Another book on biking

Maybe publishers were fishing around for bike ideas one year ago when gas prices were high. I came across another cycling as transport book today.

Read here:

From Treehugger:

The Cyclist's Manifesto: The Case for Riding on Two Wheels Instead of Four has a title that may evoke images of some earnest treatise, a dry rant. Oh, but it is nothing of the sort. It’s the inverse opposite. A wonderfully whimsical exploration of America’s transport choices. A rollicking account of how those decisions were made (and why people elsewhere travelled in other directions) and what all that means for the future of getting from A to B. Central to Robert Hurst’s story is the hugely significant influence the humble bicycle has had on personal transport. For as he points out, with all seriousness, “We almost had camels.”

Sausalito makes plans to deal with bike renters

If you've travelled anywhere betwen San Francisco and Marin during the summer (or any other time of year) you'll notice a lot of people riding across the Golden Gate Bridge and along Marin bike paths on rental bikes. Apparrently, Sausalito feels like they are overwhelming the town. The following article reports that the Sausalito City Council has approved a plan to provide designated bike parking areas.

Read article here

It seems like a common sense solution. I think the efforts described in the article to get the bike rental companies to contribute is laudable. It seems like Sausalito and Marin in general could be doing a lot more to provide facilities for this mode of tourism - there seems to be an element that sees this as creating a nuisance rather than embracing the situation as an opportunity.

Bicycle fashion in NYC

Nots not everyday that you see an article on bike commuting in the Fashion and Style section so I figured its noteworthy.

The New York Times has a feature the trendyness of Dutch bicycles and relates it to work fashion.

Read here

Pedaling Revolution

I came across a new book titled "Pedaling Revolution: How Cyclists Are Changing American Cities." I haven't read it yet, but after reading an article by its author it seems like it could be a good read.

There is only one review on Amazon, but its being given 5 stars...

Bike theft

There is an interesting meeting in the NY Times today about bike theft in NYC

Read here

Bike theft in New York sounds bad but I'm not sure it rivals Berkeley. The article includes links to a couple of interesting sites.

One site, Someone stole my bike, ttp://www.someonestolemybike.com, has some short vidoes of people who had their bike stolen.

Another blog, Kryptonite, has a list of the top ten worst cities for bike theft. San Francisco is #4, but after many years biking in SF I haven't had a problem yet (knock knock).

Bike sharing on campus

I came across an interesting article on Treehugger:

Read here

The post describes some bike sharing programs at Universities. Some schools are even giving away bicycles to students for free to encourage them avoiding the use of their car and biking to campus.

Stupid article, Interesting news

This Sunday, the San Francisco Chroncile's Matier & Ross column covered some of the issues Sausalito is having with the droves of tourists visiting the town on rental bicycles.

Read here.

If you ignore the inflated contraversy the article tries to depict, its interesting to read about how the volume of rental cyclists continues to increase despite a down economy, and how the City of Sausalito is being forced into providing bike facilities to keep up with demand.

If you're local to San Francisco, you've see the throngs of bike tourists who leave from Fisherman's Wharf, cross the Golden Gate Bridge, and head down into Sausalito. You can catch a ferry back to the City from Sausalito, or if you head a little further north, Tiburon. Its a great ride that is largely on some nice bike paths.

That said, the bike renters, often not being from the area and maybe not even speaking english, are forced onto some pretty dangerous streets due some disconnects in the bike network in Marin. I'd say the worst spot is along East Blithedale in Mill Valley, when those heading to Tiburon and forced off of a great Class I path onto a busy 2 lane road with no shoulder, across a freeway onramp to Highway 101, across 101, then through an offramp intersection. Not a very pleasant tourist experience.

I have always wondered why Marin hasn't tried to encourage this form of eco-touristm further and make the bike facilities better to try and attract business in the communities along the route.

Federal Bike Love

The big news this week was the Ray LaHood our new Secretary of Transportation gave an address at the National Bike Summit and make some comments that were very friendly to the bicycling community. From LaHood's blog:

On Wednesday, I had the pleasure of addressing the National Bike Summit. I was invited to speak as a member of the Obama administration, but I have been a supporter of bicycling for many years and was a member of the Congressional Bike Caucus when I was in Congress.

Lets hope this translates into action. This is juxtaposed with an article on Streetsblog detailing some ridiculous road building that is getting funding by the Stimulus.

Bike fitting

I went in for a bike fitting this Saturday at City Cycle in San Francisco. I had my road bike fit to some extent when I bought it 3 or 4 years ago, but it always gave me problems in my right knee. I've started to try and ride longer distances, and after have major knee pain on a 75 mile ride I decided to go in for a more thorough fitting.

Serotta Advanced Fitter Jamaica Lambie helped out me (on a side note, I liked City Cycle and Jamaica was very knowledgable and helpful) and I learned the following, which may be of interest:

• Newer frames are going for more of a relaxed gemetry where the front end is about the same height as the saddle. A more aggressive fit would have the saddle higher than the handlebars.
• The latest trend is to put the saddle height where your knee remains bent at as much as 30 degrees when your pedals are at 6 o' clock position. This keeps you foot angle flat (rather than pointing your toes down) and moves the work from your calves to your thighs. I guess that makes sense since your thighs are bigger, but I do have a toe-down motion.
• According to Jamiaca, claims of being able to increase power through a fitting should be viewed with suspicion. You can increase efficiency, but increasing power is hard to measure without doing a VO2 study like Lance.

