Category: Biking Elsewhere

My money is on that he will fail but if you want to read more:
https://dc.streetsblog.org/2011/09/13/house-prepares-to-vote-on-extension-coburn-will-try-to-kill-bikeped/

By MARKUS MANNHEIM
Not long after Henry Ford drove the car into mainstream American life, a new area of psychology began to flourish. Its aim, in layman’s terms, was to understand why apparently normal people become complete arseholes behind a steering wheel. Leon Brody’s 1955 book, The psychology of problem drivers, concluded that ”problem drivers are problem people; or rather, people with problems, including problems of which they often are not aware”. Until then, researchers had believed most crashes were caused by physical shortcomings such as slow reflexes, poor eyesight and glare-recovery time. But, as Herbert Stack wrote in the Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine in 1956, ”[In] all of our studies, these characteristics have been found to have little significance. The real causes of accidents are far more deep-seated. They have to do with our attitudes, our emotions, and our judgments.”
We don’t need to read this in journals; it’s evident to any observant driver, even on Canberra’s comparatively calm roads. Once inside a car, a harsh self-interest replaces many civilians’ usual willingness to co-operate. Driving becomes less a means of travelling efficiently than a competition to get ahead of nearby ”rivals”. We throw caution out the window in favour of cutting our journeys by seconds. Drivers who are mild mannered in all other aspects of life become enraged by the perceived slights of other motorists (and especially cyclists). And almost no one respects basic road rules such as speed limits and the requirement to indicate; somehow, when we’re in a car, these laws become optional.
Why the transformation? Tom Vanderbilt, the author of the best seller Traffic, suggests many reasons. But among the most important is that we often drive alone, and we opt to cut out external reminders (such as sounds) of the people around us. ”[We] think of traffic as an abstraction, a grouping of things rather than a collection of individuals. We talk about ‘beating the traffic’ or ‘getting stuck in traffic’, but we never talk in polite company, at least about ‘beating people’ or ‘getting stuck in people’.” For some people, driving is as surreal as a video game.
This week, talkback radio was alive with indignation as Canberrans discussed the prospect of paying a toll on the Majura Parkway. It became apparent that drivers’ lack of reason extends well beyond the confines of their cars to any road-related discussion. Caller after caller pleaded emotionally that they had already paid for the roads they use through registration fees and fuel excises. It’s a fallacy often repeated and just as often debunked. Still, let’s try again.
In 2006-07, the Federal Government collected about $14billion in fuel excises, but returned about $4billion in tax credits. Also that year, the states and territories garnered $6billion in rego fees, car stamp duties, insurance levies, parking charges and so on. So, all up, motorists directly forked out $16billion in 2006-07. In the same year, governments spent about $12billion building roads and bridges.
So drivers do pay their way? Not quite, because roads and cars create vast economic externalities; costs that the taxpayer usually wears because no one else will. The Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics estimates the social costs of road crashes alone in 2006 was about $18billion; expenses such as health care and rehabilitation, damaged infrastructure, legal bills and emergency services. The bureau also estimates that congestion cost about $10billion in 2006, mostly as a result of lost productivity. And then there’s the lost value of the public land on which roads are built: vast stretches of tarmac put to relatively unproductive use, criss-crossing Australia’s prime real estate.
In other words, driving is a highly-subsidised privilege; not a right that we have purchased. It’s worth remembering next time we feel a whine, or a rage, coming on.
Continue reading “Drivers smash the illusion that we’re a rational society”

By JANE E. BRODY – New York Times
If you have gained a lot of unwanted pounds at any time during the last 30-odd years, you may be relieved to know that you are probably not to blame. At least not entirely.
Many environmental forces, from economic interests of the food and beverage industries to the way our cities and towns are built, have conspired to subvert the body’s natural ability to match calories in with calories out.
And the solution to the nation’s most pressing health problem — the ever-rising epidemic of overweight and obesity at all ages — lies in the answer to this question: Why did this happen in the first place?
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What Changed?
When I was growing up in the 1940s and ’50s, I had to walk or bike many blocks to buy an ice cream cone.
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Continue reading “Attacking the Obesity Epidemic by First Figuring Out Its Cause”

From Wired
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The locking mechanism comprises a section of the seatstays — the two tubes that extend up to the seat from the rear wheel. Leinonen installed a universal joint at the junction of the tube and latches in the stays to secure it to the frame.
The locking section of the frame swings to secure your bike to a meter, post. Should an ignorant criminal break the lock, the chain stays — those tubes extending from the rear wheel to the crank — won’t support a rider’s weight. The bike will collapse as the thief tries to ride off with the plunder. Unfortunately, whether the culprit realizes the destruction before or after breaking the lock, all parties are left without a bike.
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Continue reading “The StayLocked Bicycle is unridable when the locking mechanism is broken.”

