The Cycling Dude

The Return of the Link Collection

I'm late! I'm late!

But returning them felt great!

Yes, 2 months overdue, The Cycling Dude's collection of Links has been returned to their rightful place of honor.

My humble apologies to regulars, and to new visitors, but things have been hectic around here since the move from MT.

Not only was I moving 2 blogs, but I've been seriously contemplating the future direction of my writing, and building a possible writing career, of sorts, out of my talent.

Friends have been encouraging me to try to earn money with my interests, and talents, and I've begun to consider it.

Because of that I've neglected Dude, but now I think I'm ready to get back to regular posting here just as I have at Sneakeasy's Joint.

Aside from my writing about my rides, and linking to (and opinionating on ) Cycling stories around the world, the most important aspect of this site remains my collection of links.

It is a resource that I am proud of building, and will continue to add to as time goes by.

Thanks for your patience, and your continued interest in this blog, and in Bicycling.

50 People, 50 Bikes: Their Stories

Here is an interesting experiment:

We went to one city, Portland, Maine, and gave 50 bikes to 50 people, then let them ride off to discover, or abandon, cycling on their own. The results weren't surprising. The power of their stories is.

The stories behind this idea are detailed in a fascinating piece in the Jan./Feb. 2004 Bicycling magazine.

What would happen if 50 people, chosen based on the the contents of a written essay, were given the use of a fancy new Trek 7200 hybrid bike for 3 months?

Would they ride them regularly? Would they become hooked on bicycling, or not?

The community chosen has a network of riding opportunities, and  so the expectations were modest with regards to results.

we'd resolved not to preach or actively try to turn these people into cyclists. We gave them the bikes, plus helmets, locks and a smidgen of advice, and let them ride off to discover- or abandon--cycling on their own.

If they needed to, they could go to CycleMania, Portland's oldest bike shop; shop owner Eddie Quinn had helped make BikeTown happen in many ways, not least of which was having his staff assemble all 50 bikes over one crazed weekend. But even he was skeptical. "These aren't cyclists," he said near the beginning of our experiment. "They're a different breed. If we get two rainy weekends in a row, they're gonna stop riding."

The BikeTowners ranged in age from 13 to 73, and included a millionaire entrepreneur and a woman who'd been homeless. Many of them already had bikes, squirreled away in basements or garages, but only a handful actually rode them. None were practicing cyclists. And for the most part, we agreed with Eddie: After a few rides, most of the Treks would begin collecting dust. We were far from prepared for the way these bikes would change some people's lives.

For the rest of this story go here: Bike Town USA by Bill Gifford.

The piece is long, but worth the time.

Hat Tip to Jim Baross, for passing this along on the CABO, Topica Message Board.

Wide Ranging article on Critical Mass

Molly O'Donnell, of Wire Tap, has written a piece on Critical Mass that, while informative, tries to have it both ways when it describes the movements philosophy, politics, and staging of events.

For many young bicycle lovers, Critical Mass puts a name to what they're already doing – riding their bikes for a fun, cheap and healthful way to get around. For others, it's an active form of protest against American dependence on oil and the war on Iraq.

She begins by quoting various statistics that show American dependence on foreign oil,  a supposedly ever-weakening national economy, and bemoans  drilling in wildlife preserves, and air pollution.

She writes about the founding of Critical Mass in San Francisco, over 12 years ago, and how the movement has expanded world wide.

As Chris Carlsson, one of those original riders, puts it, the group simply wanted "to ride home together, displace cars from the streets, and alter the use of public space." Little did they know they would also be starting a global movement.

Today, Critical Mass has become a monthly phenomenon that takes place in over 300 cities worldwide. And whether or not it is merely another way to get home, or an active act of protest, depends on whom you speak to.

She then proceeds to depict the supposed spontanious nature of the rides, and some behaviors of riders:

A grassroots effort that has no central leadership, a Critical Mass event consists of cyclists getting together, via word-of-mouth and fliering (and most recently Internet webrings, listservs and bike forums), to ride the city streets "home" together. While this doesn't sound like a typical radical protest, it's very effective at getting attention, although not always positive, and raising awareness. This is because cyclists in Critical Mass events also usually stop rush hour traffic for 5-20 minutes at a time. Riders often employ "corking" techniques (or using individual riders to block off intersections) to allow bikers – sometimes numbering in the thousands – through traffic.

Corkers will often hold up signs that read things like, "Honk if you love bicycles," but drivers are not always appeased. It is not unusual for a Critical Mass event to inspire violence and litigation. In fact, sometimes it sparks international controversy.

Her sympathetic listing of events where controversy occured lists 2 events where cyclists were "wrongfully arrested", including the Democratic Convention event that I participated in, and then provides a link to a story about an event where "a motorist attempted to drive through a pack of cyclists".

