Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycle, bicycle parking, bicycling, bike parking, bike racks, bike theft, cycling, denver, Downtown Denver Partnership, dumb racks, pedalcycle, urban cycling
The Downtown Denver Partnership advises cyclists to lock bikes to bike racks rather than trees, street lights or other sidewalks furnishings. There are 600 racks scattered throughout downtown Denver.
via More cyclists in Denver — and record numbers of bicycle thefts – Denver News – The Latest Word.
You mean one of these racks….
HURST CAN COMPLAIN ABOUT ANYTHING. In other downtown abominations, check out these new racks, which have plates welded where one would most like … to stick … one’s … lock. I should be happy you say, grateful that these things are being installed — racks is racks right? I mean, they are still useable. Unfortunately I can’t get past the sheer stupidity represented in these curious artifacts. Every time I am compelled to use one I find myself grumbling, so I avoid contact.
As the sticker there proudly proclaims, they are brought to you by the Downtown Denver Business Improvement District, an organization which until now has seemed to view bicycling as a hindrance to business, something to be stamped out rather than facilitated. These pants-suited business boosters never exhibited any appreciation for potential customers on bikes, or the workers downtown, from lawyers to dishwashers, who use bikes to get to their jobs. They certainly had little appreciation for the messengers who served their tenants, I mean overlords. Then the cycling renaissance of the ’00s took the BID by surprise. What are all these people doing riding bikes around down here? Now they present these awkward racks to their friends the cyclists with the prime rack area welded shut to create a place to put their sticker or some other form of advertisement. Am I on hidden camera here? This is a bit like getting a delicious sandwich with a huge bite taken out, and a sticky note there with ‘Brought to You by Mo’s Deli’ written on it. And of course the racks are popping up everywhere — except where they would be most useful. That’s about a D+ for execution, BID.
from http://www.industrializedcyclist.com/92809_Hope_You_Had_a_Nice.html
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycling, bike racing, biking, cycling, dopers, EPO, Fabian Cancellara, PEDs, prologue time trial, stage racing, TDF, Tour de France, TT
…TDF IS ON… somewhere …
There were murmurs that Cancellara was no longer the powerhouse he used to be, his legs slowing as younger riders developed, and despite uncertainty within his team surrounding missed wages and in-fighting, the experience and most importantly the power were there for all to see in Liège.
via Tour De France 2012: Prologue Results | Cyclingnews.com.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycle safety, bicycling, bike, Bike accidents, bike commuting, Bike to Work Day, car versus bike, car-bike collisions, common sense, cycling, denver, energy, Linkhart, looked-but-failed-to-see errors, Mayor Hancock, transportation, urban cycling
He was my favorite mayoral candidate. He has almost no TV charisma, which is a major plus for a public official. He would have made a fine mayor. He liked libraries.
Fortunately, he’s fine, but the incident did prompt a conversation between council members and the mayor about road safety regulations and the interactions between cyclists and vehicles.
…During which, of course, scofflaw bicyclists somehow came out the villains, and education and/or reprogramming of scofflaw bicyclists was re-hurled to the tippy top of the bike safety priority list. This even though Linkhart’s crash (1) did not involve a scofflaw bicyclist and (2) car-bike crashes involving adult bicyclists typically do not. The most likely scenario for an adult bicyclist is to be caught out by another road user’s looked-but-failed-to-see error while riding lawfully. But hey, we’ve all seen bicyclists run lights right? People like Mayor Hancock make no attempt to understand the truth about urban cycling safety. Why bother — everyone knows it’s “common sense.” Common sense is good politics. Let’s not let any facts get in the way of our “common sense” about bicycle safety.
According to Linkhart, he was heading west on 23rd Avenue — on a bike route — approaching Downing Street when a pickup truck went to make a left turn and collided with him.
“I was going straight. He turned left in front of me, and…hit me across the side, and I fell down,” Linkhart recalls.
… Linkhart was scraped up badly, his bike got a bit bent and he had to get several stitches in his leg.
“I kinda went flying,” he said. “I kind of plowed into the sidewalk. I had a helmet, which didn’t help.”
Linkhart, going straight, had the right of way over the pickup truck, which was turning left.
23rd and Downing is classic left cross territory. I’ve been through that intersection a hundred times. Got to ‘keep your head on a swivel’ so to speak.
via Westword Doug Linkhart, ex-councilman, hit while cycling to Bike To Work Day event – Denver News – The Latest Word.