Highlight from Commute by Bike by Dara Marks Marino

In fact, she and I both love riding together so much that the whole time we ride this is what I hear behind me: WooHooo! I love riding with you, Mama! This is so fun! This is the best ride EVER! Yes, I do want to go for a longer ride!
Continue reading “Commuting with Adams Original Folder Compact Trail-a-Bike”

Tangent based on Streetsblog Capitol Hill post

Photo: Sustainable Savannah

[B’ Spokes: Whenever someone complains about recreational cyclists, this picture really puts those complaints in perspective.]
Continue reading “Only People on Bikes Go Joyriding”

Written by Emerson Marcus – RGJ
Reno’s Max McManus said the final days of his country-wide cycling run through 50 states in 50 days have been motivated by "pure creative survival."
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McManus, who has completed nine marathons and four Ironman Triathlons, has worn a GPS given to him by the Guinness Book of World Records. Nobody has been able to traverse all 50 states in 50 days on a bike. McManus said the closest anybody has come is riding over the continental 48 states in 60 days.
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"This has to be the hilliest state in the country," said McManus, who is just south of Baltimore.
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Continue reading “Sept. 11: Reno cyclist nears 50th state as 50th day arrives”

from Transportation For America by Sean Barry
WASHINGTON, DC — Congressional leaders from both the House and Senate agreed Friday to extend SAFETEA-LU, the current surface transportation law, for six months at current funding levels and without policy changes. James Corless, director of Transportation for America, issued this statement in response:
“It is a good sign, indeed, that bipartisan negotiations between House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid resulted in an agreement that will keep Americans at work building our nation’s infrastructure. We are especially pleased that the extension funds the transportation program at existing levels and does not include divisive policy changes that deserve a full hearing and debate.
“The six-month timeline allows the relevant House and Senate Committees an opportunity to continue crafting a long-term authorization that protects and creates jobs, while investing in the travel options Americans want with the accountability they deserve. We look forward to working with Congress to get a new bill done next year.”
Continue reading “T4 America commends Speaker Boehner, Senate Leader Reid for agreement on clean transportation extension”

[B’ Spokes: I’ve been having a time argument with my Mom for my 13 mile (one way) commute. Mom:”But it takes you (almost) an hour to bike there and it would only take you a half hour by car (doing 60 mph most of the way.)” Yet my Mom spends an hour in a gym every day so to do the equivalent there would be no time savings what so ever!

It comes down to a choice of doing only one hour of gym time and then have to zoom around like you are crazy or two hours of fun relaxed bike time. Just because you are doing 60+mph does not mean you are saving any time at all. And I’ll note I have done the trip in 40 minutes by bike and because of rush hour traffic the trip has taken 40 minutes by car. The time gap is closing.]

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Are Cars Really Our Greatest Mistake?

By mike Filed in $ The True Cost of Cars Tagged with accidents, economics, neighbourhoods, waste

Definitely.

But let me to qualify that just a little. I don’t mean Man’s greatest mistake ever. And I don’t count human foibles or innate weaknesses as mistakes.

What I am talking about is our ongoing rational choice, right now, to spend our physical resources, time and creative energy doing one thing rather than another.

A mistake, by this definition, must also be an opportunity. A chance to do things differently. And yes, in these terms, the increasingly universal spread of the private motor car is undoubtedly Man’s greatest mistake. And our greatest opportunity.

Oddly, part of the problem in making the case against the car is that the arguments are so numerous and diverse that they become confusing, overwhelming.

20 million deaths from road accidents in 15 years, for example; that’s more than were killed in World War One. And don’t forget the 200 million people seriously injured. The majority of them our children and youngsters. It is a truly, truly horrific mass slaughter. And entirely avoidable.

Or our lost sense of community; the constant noise and the danger from cars stops kids playing and parents chatting. Cars physically prevent communication between people. They are by far the most conspicuous symbol of wealth and so are deeply divisive.

