Park and pedal: Bike commuting made simple Want a cool way to combat $4 gas? Take your bicycle, at least part of the way. (We can’t all live in Portland, where bicycle commuting has become a religion practiced by more than 5 percent of the population.)
Driving through Toronto on a Saturday made me wonder why ANYBODY in that city wastes their money on driving when cycling is cheaper, faster, and way less frustration-inducing. If I ever move back, a bicycle will be my #1 transportation. Hopefully by then the bike infrastructure will have improved.
There are just too many cars for the tiny city streets.
Winter riding is not nearly as pleasant as I had convinced myself it would be. Once my trachea and lungs unfreeze and the dizziness goes away, I will hopefully remember it as being lovely so that I can get it out of my system until the weather gets better.
I live in the middle of nowhere :( Crappiest town for cycling ever, because the landscape here is crazy steep. I think the student population is making cycling more common (we do have Critical Mass) but there are hardly any bike racks, let alone bike lanes.
(Although there is a beautiful bike path that takes me to the heart of downtown which is nice - but then you’re stuck on the streets downtown and that’s not fun.)
Using Google street view to check if the Tim Horton’s by my house has a bike rack for my post-History/pre-Geography homework break tonight.
Fuck yeah.
I just wish I had mittens… but it’ll be a quick ride.
The idea was to provide us with examples of the perils encountered while riding, and to show us the need for and advantages of infrastructure that makes cycling safer and more viable.
But an unintended consequence of our journey was soon apparent: Cycling is an immensely enjoyable way to get around, especially on a fall day when moderate exertion results in minimal sweat.
It promotes a sense of well-being and gets the blood flowing without leaving one gasping for breath, and allows riders to quickly manoeuvre through heavy traffic without adding to the queue of gridlocked vehicles.
Aside from the exercise, it creates a connection between the rider and the surrounding community in a way that drivers, who are sealed off by glass and steel, could never feel for themselves.
While stopped at an intersection, you can hear the conversations of people waiting for the green light. You can smell onions sizzling at a hot dog cart, read the signs pasted to a utility pole and observe things that cannot be seen from behind the wheel.
A driver sees the light about the hazards of cycling on shitty infrastructure. And I feel the need to point out that he mentions construction zones being scary - it was a construction zone I was going through when I fell off my bike in August (and still can’t get back on due to the injury - yay no cycling infrastructure).
Ten to fifteen minutes is all I’m allowed to cycle right now as part of physio and it makes me sad. When I hit the 10 minute mark I can always convince myself my knee doesn’t hurt yet. But the goal is to start rebuilding strength, not going until it hurts, which, while best for the long term, is incredibly unsatisfying in the short term.
You are not stuck in traffic. You ARE traffic.
Teefed this off Facebook.
"Hold on to your hats, folks, we’re actually removing a lane for a car — in favor of a bike lane — in Los Angeles."
— Los Angeles, CA: councillor Ed Reyes speaks to a news conference unveiling the city’s newest 3.5km bike lane in the city’s core. The famously congested city plans to install 320km of bike lanes on its roads every year for the next five years, encouraging more residents to leave their cars at home. In Toronto, a city with even worse congestion, Mayor Rob Ford’s bike plan calls for only 70km of exclusively off-road non-dedicated trails to be constructed in the next four years, and only if money becomes available. (via mayorisbetter)
Both to commend him on a great article and to ask where I could get an “I love my brain” sticker. This was his response:
Thanks [my name]. Your note was a welcome contrast to the bitter hate mail I’m getting. Yikes. Nutcase (linked in the story) fixes the “I love my brain” slogan to the back of their fetching helmets. http://www.nutcasehelmets.com/en/site
Regards Brian
I will never understand why people are so adamant to protect their freedom to sustain a head injury. I mean, if they really don’t care, fine, don’t wear a helmet… but don’t make it a big deal for everybody else. Especially those who will then be paying for your hospital treatment after the accident.
But this just goes to show that agreeing with and supporting people can be an overlooked but meaningful act. I am glad I emailed him praising his article, since I had no idea something like that would get so much hate mail.
Wearing my helmet marks me as uncool, especially in Vancouver, a city filled with stuck-in-adolescence hipsters, men and women pedalling around on fixed-speed, ironic retro bikes. The hipsters are ready to sneer at law-abiding, better-safe-than-sorry folk like me. Some, I’ve observed, are also willing to drink and ride. And toke and ride. Simultaneously. Their views don’t count. Sober up, drop the attitude, and then we’ll talk.
…
The arguments against helmet use and laws range from blessedly libertarian to utterly specious. Let’s deal with the latter first. Helmet laws discourage people from riding bicycles because they make the activity seem unsafe. News flash: There has always been an element of danger, on a bike. In certain places and under certain circumstances, it’s considerable. Ever ride on Toronto’s Queen Street, dodging traffic, potholes and the street car rails? No? Then please shut up.
I wear a helmet. I would LOVE to get a helmet sticker that says “I love my brain” :D
Helmets are not required in places such as Amsterdam and Copenhagen, and Montreal. But those cities already have or are building proper infrastructure for bicyclists. The practical Europeans in particular don’t mess around. They ride on segregated bike lanes, raised and distinct from motorways. They have concrete and rubber barriers; most of us have strips of paint. Big difference.
Strips of paint that cars ignore, more to the point. Every single time I’ve been out riding, there have been cars or trucks pulled over or even parked in the scarce bike lanes on Toronto’s roads. Which forces me to swerve into regular traffic, which undoubtedly makes drivers go AAARGH WTF GET THE FUCK OVER. See, I would, but I can’t because of you drivers being in my space.
Cities around the world are successfully reducing their congestion from private vehicles by slowly but steadily eliminating city parking spaces. By next year, Toronto will remove bicycle lanes on major thoroughfares and replace them with additional on-street vehicle parking.
A blog about how every mayor is better than Rob Ford. With actual reasons to support that statement.
