Thursday Thoughts ~ Balance

Picture this…

There’s this juggler.  He’s up there doing his best trick, juggling chainsaws, swords, and live rattlesnakes, while riding a unicycle, on a tightrope, with the rope on fire, in a high wind, and dodging thrown rocks and bottles.  No net.  No safety harness.

Does anyone else get the feeling, that this could be a fair simile for life in the 21^st century?

We who ride bicycles a lot, are all proud of our balance.  But let’s be honest.  The bike does most of the work of keeping us upright.  As long as we keep it going it keeps us up.  Cars are inherently stable.  One has to work, do something violent and drastic to get them to fall over.  Our bikes are dynamically stable.  They have to be moving to self-stabalize.  If they stand still, they tip.

That’s not a bad metaphor for life.  We keep moving, with purpose, or we fall.

Thursday Thoughts: A Fantasy

A couple of days ago there was a huge incident on I-75.  It blocked traffic in both directions, and fouled things up for hours.  I wasn’t traveling on the highway that day, but it reminded me of another time.

I was returning from a long driving trip.  I was coming into Atlanta from the north east, moving briskly along on I-85.  Traffic had been light down from the Carolinas, but it was picking up as I neared the outskirts of the metro area.  I was looking forward to getting home and getting out of the truck.  I had the thought,  “It’s Sunday afternoon.  Traffic shouldn’t be too bad.  Home soon.”

I passed the perimeter junction.  Traffic was, by then heavy, but moving.  Then I got to the merge for the connector.  Brake lights!  Full stop.  Five minutes later I heard the traffic report.  “Big jam downtown, take alternates.”  Now that was helpful.  Nothing around me was moving, and I could not get to an exit.  It took me three hours to cover the next 30 miles.  Two and a half hours of that were spent just getting below the “split.”

It occurred to me that I was moving at a much lower speed than casual cycling.  I had the thought (and not for the first time) that these interstates would be so much more fun and so much faster on a bike.  If only there were no cars here.

I started to imagine that, and suddenly saw a vision.  Imagine if there was one, just one lane of the urban interstate system that was dedicated to cyclists.  It would have to be barrier-protected, but what if?

What if I had a dedicated lane?  What if, I was in dense cycle traffic, in a lane dedicated to cycling.  That would allow about eight bikes to ride abreast.  On such a lane, it would be so easy to cruise along at 15 to 20 mph.  And what if the “Bikintersate” became crowded?  Wouldn’t that imply a lot less traffic on the motor lanes?  Certainly it would be more interesting.  The cyclists could actually talk to each other.

Wouldn’t this make so much more sense than constructing a “Lexus Lane”?

Your thoughts, please.

Thursday Thoughts: Seasonal Rites

Some cyclists really enjoy warm, even hot weather.  (I’m one of them!)  Others relish (or say they do) the cooler seasons of the year.  I’ve noted that often the Heat-seekers find that “it’s too hot to ride.”  The converse is just as true for the Heat-Avoiders.  They too seem to disappear when the temp drops down into the low 40s.

It is a fact, we all have some range in which we are comfortable.  This range can be extended with technical support, but for each and every one of us, there is a set of conditions that are unacceptable.

If there is one article of clothing that truly marks a cyclist as dedicated it would be a pair of tights.  The purchase of a pair of tights is a commitment.  The “inexpensive” ones are not cheap.  The good ones are expensive.  The types that are made for extreme conditions are insanely expensive.  (Note:  In this context “extreme” means  temps below 20 degrees F, with gusting wind, and usually some amount of precipitation.)  The expenditure necessary to acquire tights just about forces the buyer to use them.  Buying a pair of tights is committing to riding in suboptimal conditions.

Arm warmers don’t do this.  Wind vests and jackets don’t do it.  There are lots of riders out there who extend the year with these lighter garments, but most of them seem to disappear before Thanksgiving, migrating to wherever it is that Summer Cyclists go for the Winter.  Tights, on the other hand, seem to really mean something.

