Right on, ride on

Ceci n'est pas une vélo

One Parking Space = ? Folding Bikes

Posted by @teeheehee on August 27th, 2009

Earlier this week I saw this on Gizmodo, and today again on Treehugger. One parking space, if filled with folding bikes in their folded postion, can be packed to the count of one Douglas Adams answer: 42 bikes.

Lookie here:


42 folded bikes in one parking space

42 folded bikes in one parking space


Posted in bike friendly | Comments Off on One Parking Space = ? Folding Bikes

Recently Fallen: Two Area Cyclists Struck Yesterday; Hit and Run Suspect Attempts Cash for Clunkers Trade-In

Posted by @teeheehee on August 20th, 2009

I have some sad stories to share, but I think they are relevant with the current bike-car-pedestrian unfriendliness currently abuzz in the Boston area.

The first is a TreeHugger article which spreads the story of an alleged hit-and-run driver who killed a cyclist, then tried to trade his car in as part of the Cash for Clunkers program as an attempt to get rid of the evidence. An astute dealer didn’t buy Timothy Kissida’s tale that he had hit a javalina (a medium sized, pig-looking animal) and decided to follow up with a call to the police. The make, model, color, and area of damage to the car was all consistent with the hit-and-run the night before.

Next are a few articles about a Marshfield man who was struck and killed yesterday. Another boston.com article also mentions a cyclist hit in Lowell. I have not been able to find any information on the current state of the Lowell-area, I hope he does not succumb and he makes a complete recovery.

My condolences to the families of 52-year-old Charles Waldrop and 69-year-old Charles L. Campbell; my thoughts go out to the 41-year-old man struck in Lowell.

Update, August 21st:
More sad news folks, the cyclist from Lowell succumbed to his injuries. More info here.

Posted in news media, sad, wtf | 2 Comments »

Road Design: Boston.com op-ed, MassBike response

Posted by @teeheehee on August 19th, 2009

You, my few readers, may recall the recent Boston.com article on Boston’s unruly riders, or the op-ed that left a particular vomit-taste in any cyclist’s mouth. Finally we may have something sane to consider and discuss: roads are designed to kill (which is another op-ed.) Excerpt:

I took a photograph of the scene where I had found the runner. When I showed this picture to friends from Sweden they asked, “This is where you live? This is your neighborhood? Your streets are designed to kill people.’’ They said that the thin painted white lines at the intersection could not be seen at dawn, nor was there a raised bump to or a narrowing of the road to demarcate the intersection and slow down traffic. They said the speed limit should be 30 kilometers per hour (about 18.6 miles per hour) or less if we wanted pedestrians to have much of a chance of surviving. They also said traffic lights increased the number of deaths because people often speed up when the light turns yellow.

 

When Sweden removed red lights from intersections and replaced them with traffic circles or rotaries, death rates at these intersections fell by 80 to 90 percent.

This is the closest article I’ve yet seen that seems in line with Liveable Streets: the engineering is directly related to the use of the system. The usual discussion page is also available.

In addition to this op-ed there is a letter in response to the Unruly riders article as written by MassBike. (Here is the discussion page.) Concluding excerpt:

By all means, let us build better roads, which lead people into safer behavior by design. But each of us can help make everyone safer now, today, by more often following the rules of the road whether driving, bicycling, or walking.

We need more of this!

Posted in news media, traffic | Comments Off on Road Design: Boston.com op-ed, MassBike response

It’s All About Performance

Posted by @teeheehee on August 13th, 2009

I got a good chuckle from this music video, it’s not the catchiest tune but it’s all in good humor:

Posted in bike friendly, film, wtf | Comments Off on It’s All About Performance

Boston Bike Sharing Vendor Selected

Posted by @teeheehee on August 12th, 2009

Just got this link from a coworker: Vendor selected for Boston area bike-sharing program. For a peek at what we might expect, check out their website for the Montreal program.

With a vendor selected I wonder how long it will be before we start to see some bikes on the streets.

Posted in bike friendly, news media | Comments Off on Boston Bike Sharing Vendor Selected

Ask Not What Boston Can Do For You

Posted by @teeheehee on August 7th, 2009

An article today on Boston.com, Boston’s unruly riders, challenges red light runners, sidewalk riders, and wrong-way infringers. Here’s the summary:

Boston has launched a high-profile campaign to become a friendlier city for cyclists. Now the question is whether bicyclists will become friendlier to Boston.

