Theft-proof, puncture-free, and slightly implausible

I'm still stumped. I have no idea how this bike would actually work. Sure, maybe the wheels work on bearings and the brake cables are contained inside the frame, with the brake pads nestled in where the frame wraps around the tires. And I will assume that it's a fixie (because I can't imagine how else the drive train would work - and even then I find myself peering at this photo and trying to imagine the workings in there by the pedals). And sure, it is futuristically Tron-like. But... I still don't quite get it. Maybe because I'm not a racer?

I was sent the link to this design concept by a friend. Cool, yes. Pretty, yes. But the designer's statement that these will be commonplace in 20 years... I find that hard to agree with. Looks like design for design's sake, and that doesn't often stand the test of time unless it also improves on the old model: makes it easier or more efficient. Really, I like my gearshifts, the fact that I can do most repairs on my bike myself, on the fly if need be (I can't imagine trying to crack this carbon-fibre frame to try and fix anything).  Mike can handle slush, road salt, grit, potholes, and slipped chains. Although I have to admit, too, that this design has a whole lot fewer moving parts to get coated in grime and grit and start up all kinds of friction problems. Although since those wheels must be rolling on ball bearings or something, I'd hate to think what happens when you get grit into those workings. Seems like this bike would be clean tracks and pristine asphalt or nothing.

But it sure is space-age.

Hooray for subzero!

Wow. I never would have thought I'd hear myself say that. . .

Over the weekend it rained. Sunday night I took the bus downtown for a meeting, and as we left the coffee shop, the fine rain had left a thin glassy layer of ice on the pavement that nearly had me falling down a couple of times. So I was glad I didn't have the bike. I actually enjoyed the chance to be lazy.

Then the next morning I looked outside. Slush, drizzle, mushy edges on all the roads, and the weather forecast saying something about freezing rain and temperatures between a couple of degrees over and a couple of degrees under freezing. Well, I could have taken the bike. Frankly, I just didn't want to. I was still okay with slacking off and being lazy. Sure, I've got rain gear - but it was cold and decidedly un-pretty out there. And unpredictable. So I caught the bus.

But then Tuesday I woke up to actual snow. And I had to take the bus: really, if there's going to be a few centimeters coming down I don't want to have to negotiate that, plus hidden hummocks of ice underneath the concealing layer of snow where it's been petrifying all winter, plus the general loopiness of traffic in this town when the weather gets bad. Plus no assurances anyone would have cleared the canal path. So, once again I found myself standing around waiting for buses, peering at bus numbers through the forest of heads, choking on cigarette smoke, shivering, wrestling with bags, cramming onto buses and being admonished to "keep moving back please..." Not to mention trudging all over the East End looking for someplace that would sell bus tickets so it wouldn't cost me $3 just to get home.

Suffice to say, I was pretty much done with being lazy by the time I got home last night. So when I woke up this morning to the kind of brisk, clear sunlight that tells you it's got to be below -5, I was pretty happy. There was a goshdarn spring in my step while I pulled on my wool tights and mittens for the ride to work.

Yup. I'd much rather bike over dry, rock-hard ice in 20-below than slog through slush at sort-of-maybe-not-quite-freezing. I'm actually looking forward to Friday's predicted -15.

Budget Deliberations

I've been watching the city budget deliberations with what attention I can devote these days - the cuts to public transit are pretty disturbing, and the ways in which things are still giving priority to cars. But at least cycling infrastructure funding is up! Ecology Ottawa is keeping an eye on the proceedings, and has some links to ways you can get involved. The budget's being considered for the rest of the month, so you've got a few more days to make your point.

Entirely too silly

How do I stumble across these things?

I don't know what led me to the hilarious blog Bike Snob NYC, but something did. I ended up reading a frankly stunning account of a hawk killing a pigeon in the middle of the bike lane (this guy is speedy with a camera, too!), which then turned into a meditation on intersection behaviour in New York. This led me to his rant about something called "shluffing," and an explanatory link to a blog post and short movie that's so heroically dorky that I have to believe it's tongue-in-cheek. I have to. 

The concept behind "shluffing," as far as I can tell, is that if you have about a block to go but can't ride in the street, but don't want to ride on the sidewalk for fear of being ticketed or inconveniencing pedestrians, you can swing off the saddle, stand on your bike pedal and push yourself along with the other foot. Watch the video for the all-important "transition," where you smoothly step off the pedal entirely and begin to walk the bike in order to pass people on the sidewalk.

This needs, or warrants, an instructional video? Okay, I don't agree with the Bike Snob that touching your foot down at an intersection is a "despicable act of surrender," (in fact, that's what I think the hardened piles of snowplow-heaped slush at the corners are there for) ... but I have to agree that even coming up with a technical term for treating your bike like a very awkward scooter is lame, much less making a video to encourage people to do it. Ride in the street like everyone else, or ride on the sidewalk but be prepared to stop and walk when you have to, or when the cops tell you to, people. Don't "shluff."

Then again, while I'm in the realm of the entirely too silly, I also spotted a design blog's post with something that I think deserves to be filed as chindogu. (For those of you who don't know chindogu, here's the Wikipedia entry: essentially they are gadgets that on the surface look like they might be useful, but on second thought cause way more problems than they solve.) This one wins: an aerial bike lane. Like a monorail for bikes. Wow. I can think of so many things that are wrong with that...

...and yet if someone built one I might very well give it a try...

Moving, by bike

Spacing Ottawa just forwarded this link to a blog I just recently discovered, You Are The Engine. They've posted some cool pictures of moving by bicycle, with a bike-powered Montreal moving company. Which reminds me, somewhere out there I have a picture from Momentum Magazine of someone moving a refrigerator by bike.

Never say "you can't do that with a bike." There's usually a way. Where there's the thigh power, that is.


And another short anecdote: I was buying my coffee this morning when the two ladies in line behind me said, "Oh, my ... you must be a biker." I turned around and said, "Yeah..." wondering how they could tell; my helmet was sitting on the bike, outside.

"Your jacket..."

Oh, yeah. Right. My jacket is a blue two-parter with an outer, semi-waterproof shell, and an internal fleece. The shell is brown with mud spatters right up to the nape of the neck. I was wearing my waterproof pants: they're greyish from the knees down. It was a damp, damp, slushy week last week. I know all too well what road salt tastes like. Fenders. One of these days I should get fenders.

Stranded... still

Remember the forsaken bike that started off my inquiry into what happens to abandoned bikes?

It's still there.

What I find sort of poignant is that there's still a plastic bag wrapped over the seat, as though someone thought they were going to be right back for it.

A bicycle built for three

My friend John is in Japan visiting his wife's family and sent me this picture: a bicycle for three. One kid on the back, one kid on the front, parent in the middle. And judging from some bikes I saw in use in Japan, a week's worth of groceries balanced in the middle too! This is a seriously practical vehicle. Now who said you can't have soccer moms on bikes?

I also just love the sheer sturdiness and sensibility of the bike. Little bitty tires, low bar so you can step over the frame without having to swing your leg up and back. Good for biking in a dress. Now that - that's a mode of urban transportation.

Nice kickstand too.

Just while we're hanging out in the Far East, Japan is also where they've implemented the most freakishly cool space-saving bike parking ever: according to BoingBoing.net, it "accepts your bike and sends it into the 7th dimension. Returns it to our world at your command."

And it's actually totally worth it to watch this clip from Japanese television giving a tour of the parking space. Partly because the engineering is so completely amazing. Ah, who am I kidding... mostly because Japanese TV is just too much fun. And watching the host climb down into the system, and the shots from the point of view of the bike, is way cool.