Tights tend to define things.  Only the more dedicated riders own and wear them.  They mark two seasonal shifts.  In the Spring there is the First Ride Without Tights.  In the Autumn there is the First Ride In Tights.  Some folks always rush the season, at both ends.  One sees riders out in tights in the earl Fall, on sunny days with temps in the low 70s.  In the early Spring there are always those who decide to go bare-legged on cloudy days just above 40 degrees.

In both cases, the decision to use, or abandon tights is a commitment.  It says,  “I am here.  I am riding.  I will not be stopped.”  For some it’s an emotional decision.  Others operate on cold rational calculus.  But either way, once tights are donned, or abandoned, a choice is made, and a course is set.

It is now November.  Our climate is doing just exactly what it should be doing.  The first cold snaps are arriving.  Its time to put on the tights.

Thursday Thoughts: You are Very Special

Let’s look at some numbers.

Population of Earth = 7,100,000,000

Population Of the USA  = 314,685,167

So just by virtue of being an American, you are in a select group of 4.4% of the world population.

Over half of all Americans are obese to morbidly obese.

Most of you aren’t.  Congratulations!

There are about 2,500,000 cyclists in the USA.

If you are one of them, you are among 0.796% of the US population.

Athletic Cyclists (those who participate in some form of racing, tri-athletics, cyclocross, Velo, mountain biking, organized centuries, randonneuring, touring, etc.) account for about 15% of all cyclists.

If you are in that crowd,  you are in the top 0.12% of the US population.

That’s true even if you are always dead last in your event.

Baseball fans watch baseball.  Football fans watch football.  We have lots of sports fans in this country, but most of them are fans of spectator sports.  That is to say that they do not participate in the sport.  Sure there are exceptions, but on a population basis the rule is fans watch, and players do!

We who are fans of cycling are also, almost always participants in the sport.  We may not compete, but we do ride.

Thursday Thoughts: The Second Stage

On this blog, we devote a lot of attention and time to Utility Cycling.  Here’s another aspect, and one I don’t see often discussed.

Most of the time when I am driving, I have a bicycle (or two) loaded up in the back of the truck.  I also almost always have a helmet and a pair of shoes aboard with me.  I prefer to ride to group rides and events.  It’s not always possible.  Sometimes, in order to have the correct machine at the appropriate place, I have to shuttle bikes around.  Sometimes, I’m transporting a bike to or from maintenance sites.

But there is often a more hidden and subtle reason for that bike in the bed of the truck.  It’s part of a multi-stage vehicle.

I’ve used it in just that fashion.  The bike can be launched at any time that the truck becomes impractical, or disabled.  Increased reliability and versatility.  Pretty cool.

Thursday Thoughts: Long Live Long Rides!

Just what constitutes a long ride?  Time perception is flexible.  Distances can be deceptive too.  It’s sort of like the old conundrum about the length of the coast of England.

How long is the coast of England?  Or put another way, If one were to measure the distance all the way ‘round England, how far would that be?  Well, it depends on how fine the measurement is.  Ignore the effect of tides for this, and imagine a surveying crew moving around the island at the high tide line.  If the surveyors took their measurements at quarter mile increments, they would derive a number, but wouldn’t the coast have some variation between those measurement points?  Certainly there would not be many places where the coast was exactly straight for a quarter of a mile. 

What if the measure was a standard surveyor’s chain of 66 feet?  If this finer scale were used, more of the irregularities of the coast would be mapped, and the distance would be longer.  But wouldn’t there still be irregularities inside each 66 foot length?  (And wouldn’t it take longer to do that many more measurements?)

Suppose the measurements were taken with a yardstick?  A one-foot ruler?  A one-inch caliper?  You see it, don’t you?  The finer the scale, the more “stops” made, the more detail emerges, and the more time is required.

Trips by bicycle can be a lot like that.  I’ve ridden centuries that took only a bit more than four hours.  I didn’t see a lot of countryside while doing that.  Don’t get me wrong, those were pleasurable rides, but casual they were not.  On the other hand, I’ve had times when I spent a day riding about on the bike, going here and there, for more than eight hours.  At the end of the day, I’d had a great time, and experienced much, but actually traveled a bit less than 50 miles.