There is the usual “discussion” page which seems surprisingly tame in the initial posts (I’m only up to page 2.) Anyone recognize themself in the video? Also, I had thought Nicole made it well known she didn’t like being called a ‘czar’. Why does everyone still call her that, then?

Posted in bike friendly, news media, safety, wrong | 2 Comments »

Boston Bike Sharing

Posted by @teeheehee on July 29th, 2009

There’s an article today on Boston.com introducing a bike sharing proposal. (There’s also a sweet video with Nicole Freedman performing a small track stand in rainy conditions while waiting in traffic.)

From the article:

Over the next few weeks, officials expect to name the company with which they would negotiate a contract on how to run the system. They hope the program will lead to tens of thousands of people saddling up in Boston daily.

Bike sharing is the next step. The city envisions making available between 1,000 and 3,000 bikes at stations 300 or 400 yards apart, located at subway and bus stops, main squares, tourist sites, and across city neighborhoods.

This makes me wonder, would I ride my bike around as much if there were publicly accessible ones available? I guess we’ll have to wait and see, either way I’ll be very happy that a program like this will be made available.

Posted in bike friendly, news media, personal view, traffic | Comments Off on Boston Bike Sharing

Boston Stolen Bike Report Service, Tied To Boston Police and Others

Posted by @teeheehee on July 15th, 2009

Just wanted to spread the word about something I just saw on the Boston PD twitter page.

Stolen Bikes Boston is a City of Boston service for registering your bike with the city and reporting if your bike has been stolen. These reports get sent to the Boston Police, local bike shops, hospital and school security, and anyone generally following the new Twitter account or Facebook account. There is also a way to report if you have seen a bike that has been stolen to help it get back to its rightful owner.


And remember, it’s important to lock your bike up sanely to deter theft. Here are some examples of how not to lock your bike up:
Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in bike friendly, safety | Comments Off on Boston Stolen Bike Report Service, Tied To Boston Police and Others

Bulgarians Don’t Like Peanut-butter

Posted by @teeheehee on July 12th, 2009

Happy (belated) Birthday, America!

Last year I hiked some of the Presidential Mountains in New Hampshire in recognition of our Declaration of Independence . This year I joined a group for camping and hiking in the Adirondacks, and later visited my parents for a couple of days to catch the fireworks at Boldt Castle in the 1000 Islands.

When I first heard of the plans for the camping trip began I was overjoyed. I grew up in the northern foothills of the Adirondack mountains in upstate New York. This is a familiar area to me and one that I missed many opportunities while growing up and living around.

It is impossible to grow up where I did without some degree of camping; however, my family tended to stop outdoor activities there and not participate in many of the other mountain-based experiences: hiking, rafting, skiing/snowboarding, snowmobiling, hunting, or cycling.

My experiences growing up with biking there ended when I was able to start driving a car. The nearest real grocery store was 10+ miles away, as was the nearest movie theater and bowling alley. The farthest I rode a bike back then was less than 10 miles in a single trip, and it might have been to get to the baseball field for practice during those questing couple of years where I tried every sport my school had to offer. (I stuck with soccer throughout high school, but even so I have never really been much into sports.) I only biked around town – in hindsight I see that I missed an opportunity to get ridiculously strong at hill climbing.
Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in bike friendly, rant, ride | Comments Off on Bulgarians Don’t Like Peanut-butter

Countdown to 30: Century: Monument St and Dover/Sherborn Loops

Posted by @teeheehee on May 25th, 2009

At last. At long last. The training, the preparation, the nervous anticipation; it was all for something.

On May 16th I set out at 9:30AM to ride 100 miles. Six weeks prior to that day I began my training in earnest, building on a physical foundation that the last two+ years of riding my bike around Boston had sculpted.

I followed a plan I found which recommended performing long rides on weekends, increasing the distance each week until two weeks out. Since I did plenty of riding around during the mild winter we had this year I was able to start part of the way into the program.

First was a (roughly) 30-miler. The following weekend I went on a ride of opportunity: in the middle of the night I did a modified 50-mile route the Marathon was set to take several hours later. The next weekend I punched in 57 miles going around the Nagog Pond in Acton. Next up was a Metric Century achieving 68 mile ride that I stitched together from two smaller routes. Having done more than 65% of the total distance I planned the next ride to be a shorter 50 miles to Walden Pond and the DeCordova Sculpture Park, which is a much recommended way to ready oneself for…

a Century Ride:
Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in ride | 7 Comments »