This, and her depiction of the events, written about here, at the 2004 Republican Convention shows me a bias toward depicting the movement as being put upon by the mainstream.

She then briefly mentions the contridiction that I've been talking about for years:

Despite some opposition, Critical Mass has gained large-scale, positive notoriety with the distribution of several documentaries such as "We are Traffic", and “July 25th: The Secret Is Out.” The Rio de Janeiro contingent is 7,000 strong and even has their own corporate sponsor: Diet Coke. Although corporate sponsorship seems antithetical or, at the very least, contrary to the philosophies behind a leaderless protest movement, it does show evidence of the amount of well-deserved attention and positive response this radical re-conceptualization of travel is getting.

So much for a leaderless, sponsorless, movement.

Promoting Bicyclings, and a better stewardship of the environment, is all fine, and dandy, but when the Far Left Agenda hi-jacks the movement, and no-one complains loud enough to make a difference then that pisses me off.

Imagine the uproar, and justifiably so ( to be fair ), if the politics of the movement were all about promoting a Conservative Agenda, while using support for Cycling, and the environment, as a smokescreen to dupe folks into going along for the ride, and generating positive publicity.

Jesse Jackson, the ACLU, and others, wouldn't shut up.

The author does go on to point out some very positive Bicycling environments across the country, and shares the views of various participants, but all this does is hi-light the mix of politics, and naivete, of many riders.

For many young bicycle lovers, Critical Mass puts a name to what they're already doing – riding their bikes for a fun, cheap, and healthful way to get around. Critical Mass also offers a creative outlet for artists, who design costumes and customized bikes for the rides. Many, like Baltimore participant Russell Deocampo, 27, use the ride to show off bikes they’ve rebuilt using old and broken-down bikes. Deocampo describes the rides as laid-back events, where the riders "usually end up at a bar afterward" discussing, among other things, the events of the ride. The festive, parade-like atmosphere that many Critical Mass events may be one reason the movement has grown so steadily over the last decade.

That's all well, and good, that these people feel this way, but there's more to Critical Mass than meets the eye.

The full story is on AlerNet: Critical Mass: Social Change on Two Wheels

The Houston Is On A Roll Campaign

City Officials in Houson, Texas, are out to make the city more bicycle friendly.

The campaign is a series of activities and programs designed to help improve the city's minor-league status as a cycling-enabled city.

The Houston Is On A Roll Campaign includes programs to promote cycling and to increase bicycle awareness, with components for motorists, cyclists and city employees. The campaign also is scheduled to involve an organized ride this spring to tour various Houston neighborhoods as part of the training season for the MS 150.

While the city leads the nation in the number of miles of bikeways they apparently think they can do more.

The mayor also introduced the Bike Smart handbook scheduled to reach 300,000 Houstonians and students in the Houston, Spring Branch and Alief school districts. Students will have an opportunity to demonstrate what they learn from the program with a year-end contest. Top prizes in the contest include two bicycles and helmets.

That is a cool idea!

To learn more check out Houston Bikeways.

Full Story in the Houston Chronicle: Initiative Shows City on Right Path: Campaign hopes to boost bike awareness.

Portland Bike Blog Spawns Community Mag

Casey, of the blog Bicycle-Eye, has expanded his mission of opening peoples minds to bicycling through his wonderings, and wandering around the Portland, Oregon area, by creating, and distributing a small, 22 page, magazine.

I have spent the last couple of weeks perusing my own copy of the 1st issue of Bicycle-Eye, the Magazine, and wish to share my thoughts.

The cover is an attention getter with an eye gazing at you, as if to say "look at me!"

The contents are an eclectic mix of stream of consciousness, opinion, review, profile, poetry, veganism, and sillness.

In a piece called MEDITATION he writes:

Bike lane blurring underneath. A omfortable hum, a breeze, a smile on my face all at once. An Air that becomes the ground. The ground a cloud. A Whisper that started nowhere. But heading in all directions. It said to me, as I said to it: Be.

A young man a child again. A young man everything. Peacefulness rididng with me as I breathe in, turn the crank, and be.

He writes a review of a small cycling story collection by a Chicago rider named Mayonaise describing him this way:

A white boy in lycra shouting his passion through the window of a van that just cut him off, "Kill Me Motherfucker, Kill Me Motherfucker!" It's not from a rage or disdain for anything tangible, but an essential zeal for life. Like a true yogi mystic, mayo tempts us to forget the clutter of what we believe to know about the world and the city we ride through, and accept fully the unbounded jazz of a life that burns with illusive ardor within us.

In a piece called JAZZY, there is this:

Pedal for the pleasure, for the wonder and wandering. Toget you there, to lead you where the sound reminds you your days are fleeting. You'd better get movin' but you'd better stop to listen as you get movin'. Just grab your bike and hold on tight and ride on throu this life all right.