Oddly, the 4+ hour long centuries seem to have been shorter than the 50- mile “wander days.”  There’s a lot more experience packed into the “walkabout” style ride.

I’ve had incredibly pleasant four and five hour morning rides, spent in good company.  Conversations rambled on, and covered huge topical ranges.  Laughs abounded.  At the end, the experience seemed to have taken only a very short time, and the computer reported a distance of close to 70 miles.

I’ve had times when a mere ten mile ride was an accomplishment and a serious challenge.  When each crank-stroke took an effort of will.  At the end, the satisfaction came from simply having persisted.

What is a long ride?  How do you measure it?

Thursday Thoughts: Dreaming

What would a cyclist’s ideal world look like?

Imagine big, open, well paved limited access highways.  You know the type, like the Interstate Highways.  But in this case, imagine that these highways were restricted to the exclusive use of cyclists and pedestrians.  No cars allowed.  Picture the “down-town connector” here in Atlanta, with no cars on it.  Picture it.  It’s 7:30 A.M.  You are looking at the infamous “Grady Curve.”  Instead of cars, imagine you are seeing a volume of 1,000 bicycles per hour here.  The road looks oddly empty, and it’s a lot quieter!

How about a world where motorists actually paid attention to their task?  Wouldn’t it be nice if they weren’t yapping on their phones, or texting, or reading the paper, but rather were actually looking where they were going?

While we’re talking about motorists, imagine a world where vehicle operators (both cycling and motoring) actually understood and followed the laws.  I, for one, would truly enjoy it, if I could approach a four way stop knowing that the other folks there would actually get it done, in accordance with the simple rules governing such an intersection.

Imagine a world where all the operators on the road simply granted each other courtesy and respect.

Imagine a place where the following could happen:

The errand:  You are at home, attending to your day, when you realize that you simply must go to store for some small necessary item.  No problem.  You walk out the door and hop on your bicycle.  The store is only two miles away.  You ride through your neighborhood, waving and calling greetings to your neighbors, who are out working on their gardens or walking about.  After a leisurely ten-minute ride, you arrive at the store.  On the way you have been calm and happy.  No one has assaulted you with a three ton SUV.  You have not been “buzzed,” or screamed at, or honked at.  Instead you had a peaceful, trouble-free ride, looking at the sights and enjoying the day.  There is no trouble parking at the store, plenty of space in the nearly car-free lot, and lots of bike-racks to assist your temporary storage of your bike.  One half hour after leaving, you have returned, somewhat refreshed, mission accomplished.

The Family trip:

It’s a Saturday afternoon.  The family has been planning this one for most of the week.  The latest super-wonderful blockbuster, all-time smash movie is playing at the Cineplex.  It’s a trip of four miles to get there.  It’s time to go.  You and your partner have rounded up Junior and little Sis.  Everyone has their helmets, and their tires are all pumped up.  The group saddles up and begins.  After a pleasant half hour, the family arrives at the theater, parks and locks their bikes.  Of course Junior had to race ahead, but it’s not a problem, bike traffic is light today.  The lanes are not crowded, and there is plenty of room for the young rascal to burn off some excess energy.

The Big Race:

It’s an important day.  Little Sis is going to be representing!  She is one of the starters on the School Velo Team.  You and your partner have it all planned.  You’ll be there to support her.  You leave the office early, and ride to the station.  You lock your “city bike” at the station, take the early train south, and arrive at the local station in plenty of time.  There you unlock your trusty “do-everything-bike” and mount up.  You have plenty of time.  The school velodrome is only about five miles away.  It’s still over an hour until the meet begins.  You can even stop and get a sandwich along the way.

At the track you meet your partner.  The two of you lock your bikes and make your way into the bleachers to cheer Little Sis on to glory as she races against her school’s arch-rivals.

NOTE:  In the scenario above, you used two bikes.  You had to replace both bikes this year, the old ones being pretty well worn out.  Both bikes, together cost you a total of $900 dollars.  Maintenance on them amounts to about $200 a year.  Add in a year’s train fares, for another $600.  Your year’s work travel expenses amount to $1700.  Gosh!  You used to spend that much  on just three car payments!