Filed under: Bike of the Day | Tags: 29-inch wheels, 29er, 700c, all terrain bike, bicycle, bicycling, bike, bike of the day, cycling, Flite, Flite saddle, Mike, mountain bike, mountain biking, MTB, off-road bike, pedalcycle, WaltWorks
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bici, bicycling, Bike sharing, bikeshare, biking, cycling, green transportation, transportation, urban cycling
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/may/29/hurt-capital-bikeshare-is-making-biking-ugly-smugl/
Unlike Sarah Palin or Tina Fey, or whoever it was, I really can see Russia from my front porch. Or, at least, I can see broken-down socialism.
That is because across the street from my house on Capitol Hill is a loud, clanging “Capital Bikeshare” docking station. It is one of the locking ports for those fat, red communal bicycles you see peddled all over town by commune enthusiasts. (Say that fast, and it sounds like you are saying “commun-ists.”)
For a small membership fee, users can pick up a bike at any of 165 such docking stations and proudly pedal themselves to work, school or to pick up Chinese food.
Filed under: Bike of the Day, Uncategorized | Tags: aerodynamics, bicycle, bicycling, Cervelo, Cervelo P5, competitor, cycle sport, cycling, Giro d'Italia, milan, p5, pro bike, Ryder Hesjedal, time trial
An attack on the air.
via http://velonews.competitor.com/2012/05/video/pro-bike-video-hesjedals-cervelo-p5-in-milan_221888
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycle racing, bike racing, Canada, chipotle, cycling, former mountain biker, Garmin-Cervelo, Giro d'Italia, mountain bike, mountain biking, MTB, Ryder Hesjedal, Tour of Italy, Vaughters, xc world champ
Vaughters said:
“His biggest strength is his ability to do a gut check and dig deep when there’s no hope,” Vaughters said. “He’s also a little bit stubborn, which can be frustrating at times.”
No hope, he says, after the guy wins the Giro. I hope Hesjedal steps up his frustration of Vaughters.
via Former Mountain Biker From Canada Wins Giro – NYTimes.com.
The sports guys are impressed that a “former mountain biker” won the Giro. Seem to have momentarily forgotten about Cadel Evans, also an xc world champ. The novelty of mountain bikers winning major road races wore off long ago among those involved in the actual races.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: active commuting, biblioteca, bicycle, bicycling, bike, biking, ciclista, ciclistas urbanos, cycling, gob mx, green transportation, Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico City bicycling manual, Mexico D.F., transportation, urban biking, urban cycling
(En Espanol)
http://www.sma.df.gob.mx/sma/links/download/biblioteca/flippingbooks/manual_ciclista_urbano/
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: active commuting, active transportation, bicycle, bicycle commuting, bicycling, bike, bike commuting, biking, cycling, gas taxes, transportation
And, it kills your back and hips. Which causes more stress.
The bit below about American cities not being built for active commuters. Not exactly true. Somewhat true. A lot of American cities are currently set up quite nicely to accept vast numbers of additional bike commuters should these autonomous individuals choose to take that step.
A 2011 study of 21,000 Swedish workers found those who commuted by car or public transit reported more stress, exhaustion and missed work days than those who walked or bicycled to work. But few American cities are built for active commuters.
“We’ve engineered physical activity out of our lives,” said Hoehner. “We need to change our communities and make improvements to the infrastructure to make the healthy choice the easy choice.”
via Commuting Drives Up Weight, Blood Pressure – ABC News.
There is a lot more to making a bike-friendly environment than “engineering” the built environment. Like what:
–The cost of driving in Europe is much higher than it is in the US, due to famously high fuel taxes and fees. We complain about 4$ gas. No Euro country has gas anywhere near that cheap, due to govt. fuel taxes.
–Laws and court proceedings in bike-friendly countries favor bicyclists and pedestrians.
–Culture is overall more bike-friendly.
It’s already an easy choice for many in the US. Let’s stop making excuses. There will always be room for improvement. The built environment will never be perfect here, and it isn’t in Europe.
I guess what I’m saying is this. We all wish for improvements in the cycling environment. If you complain about and push for better bike infrastructure, great! That helps. But I sure hope you’re doing it as a bike commuter, not as an excuse-making car commuter.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycle, bicycles, cycling, faired bikes, fast bikes, Graeme Obree, speed record, Whittingham
Flying Scotsman thinks he may have figured a few things out about building a world-record recumbent. Seriously looks like he may be on to something, again! This looks like the position he always wanted — not Superman but Human Missile.