The fitting included a RAD fit where they replace your pedals with special diagnostic pedals that allow the fitter to see the angle of your foot with respect to the bike. Kind of cool equipment.

Good article on Alto Tunnel

SF Streets blog comes through again with a good article on the Alto Tunnel meeting.

Read here.

Alto Tunnel Update

I just got back from a community outreach meeting for the the Mill Valley/Corte Madera Bike and Pedestrian Corridor Study. Basically, what is being evaluated is whether or not to re-open the Alto Tunnel - a railroad tunnel that connects two large communities - each with excellent bike paths that deadend at either side of the tunnel. You can learn more about the project here.

It drew a crowd or about 100 people. I'd say most of those in attendance were interested in opening the tunnel; however, the opposing arguement was represented and those with that viewpoint did raise some valid issues. The basic problem is that everyone knows opening the tunnel will be very successful in bringing more bike traffic and if you live near the tunnel you aren't inclined to want that.

2 Mile Challenge

Cliff Bar put up a new site to encourage people to bike rather than drive for local errands. Its a slick Flash site that lets you map local amenities within a 2-mile radius - the idea being that you should biking rather than driving.

2 Mile Challenge

The Big 56 Cont'd

Streetsblog has coverage of the San Francisco Bike Coalitions volunteer outreach for their The Big 56 campaign here. One commenter has an interesting point regarding the SFBC goals. Since this project has taken soooo long to get going - is it really the most pressing need at this time? Or is it the last war?

Tour of California - Stage 8 - Levi Wins it All

The Tour of California wrapped up Sunday. Levi Leipheimer won the General Classification and Frank Schleck won the final stage. Web coverage is available at Versus.

It was great to have some local racing to watch, but I have to complain a bit about the Versus coverage. The last couple of days they pre-empted the Tour with Pabst Blue Ribbon Bull Riding which wrecked havoc with my Tivo. Then, the schedule the final stage to air right during the second half of the Academy Awards. The TV coverage said that 2 million people turned out along the road to spectate and that it was the most attended race in the United States - ever!

You'd think that they'd get better treatment on TV. But, I am still grateful that somebody airs it all.

Alto Tunnel

In Marin County, north of San Francisco, there is a great bike path that runs along the bay connecting several cities. It uses a right-of-way originally created for a commuter rail line that ran up to sometime in 50's-70's (I really have no idea - before my time at least).

Currently, the bike path just dead ends into a hill. If you want to continue to ride, you are forced onto surface streets and have to deal with a lot of traffic and a fairly narrow shoulder.

However, there is a tunnel through the hill. On the other side there is a residential neighborhood, and then a fairly straightforward connection to link back up with a Class II bike path.

Why not open the tunnel?

Well, it will cost money, and there is the inevitable disapproval from the residents on either side of the tunnel. Why? Well, of course the increased crime that would come along with bike commuters! Huh?

You can read more here.

And here is a video on the issue from who knows when.

Kinky Llama

Ok, you probably have already heard about this, but I figure it warrants a post.

From the Chicago Tribune:

Inspiration can strike at odd times. Anthony Mikrut got the idea for his business about 3 o'clock one morning, when he and a girlfriend were in search of some ... uh ... products to enhance their ... er ... special evening.

"We figured you can get pizza any time of night," he said. "Why can't you get [sex] toys?"

Thus was born The Kinky Llama, a purveyor of adult goods that promises one-hour delivery—by bicycle, no less — to most places in Chicago. Mikrut, 33, said the company has been around for 21/2 years and that, despite the recession, he's busier than ever.

The Big 56

Here in San Francisco, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition just kicked off a new campaign: The Big 56 For Bikes. Its kind of a long story, which can read about here but San Francisco put together a plan for a pretty big improvement in biking infrastructure, which has been held up for several years. Now the roadblocks (pardon my pun) are slowly being cleared, but the SF Bike Coalition wants to make sure that the City actually follows through and approves and funds the plan.






I think the Coalition does a pretty good job at community involvement and has added a feature to their web site where we can sign up for notifications on projects in your neighborhood and tap into volunteer opportunities.

Tour of California: Day 3

I made it out to the Great Highway today to watch the race. It was cold, rainy, and kind of windy. I got there about 7:30 and stood in the rain. The picture above is from about 8:30. By the time the race came by at about 9, a pretty decent crowd had shown up. Guys came with cowbells and all!

I got a video, but its 165 MB. I'll try and figure out how to downsize and then post.

They all came and went pretty quick.

Tour of California: Day 2

Its been rainy all day. Pretty cold too. My Tivo didn't really catch the whole race unfortunately, but it looked pretty miserable. At this point getting up early on my day off to go stand in the rain is not sounding too exciting..

Tour of California: Day 1

The Tour of California kicked off today with a prologue in Sacramento. I tivo'ed it so I am trying to avoid reading who won.

I scoped out my viewing location for Monday when the race comes through San Francisco. I'm thinking of climbing to the top of a dune along Great Highway, either at Judah or further out around Taraval. It was pretty windy today with scattered showers so hopefully Monday morning is better.

For some reason, I think there is a lot more excitement this year. We'll see what the turn out is.

Read here