Does this appeal to you?  What do we do to make something like this world happen?

Thursday Thoughts: Bootstrap Problem

P1:  “I’d like to ride my bike more, but there’s no place to ride around here.”

N1:  Sure there is!  It’s legal to ride on the road.

P1:  “But there are no shoulders here!  The roads are narrow.  The drivers are all really bad.  Have you heard about that thing..?  It’s called the Comet something?”

P2:  “I only do group rides.  It’s safer in groups.”

N2:  Large group rides tend to antagonize motorists.  Then the motorists tend to take it out on the next solo cyclist they see.

P2:  “Right.  That’s why I do group rides.  I don’t want to be alone around the cars.”

N3:  If we could get more riders out there, then we’d have less automotive congestion.  Bikes don’t take up as much room as cars.

P3:  “Yes you do!  You’re slow, in the way, and you run through stop signs as if they weren’t there!”

P4:  “I’d ride to the gym if I could, but there’s too much traffic.”

P5:  “I’m stoked!  A bunch of us are going to go over to the ride at (insert name of any town) and join their ride.”

N5:  Why not ride your bike locally?  The road connects to your driveway.

P5:  “But I don’t have any place to ride around here.”

 Seriously, folks, what do we do about this?  How do we break out of the cycle?

Thursday Thoughts: Waiting

So much of life is spent waiting for one thing or another.  Waiting for the light to change.  Waiting for a riding partner to show up.  Waiting to see if the weather will clear.  Waiting for that motorist (the one who just forced a pass around you!) to get out of the way!  Waiting for the money to accumulate so you can buy those new parts.  Waiting for those new parts to come in.  Waiting for the Big Ride.

Sometimes the waiting is active.  How many of us have spent time on the bike, pedaling under less than ideal conditions, just waiting for it to be over?  Waiting for the work day to end so the riding can begin.

Waiting for good news.  Waiting for bad news.  Waiting for the end of this long watch.  Waiting for the dawn.

I’ve experienced that last one.  Long rides through the night, sleep deprived, chilly, bone-weary, waiting for the first grey hint of dawn.  Hanging on and pressing the pedals robotically, knowing that, with the rising of the Sun, conditions would improve, the new day would bring better things.

Waiting for the new bike to arrive.  That’s a delicious kind of wait.  When you know that the thing is coming.  It’s that “night before Christmas” kind of feeling.

Standing with the bike, waiting for the ride to start.

What goes through your mind when you are waiting?  What do you wait for?

Thursday Thoughts: Scary

I’m seeing more and more of relatively new phenomena.  Allow me to describe the situation.

A cyclist (or a small group of them) is riding along any road in our state.  It is a typical Georgia secondary road.  That means it’s two lanes, none too wide, and has no improved shoulders.  The cyclist is operating in a predictable and legal fashion.  The road is carrying light to moderate traffic.  The road’s posted speed limit is 35 or 40 mph.  Usually there is a hill or curve in the situation.  There is a clearly marked double yellow line down the center of the road.  Got the picture?

Now something happens.  A car (or several are approaching the cyclist from the opposing direction.  At the same time, a car or truck is overtaking the cyclist from behind.  Now, without hesitation, the overtaking driver hits the gas, pulls over into the oncoming lane, and accelerates sharply.  The driver is now playing “chicken” with the oncoming cars, and with the cyclist.

The passing driver does not slow down.  Oncoming cars sound their horns and move to their right, but there is still no room.  Worse, they are not slowing down.  Eventually, the oncoming driver brakes sharply, possibly even running off of the road.  The overtaking driver speeds away.

Am I missing something?  Isn’t this highly illegal?  Isn’t it homicidally insane?  Oddly, I almost never saw this particular kind of psychotic behavior until about a year ago.  That’s right, the sudden rise of the “forced chicken pass” seems to have coincided with a public awareness of the “Three Foot Law.”  Perhaps that’s just a coincidence, and there is a simpler explanation.  I don’t get it.