In a piece called CHAMELEON there is this:

I've somehow figured out how to blend in with the natural essense of the city. There's a bicycle between my legs, and it gives me so much power out and about in this modern jungle. I have an advantage over the otehr humans prowling for food and work in their automobiles, because I have learned how to float freely through this land, to move with my own power rather than power bought. I've figured out how to get where I need to go with complete enjoyment.

There is an interesting interview with a local Bike Commuter where answers were gotten to such questions as:

When did you start Bike Commuting?

What made you start?

Riding on Road or Bike Path?

Getting there quicker, or taking it easy?

Gatorade, or gin and juice?

Do you know all the hand signals?

Regular readers here know of my interest in poetry, and how Casey inspired me to try my hand at the Bicycle Haiku.

He includes over 20 that were posted by him, or sent to him to share on his blog, and they are wonderful to read if you get the chance to visit the blog.

8 pages are devoted to the semi-serious, semi-silly, column he writes for the website BIKE FORUMS.

It is called ASK GONESH 9..., and is introduced this way:

It's time to lay back on Gonesh 9's purple velvet cyber couch of alter-reality, and ask what you've always wanted to know.

A sample of the questions and answers:

1. Dear Gonesh 9... A bit of a long shot, but how can I make it rain every timeI go for a ride?

Dear Chris L... What I do is hold a giant sliced onion up into the heavens while I ride. God is very sensitive to the vapors and will tear up every time.

2. How can I convince my Girl Friend that sleeping with my bike is not cheating. Also, how does one go about getting chain grease out of bed sheets?

Dear gt8bikelbvr... I think it is time to give your GF an ultimatum: There is no choice, the bike stays in bed with both of you. I'm sure she will understand. Women are always very understanding, and will almost never break out into unwarranted, irrational fits toward their significant others. Especially when it comes to our bicycles, they only want us to be happy no matter how much time and money we spend on our beloved bikes.

As for the issue with chain grease on the bed sheets, why would you want to remove it? It's a natural bodily excretion from a healthy bicycle, and can come in handy when you and your Girl griend need that extra bit of excitement.

Hmmm..... okaaayyy.

The issue ends with a thought provoking essay on Bicycling and Veganism, and why a person might choose not just one, or the other, but both as a part of his, or her, lifestyle.

Much, if not all, of what appears in the issue originally appeared on his blog, or elsewhere, but by putting it in something folks can actually hold in their gritty little fingers, Casey is aiming to get the attention of those unaware of cycling on the net, and BikeBlogs.

I'll end by sharing with you my favorite question asked of Gonesh:

The girls I ride with keep telling me - "It's not the size of the stem that matters, but the power to the crank."

What the heck do they mean?

Since Gonesh didn't exactly answer that one, and I'm not gonna touch it with a 10 ft. pole, either,  I'll leave it to you, dear reader, to provide your own answer....

And share it here, if you dare. :-)

   

Pedaling Smiles Across America

Most Media Stars wouldn't imagine go anywhere without their Limo, or Jet to get them there but, for the last 17 years 1 man has pedaled his talent to Americans on 2 wheels.

From Hannibal, Missouri, comes this story:

Comedian Tom Snyders has spent the past 17 years pedaling his fully-loaded touring bicycle to all his stand-up comedy performances. He's cycled more than 129,000 miles and to all 50 states. Along the way he snaps pictures of weird and amusing road signs he encounters ­ the best of which are featured in his live performances.

His next stop is Hannibal, where he will perform his show and sign copies of his new book, "National Lampoon's Big Book of True Facts." The hardcover book, officially released June 23, features more than 200 photographs of funny road signs contributed by Snyders. Snyders and his bicycle are featured on the cover.

Next Monday he's performing at a local high school, and it ought to be a hoot. :-)

The Bicycling Comedian, as he's known, began his "Smile America Bicycle Comedy Tour" in 1987, and has made quite a career for himself.

Traveling the backroads of America he has performed on TV Shows, and at Bicycling Events of all kinds.

His story deserve to be made into a movie, as seen from his description of some of his adventures:

"I'm off the interstate and not going by at 60 miles an hour so I see a lot of strange stuff," Snyders explains. "Some of it's incredibly funny, and I always keep my camera loaded and ready." On this journey Snyders has also: been attacked by a police dog; pedaled up a mountain in the middle of a raging snow storm; looked a grizzly bear in the eye from 15 feet away; and been run out of town by local police in Georgia.

Chased by dogs, confronting deer, narrowly averting jaywalking bunnys, lizards, squirrels, and cats, I can deal with, but grizzly bears?

Now you see why I take a camera along on my own long rides. :-)

The full story: THE HANNIBAL COURIER-POST: 'Bicycling Comedian' pedaling to Hannibal for Dec. 13 performance