needed service.
In my own hometown, where bike rack space is much more sparse, a local bike shop started locking unrideable bikes with their advertising signs on them to promote their shop. After unheeded suggestions to remove them, they started getting cut clandestinely before the shop took measures to remove the bikes on their own. That was a very temporary incident in my town, but it looks to be a much more widespread blight in New York. That mapping visual is intense! I could see a lot of heavily populated cities using a good abandoned bike purging. We all need the parking space!
From The Atlantic Cities:
Bicycling is such an integral part of life in the Netherlands, you might think that Dutch people are born knowing how to cycle.
They aren’t, of course. What’s kind of wonderful is the way that they learn.
Antonio Bigarini shot the cover and L’Eroica feature story in Urban Velo #29, and recently sent me a link to his photo gallery site. He has a large gallery of images L’Eroica, black and white work from Rio, the 2012 Paris-Roubaix and more. Great stuff, I love Antonio’s style.
Happy Bike To Work Day. Let’s celebrate with some good news….about cars.
It’s incredibly disconcerting when a loud car comes barreling up from behind and grazes you. This we can all agree on. But there is something worse. Have you ever been riding along in commuting bliss when the same things happens, but COMPLETELY SILENTLY? That scares the CRAP out of me. The silence of a hybrid doesn’t even give me a chance to brace myself as I hear it’s approaching engine roar….it’s just THERE. That. Sucks. And the first time it happened to me I thought about all the potential cyclist and pedestrian deaths that would come from well-meaning hybrid drivers.
So, I was stoked to read that the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration is requiring car manufacturers to institute a minimal level of noise to be emitted from any vehicle – hybrid, electric, etc. This is in part due to the findings of a couple studies showing that the cars are TOO quiet for the blind to hear first and foremost, but even for the sighted as well. Don’t believe me? Watch this video for the proof.
Cars that emit SOME noise are undoubtedly a welcome development for cyclists and pedestrians, but I’ll admit that I can rant against super loud vehicles all the same. It’s too bad we can’t establish some sort of vehicular sound police to control both ends of the spectrum. Regardless, drivers won’t be able to silence the noise emitting modifications that are to come and this is good news for cyclists, period.
Ok, that title is, admittedly, a little Americanized. Still, I remember my experience with training wheels as if it was yesterday, probably because I’m so emotionally scarred from the experience. Thanks a lot Dad! I remember impatiently waiting for my dad to install the trainers so I could jump on my bike and speed towards freedom, so when he gave me the all clear I did just that, but instead of riding off into the sunset of maturity and self-reliance, I made it about 4 feet and instantly fell over sideways. After getting over my shock and dissapointment of the training wheel safety net that was SUPPOSED to prevent something like that happening, I ran to my mom screaming and crying and basically hating my dad for tricking me. Turns out, the training wheels weren’t the right size and so my comfort with trying to balance on my over-sized bike was delayed for months until I was ready to try again. Not a good start to bike riding.
Then somewhere along the trajectory of human evolution we did something akin to discovering fire. We abandoned the training wheels…and the pedals…and started relying on kick bikes to get comfortable with the precariousness of balancing on a couple inches of rubber. And it worked! I came across this article on Slate.com, which details the science and skill of bike balance and does an equally fine job of explaining why balance bikes are infinitely better than training wheels.
Oddly enough, it seems we’ve had to regress to the VERY FIRST BIKE design in order to learn to ride again, once again proving that the bike was pretty much perfect from the get-go.
Do your kids a favor. Spare them the lifelong therapy sessions and leave the training wheels on the shelf. Their self-esteem will thank you endlessly. Happy Bike Month!
Super7.com is celebrating National Bike Month by offering a 25% discount to OMG Posters readers (or anyone who uses the “OMG” promo code – that’s you!) for the entire month of May. Super7 is a clearinghouse of “Toys, Art, Design & Culture” and they have a number of awesome bike-themed designs. The posters usually run $40.00, so take advantage of this deal while it lasts.
Running on a treadmill at the Y last week, while watching others spinning like mad on the stationary bikes, I couldn’t help but wonder why they haven’t hooked these machines up to generators and started recycling the energy. It seems like a no-brainer to me. So, imagine my surprise when I found this article the very same day.
An eco-friendly bed and breakfast in the UK has hooked up a stationary bike in one of their rooms to the television, so if you want to watch your favorite shows (let’s assume it’s just raining outside) you have to start pedaling. This may be a sort of novelty experience for the visitor who wants to have as eco-friendly an experience as possible while traveling, but I don’t see why hotels and other such institutions can’t harness this power on a larger basis. Feel free to add comments on places you know that have done just that.
Let’s kick off the week of Bike To Work Day with this simply awesome video that is what the title says, “How a Bicycle is Made”.
Part of me thinks I’m about to watch a Tom & Jerry cartoon and another part is waiting for the MST3K silhouettes to pop up and start delivering witty snark. But really, it’s just an incredibly fascinating and detailed video from 1945 that shows questionably young workers putting bikes together with “bracket pieces” and makes me wish for ye days of olde when the bike industry necessitated seemingly endless rows of warehouses to keep up with the demand.
Do you think this is how they do it in Taiwan today?
Videos about fixed gear bikes are a dime a dozen, so it takes something a little extra to make yours stand out. The folks in Bristol did just that when they put together this beautiful piece of work for a 30 minute documentary about fixed gear riding in the Bristol area called Boikzmoind. Instead of just releasing the video they also crafted a 95 page book to complement it, using screenprint and digital printing processes to bring it all together. The video looks to be shot with equal attention to detail, mixing standard philosophical waxings with a good dose of humor (what’s up with that bunny?!).
The package will run you $47 and you can purchase it here.
More shots of the book are here.
New York released the look of their much anticipated Citibike bike share program on Monday. Sponsored by Citibank, the rides look like rolling advertisements, because they basically are. Citibank fronted a significant amount of money for the program and this is their return. The program details haven’t been devoid of criticism, but that hasn’t been directed toward the aesthetics as much as it has the price of renting the bikes. This, I discovered, is due to a lack of understanding as to how the program works.
The bikes can be rented through a $95 yearly membership, $25 for a week, and $9.95 for a day. These membership prices don’t get you a bike for an entire day though, only 30 minutes (45 if you’re a yearly membership card holder). Extra time usage for the bike skyrockets after that, adding up to $13 for another hour, $25 for an hour and a half and upwards. It sounds laughably expensive, but the comments from this post explain the system further.
These bikes are meant to be rented for very short periods of time and to get you from point A (the rental station near your house) to point B (grocery store, library, etc.). You pay nothing beyond the membership for that short ride. You then lock the bike up and when you need another one to get back to your original destination (or somewhere else), you check out another bike. The point is to keep these bikes in constant circulation and refrain from having a bike checked out in the morning and put out of commission with one rider all day, in case they planned on taking it somewhere and locking it up all day before riding it back to the rental station once they are through with it. High prices are a huge part of the incentive to use the bikes on a short trip basis only. I must say, I agree with this approach.
Hopefully an educational component will help people understand the seemingly high fees and get them over the fear of using this rental program.
More about the program here.
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