The real wonder is that there isn’t more bloody carnage as a result of this hyper-aggressive behavior.  These folks seem perfectly willing to risk a head-on collision.  Good grief!

What am I missing here?

Thursday Thoughts: T-SPLOST? REALLY?

On this coming 31 July, Georgians will be asked to vote on a transportation funding bill.  That bill is the “T-SPLOST.”  That stands for Transportation-Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax. That July day is listed as a “General Primary/Non-Partisan/Special Election (to fill vacancies and propose questions)”  One of the “Questions” will be whether we will add a sales tax to fund a huge laundry list of “regional transportation projects.”

We, as cyclists and residents of the area should pay attention, and take some actions.

Possibly the first thing that should be done is to look at what this proposed SPLOST is to fund.  This LINK http://transformmetroatlanta.com/regional-projects/  will take you to an interactive map of all the projects that are to be funded by the Sales Tax.  I only count six project that are bicycle-pedestrian related.  On the other hand there are numerous roadway projects.  More, if one looks at the money proposed, a huge amount is going to heavy rail.

I’ll leave the analysis and debate of the merits of each of these to others.  I should like rather to address some principles.

The “Build Your Way Out of It” model:

This one seems, intuitively to make some sense.  The problem is, it doesn’t work.  The concept is that we have congestion and transportation problems, so increasing system capacity will alleviate them.  This has been tried.  I’ll mention Los Angeles, New York City, and Houston, Texas as examples.  Simply put, increasing roadway capacity, and extending highway networks leads to increased usage!  That’s not less, but more congestion.

 The “It’s Not Working, Make it Bigger” model:

This seems to be the philosophy behind the “transit” portion of these plans.  MARTA doesn’t have enough riders to make it pay.  It’s never met its budget, and it always runs in the red.  So what’s the solution?  Well, if we just made the whole system bigger (and more expensive) then it would pay for itself.

A History Lesson:

Once upon a time, we here in Fayette County were handed a SPLOST to fund a “transportation improvement plan.”  I worked hard on that one.  I worked to motivate cyclists to support the passage of the SPLOST.  The idea was, there would be nice things for cyclists in the plan.  The SPLOST passed.  It was a narrow passage.  It could be argued that the vote of cyclists in the county made the difference.  (Cyclists vote.)

What were the results of that particular plan?  Well we had to charge 1% more for everything sold in the county.  But aside from that…  How many cycling improvements have you seen?  I see large road-building programs going on.  The southern portion GA-74 has been turned into a massive highway.  It’s all but impossible to cross it, and there are no accommodations for cyclists along it.  As I write, the massive “West Fayetteville Bypass” project is advancing.  It’s tearing the heart out of the county.  I don’t see how it will benefit cyclists, and I see a lot of ways in which it will have a negative impact.

A Look at the Big Picture:

To se an interactive map of all of the proposed projects the T-SPLOST is supposed to fund please follow this LINK.

One of the biggest problems I have with this whole thing is that the proponents have no “Plan B.”  We are told that we must do this, and that this is the only way to accomplish “critical” ends.  I’ve never been happy with that kind of rhetoric.

I’d urge all to take a look at this thing and ask the following:

• “Do we really need another regressive sales tax?”
• “Do we really need to do all this stuff?”
• “Is this the only way to accomplish it?”
• “Will any of this stuff actually help us?"

Thursday Thoughts: Gasoline, Cycling, and Natural Laws

It’s not news that gasoline prices are rising.  The correct questions are,  “How high will it go?”  and,  “What are we going to do about it?”  As I write this, local prices are between $3.81 and $3.98 per gallon.  Nationally the average price is above four, and climbing rapidly.  Does anyone think this is going to stop soon?

Today’s post title refers to Natural Laws.  The Natural Law I have in mind is the Law of Supply and Demand.  Make no mistake, it is a LAW!  When demand for a commodity is high, the price rises.  When the price rises high enough, the demand will fall, followed shortly thereafter by the price.  Believe it!  This is as much a Law, as Gravity.