“You just roll it and go up through the gears. If you get into the top gear you are already doing 80mph,” he said.
The wheels are home-made but are the same size as those used on BMX bicycles, and the gears are from a conventional bike.
While he is confident that “the engine remains in decent nick”, the bid will be as much a test of engineering as physical strength.
His riding position, which will have him lying horizontally on his front, pedalling head first just a few inches from the road, is completely unlike the design used by Whittingham to set the existing record. The Canadian, like other speed cyclists, rides in a reclining position, with his head at the back of the bike, and his legs turning pedals at the front.
To maximise aerodynamics, Obree will also be surrounded by what he calls “the skin”, a carbon shell that is reinforced with bullet-proof Kevlar so that it does not disintegrate if he crashes. “It’s basically a torpedo – a land based missile,” he said.
via The 100mph bike – designed in the bath and made from an old saucepan – Telegraph.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycle, bicycling, bike helmets, bike safety, cycling, deceleration, g-forces, Hovding, invisible bike helmet, invisible helmet, safe cycling
… Designed to inflate like an airbag in the event of a collision.
By Hovding.
Here’s how it works: Sensors in the collar detect unusual movements by the wearer. Upon impact, the sensors trigger a gas inflator that pumps air into an airbag that’s folded into the collar, which fully inflates around the head it in 0.1 seconds. Hövding, which is available in Europe for SEK3,998 (about $595), weighs about 1 1/2 lbs. and uses a rechargeable battery. It must be turned on. About one hour before the battery runs out, it makes a “battery low” sound.
Via http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-04-26/an-invisible-bike-helmet-from-sweden
I see a little problem with this. “Unusual head movements…” There is a fair bit of head movement in normal non-crashy cycling, so the Device would have to be calibrated to ignore all that. In the event of a solo wreck during which the front wheel is suddenly removed from beneath the rider (a relatively common path to head injury for bicyclists), for example, when a rider totally wipes out on black ice or a wet streetcar rail, the first sign of “unusual head movement” that would be detected by the Device could very well be that of the head impacting the pavement structure. In other words, too late. And so the rider is injured twice, first by slapping the skull onto the pavement structure, and second by paying six-hundred bucks for an invisible helmet that inflates only after the collision has occurred, thus launching the injured rider’s head off the ground rudely with further negative consequences to his or her neck and overall temperment. However, it may do quite well at detecting sudden accelerations involved with collision with a motor vehicle or fixed object.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Africa, America, bicycle portraits, bicycles, bicyclists, bikes, cycling, people, South Africa
Okay.
http://www.dayonepublications.com/Bicycle_Portraits/Index.html
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycle commuting, bicycle mode share, bicycle ridership, bicycling, bike commuting, cycling, Oregon, patterns of use, Portland, urban cycling
A measure of commuter cycling, from the new City of Portland bike count report:
click to enlarge
See The Industrialized Cyclist Bicycling Research Page to download the report, and just about any other report you may want.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycle, bicycling, bikes and red lights, cycling, France, Idaho stop, red lights, traffic law, transportation, urban cycling
France gets all reasonable about bicycles and red lights.
The newly relaxed rules of the road for cyclists is now being tested across 15 intersections in Paris, though with it bike-commuters aren’t given full liberty to blow through crossing points unreasonably. Law will continue to require that cyclists yield to pedestrians and opposing traffic, though that’s quite likely consistant with the standards of etiquette and personal safety most cyclists abide to anyways.
via France Grants Cyclists the Right to Run Red Lights : TreeHugger.
Maybe now American advocacy groups will get behind the idea. They haven’t in the past. But they seem to love anything remotely Euro-flavored, so it wouldn’t surprise me if this caused a noticeable uptick in Idaho Stop-related chatter around here.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycling, bike, cycling, exercise, Parkinson's Disease
Bicycling is really good for you.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: accident, bicycle, bicycling, bike, collision, cycling, traffic, traffic safety, Washington, Wessels
Also from the Wessels pdf…
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bicycling, cycling, efficiency, energy, kilocalories, mpg, transportation
Murphy gives about the same figures I came up with for Cyclist’s Manifesto. —-> 1000 mpg for cycling.
Industrialized Cyclist Notepad 