Or the fact that these hugely expensive, high-tech assets spend 96% of the time idle and cluttering up the place. We live in rich societies, but it doesn’t feel like it because our wealth sits around, depreciating in car parks, front gardens and at the side of the road.

Or the land use – look around what used to be a green and pleasant land and you’ll see mainly tarmac.

Or the inflationary pressure on all our main commodities, including food.

Or the health impact of the obesity crisis.

Or the deaths from air pollution.

Or the oil wars.

Do you see what I mean? The car is so dominant in our economics and in our public space that we are faced with a many headed beast. It is the combination of these massive detriments that adds up to what is by far our our biggest mistake.

And other crimes could be added to the charge sheet, but the one that really sums it up for me is this: the cost to our time.

Time is our most precious personal resource. Given time, anyone can achieve anything. Cars are meant to make life faster and allow us to do more, to get more out of life. It is deeply ironic then, that cars actually suck up vast amounts of people’s time, apparently without us noticing.

It takes time to research, purchase, insure, tax, maintain, clean, fill with petrol, plan routes, drive ourselves around, find parking spaces, deal with breakdowns, accidents and tickets and generally worry about our cars. People don’t keep tabs on all this time and compare it to journey time saved, we don’t tend to think that way.

But even if we did keep careful notes and tot it up, we would still be ignoring the car’s biggest drain on our time. Because we’ve got to pay for our cars somehow and for most people that means working to earn the money. On average we spend around a quarter of our income on running a car. So we spend about 1 to 1.5 days every week working for the car. As we earn more we simply ‘upgrade’ the car. It’s amazing really, the power of marketing and peer pressure.

Now if you are a real car enthusiast, a hobbyist, it’s kind of understandable that you should devote so much of your life to your car. As for the rest of us, wouldn’t we rather save the time and work 3.5 days instead of 5? Imagine what we could do with that time. At very least, shouldn’t our society and infrastructure be arranged to give us that genuine choice?

So, by a whisker, and out of several strong contenders, that’s my personal favourite reason that the car is Man’s greatest mistake. What’s yours?

Continue reading “Man’s Greatest Mistake CARS ARE BRILLIANT, BUT THEY ARE A BRILLIANT MISTAKE, AND DEEP DOWN, WE ALL KNOW IT…”

From The Economist
DYING while cycling is three to five times more likely in America than in Denmark, Germany or the Netherlands. To understand why, consider the death of Michael Wang. He was pedalling home from work in Seattle on a sunny weekday afternoon in late July when, witnesses say, a brown SUV made a left turn, crunched into Wang and sped away.
The road where the 44-year-old father of two was hit is the busiest cycling corridor in Seattle, and it has clearly marked bicycle lanes. But the lanes are protected from motor vehicles by a line of white paint—a largely metaphorical barrier that many drivers ignore and police do not vigorously enforce. A few feet from the cycling lane traffic moves at speeds of between 30 miles per hour, the speed limit for arterials in Seattle, and 40 miles per hour, the speed at which many cars actually travel. This kind of speed kills. A pedestrian hit by a car moving at 30mph has a 45% chance of dying; at 40mph, the chance of death is 85%, according to Britain’s Department of Transport.
Had Mr Wang been commuting on a busy bike route in Amsterdam, Copenhagen or Berlin, his unprotected exposure to instruments of death—namely, any vehicle moving at 20mph or more—would be nearly nil. These cities have knitted together networks for everyday travel by bike. To start with, motor vehicles allowed near cyclists are subject to “traffic calming”. They must slow down to about 19mph, a speed that, in case of collision, kills less than 5%. Police strictly enforce these speed limits with hefty fines. Repeat offenders lose their licences.
Calmer traffic is just the beginning. In much of northern Europe, cyclists commute on lanes that are protected from cars by concrete buffers, rows of trees or parked cars. At busy crossroads, bicycle-activated traffic lights let cyclists cross first. Traffic laws discriminate in favour of people on bikes. A few American cities have taken European-style steps to make streets safer for cycling, most notably Portland, Oregon, which has used most of the above ideas. The result: more bikes and fewer deaths. Nearly 6% of commuters bike to work in Portland, the highest proportion in America. But in five out of the past ten years there have been no cycling deaths there. In the nearby Seattle area, where cycling is popular but traffic calming is not, three cyclists, have been killed in the past few weeks.
Continue reading “With a very few exceptions, America is no place for cyclists”