I have spoken and written a lot about using the bicycle for transportation.  Please consider the following facts:

There are approximately 2,000,000 active cyclists in the United States.

Almost all of those cyclists are drivers too.

The average driver travels 12,000 mile per year.

The average private motor vehicle gets about 19 miles per gallon.

For the typical driver about 45% of miles are commuting to work, 45% are “utility driving,” and the remainder falls into a variety of categories.

“Utility Driving” means trips to the store, to the pharmacy, the doctor’s office, hauling the kids, or other errands.

Supposing all two million American cyclists actually managed to do about half of our “utility driving” by bike?

1. 12,000/19 =   631.6 gallons of gas per driver.
2. 631.6 X 0.225 = 142.1 gallons saved by using the bike instead of the car.
3. 2,000,000 X 142.1 = 282.4 million gallons not purchased.
4. If gas goes to $5.00 per gallon, that means we could take about $1.421 billion worth of demand off of the market.

If we further suppose that each and every one of us managed to “recruit” one more rider to do the same thing, we’d remove upwards of $2.8 billion worth of demand.  Might that not have an effect on pricing?

Let’s take it just a bit farther.  What if we could manage to change something like10% and 50% of our commuting from gasoline to pedal power, the increased savings could be huge, and the decrease in demand would be felt at the pump.

One might, reasonably ask,  “Okay.  What’s in it for me?”  For a good answer, go to the second line above, and multiply it by $5.00.  The answer is $712.00 saved each year.  And that figure doesn’t include improved health and fitness, and deceased wear and tear on the car or truck.

A further advantage would be the increased presence of cyclists on the roads, with a companion decrease in automobiles and light trucks.  More cyclists means we are more visible, and that usually leads to greater acceptance and to more attention being paid to us.  Good all the way around.

This blog’s readership is relatively small.  Please point your friends to this post.  In addition, I’m going to start a series, aimed at the nuts and bolts of transforming automotive driving to “utility cycling.”  In addition, I’ll be carrying this in my weekly email newsletter, the “Tuesday Tome.”

Please do give this one some thought.  Feel free to comment.  Let’s see what we can do on this one. 

Thursday Thoughts: Cell Phones & Such

I don’t take like hearing the phone jangle when I'm on the bike!  One of the reasons I ride is to get away from “all that.”  I’m aware that there are many people in the world who don’t feel this way.  There are those who (apparently) feel a desperate need to be connected.  I am not one of those people.

When I express this kind of sentiment, I’m often asked,  “But what if something happened!?”  In these cases the “something” is always presumed to be some emergency that requires immediate attention.

Don’t worry, if it’s bad enough, they (you know who they are) will find a way to let you know.

Don’t believe that?  It’s true.  One time, whilst I was riding, a family situation got bad enough.  Believe it or not, a relative, at the time over 800 miles away, found a way to get someone to get in a car and track me down on the road to give me the bad news.

Everyone who was then alive remembers the morning of September 11, 2001.  That would be a case in point.  I was not on a bike, but I was (quite deliberately) cut off from communications.  Despite my self-imposed isolation on that awful Tuesday morning, the news did get through to me.  I am certain that, if I had been on the bike, and in a remote location, I would still have been made aware of the situation.

Basically, the news, good or bad, can wait.  There’s not much I can do about it while I’m out on the bike.  Add to that, if I need to take or make a call, I will get off the road and off the bike to do so. To attempt to use a phone while operating a vehicle is to invite disaster.

On the subject of texting?  Good lord!  I see it done.  I can’t imagine attempting to receive, let alone write and send text while on a bike.

Any commentary on this one?

Thursday Thoughts: Noise

One way to look at history is view inventions, and their impacts.  A part of this invention thing would be a whole chaper (or twenty) on transportation.

Apparently somebody invented the wheel about ten minutes after we first thought of the opposable thumb and the war club.  Wheels make sense.  They let us carry stuff a lot more easily.  Consider, there are only so many ways to handle things if you have a lot of crap that you have to get from one place to another.  You can drag it.  You can push it.  You can pick it up and carry it.  You can con your family members, neighbors, and friends to do the dirty work for you.  Eventually you get tired of doing all of these things, and you tend to run out of family, neighbors, and friends.

“Oh oh!  Here comes Fred.  Quick, look busy!  He’ll want us to help him move that dinotherium carcass down to the dump.”

But once you and the other primatives invent the wheel, and the wheeled cart, things get a lot easier.  And, whether you intended it or not, you invented transportation at the same time.

It seems to me that the history of transportation divides into two different camps of inventors. 

The Efficiency Camp:  “We can do this a lot more easily.”

The 4^th Grade Boys Camp:  “Let’s make a big noise so everyone will look at us!”

Over the many years of mankind’s struggle with invention, I am convinced, psychotropic drugs have played a role’.  Also, the lines between the two “camps” sometimes blur.  (How else does one explain downhill racing?)

When I was a kid, there seemed to be a dichotomy between the two camps.  One group of kids wanted to ride faster and lighter bicycles, to go farther and do it with more speed.  The other group clipped playing cards to their bikes to rattle in the spokes.

Cars come equipped with horns.  Supposedly these are warning devices, and are included for safety purposes.  In fact, horns are on cars because some joker wanted to make them louder, and they remain on cars so that ignoramuses can blast them at cyclists.

The bicycle was clearly invented by the Efficiency Camp people.  Explosives must  have been invented by the 4^th Graders.

“Loud Pipes save lives!”  Some (not all) motorcyclists proclaim this with a straight face.  It doesn’t matter that a bit of thoughtful reflection will show this statement to be absurd.  In reality, these folks are clearly in the 4^th Grade camp.  (They need really loud pipes on their motorcycles, and blast their throttles as they pass cyclists?  Really?  Why?)

I do believe that the mentality behind loud exhausts, on motorcycles, cars, or trucks is truly traceable to the 4^th grade.  Remember when some boys in the 4^th would seem to compete to see who could make the most obnoxious, and loudest of noises?  Belches and farts seemed to be especially favorite subjects for those kids.  The loud exhaust phenomena seems to be a mechanical extension of the pastime.  They seem to be saying,  “Let’s see who can make the loudest mechanical fart!”

The very first motorcycles were little more than early gasoline engines, kludged into the frames of bicycles.

Boom boxes, and super loud car stereos clearly fall into the same category.  It’s not enough for the perpetrator to ruin his own hearing.  (That could be done just as effectively with earbuds or headsets.  No.  They feel a bounden duty to generate as much noise as possible.

Why in blazes does it have to be so freakin’ LOUD!  What’s wrong with quiet?

I love going to the high country.  The silence is awe-inspiring.  More and more, I especially like doing this in the Winter.  The peace is much less likely to be shattered by a troop of two wheeled monkeys, astride their chromed up noise makers.

As more and more humans move into the same spaces, the noise problem increases.  How are we to deal with this?  If it is true that “the squeaky wheel gets the grease,” then are the loudest to be the only ones accommodated?  Must we, who ride quietly and with little protection be bullied aside by the mechanical loudmouths?

Thursday Thoughts: Confusions

The “Bicycle Industry” is in such a state right now.

I just read the latest Bicycling Magazine buyer’s guide issue.  Wow!  There is really a lot of very high priced candy and jewelry in there.  I guess I’m most staggered by the presence of a $15,000 bike.  Ummm…  I don’t know what to say.

For the moment, let’s assume that I had an odd 15 kilobucks lying around, and I went out and bought such a thing.  What would it do for me?  How would my life be different?  Would I be the envy of my friends?  Would I suddenly become the fastest rider in the state?  I’m sure it’s amazing, but the overarching question I have is…  Why?

At this point in time, there is actually a fairly strong reaction to the high-end, elitist, “roadie” part of the cycling spectrum.  And it’s not positive.  There are a growing number of blogs (and a few print publications) that are weirdly anti-high end.  I say “weirdly” because they seem to be critical of “racy rider” excesses, and then turn around and wax rhapsodic about something like a $9,000 “custom,” handbuilt cargo bike.  Huh?

There’s all kinds of “messenger chic” bikes, accessories, apparel, and very expensive “designer” messenger bags.  This at a time when bike couriers have all but disappeared from the landscape.

I read about how electric bikes, and “electric assist” bikes are a good thing.  They are supposed to make cycling accessible to more people, and increase the bike’s utility as a “transportation vehicle.”  Um, maybe.  But the halfway good ones start at around $1,500.  Worse, in the shop where I work, the folks who are interested in electrics tend to fall into two categories.  1)  “I want to ride a bike, but I don’t want to work at it, and it shouldn’t cost more than $150.”  2)  “I just got convicted of my X^th  DUI and I want a car but they won’t let me drive so I’ll use this to get around the system, and don’t you, like man, have anything cheaper.”  I may be missing something, but this doesn’t look like the beginnings of a transportation revolution to me.

The urban hipster thing is becoming sort of passé’, but let’s not be too hard on them.  They managed to recruit a lot of folks, and a lot of them are still riding.  I’d say that’s a good thing.

Most of our “professional advocates” seem to be all wound up with high-dollar projects, and an outright lust for building more facilities.  What happened to just getting folks on bikes?  I realize that the “build it and they will come” argument has some validity.  On the other hand, in an era of huge spendthrift government stuff, the question could be asked,  “Why build all this stuff for the tiniest fraction of the population?”  (I have my own fears about some of this.)

It is a time when the Economy absolutely stinks, and the “Industry” is touting some of the most expensive equipment ever made.  I’m not sure I understand that.

There are more different types of bikes, more bike “categories” and “niches” more accessories, more equipment, more agendas, more “cultures” and “sub-cultures,” and more bicycling “manifestos” than ever.  It’s confusing and bewildering.

It’s also Spring.  I’m not really sure what to make of all this.  Anyone?

Thursday Thoughts: Along the way…

March 1.  It’s the first day of a brand new month.  I’ve always felt like the year actually, finally, really started on this day.  A lot of things start in March, and a lot of them come to fruition.

Of starts, the organized ride that seems best to kick off “The Season,” would be the annual Kiwanis Tour de Pike.  This year it’s running on 17 March.  It’s a good ride, with good support, and a very reasonable price.  For more information, go to this link.

With cautious optimism, I’m beginning to think that Winter has done its worst to us, and has moved on.  A large number of signs point to the arrival of Spring.  The songbirds have begun to arrive in our area.  The forsythia (an early bloomer) have been out for several weeks.  The bradfords are blooming, and many of the cherries already have.  (I don’t really relax until two things happen; the dogwoods bloom, and the temps hit 80 degrees at lease once.)

One thing is definite, we are seeing more daylight, and the weather is improving.  Folks are stirring about.  More cyclists, like early robins, are appearing on the roads, paths, and trails.  We’ve launched this year.

So what will we see as we ride through 2012?

Gas prices are high, and rising.  Will this continue?  Will we see a shift to more folks riding their bikes to shops and to work?  (‘T would be nice!)

 Our state legislators seem to be bent on “protecting” us, and “ensuring our safety.”  I’m not entirely sure that we’ve managed to kill that nasty  bit of legislation.  (see this past Monday’s post, and please do take action.  This deal is not done yet.)

Speaking of Legislation, now that the “Three foot pass law” has been in effect for about a year, will we see motorists settle down a bit?

The folks who promote the Tour de France have been oddly quiet.  Usually they’ve managed to stir up some controversy and veiled scandal to whet appetites for the coming Summer’s contest.  So just what kind of fun do the exalted “Euros” have in store for us?  No doubt there will be lots of drama (some of it real) and excitement to entertain those who care for it.

Who will join our ranks locally and add to the sport?  No one can know the answer to that, but each and every one of us knows someone who would benefit from a bike ride.  Will you be the one to invite that newbie novice who becomes a key player in our local scene?

What amazing things will you see from the saddle this year?  Who will you meet?  Where will your bike take you?  How will it change you?

What will happen this year, along the way?