I haven’t felt like doing this bike blog lately. I bike almost as much as ever. I have to get where I’m going. But the bike muse doesn’t sit on my handle bars like she used to. Instead my mind has been trying to muck its way through this thing called “the economy.” Like many of you, no doubt, I’m wondering intently what will become of us.
Like practically everyone else, my husband and I found out we’re going to be a bit poorer than we planned in our advancing years. We’ll have to cut out our frivolous travel hobby. We’ll have to stay home more and lead an even simpler life than we already do. Meanwhile every night after I park my bike in the basement and head upstairs, I will keep breathing a prayer of thanks that none of our kids has yet joined the teaming multitudes of the unemployed.
But the big concern for me now is Othello, not the Shakespearean play. It’s the neighborhood where I live. I’m pretty invested in the place, heart and soul. Some people have jokingly dubbed me “unofficial mayor” of Othello. Actually, I think of myself more as the wife of Othello. I’m married to the place. So maybe they should call me Desdemona.
What I have invested in Othello is about a dozen years of neighborhood organizing trying to make sure we get a pedestrian friendly town center built around our new light rail station. Up until October 2008 our neighborhood dreams appeared to be coming true with bravado. Riding the wave of the great real estate bubble, new urbanist developers who had also fallen in love with Othello were planning mixed use commercial and residential buildings around the station. Their beautiful drawings and models exceeded our hopes and dreams. Then in October 2008, the economic bubble burst. The now familiar phrase is that development is, for the most part, “on hold.”
Not the light rail. That appears to be moving along. Sleek modern cars run up and down the street every few minutes cheerfully ringing their little test train bells as they pass in and out of the pretty wrought iron station. I throw them kisses as they pass and picture how in July when they start picking up passengers, my bike and I will be among their most loyal customers. But to attract enough ridership to really keeps it going we’ll need more people and shops and stores. That’s where this thing called “the economy” comes in.
I’m not one of those gullible types that sit around watching the news and waiting for the economy to start “growing” and get back to “normal” again. I don’t believe in that. This isn’t “Econ for Dummies Made Easy.” What it looks like is that past economic booms were just big Wall Street casinos where rich people gambled with our future using paper monopoly money. This notion that we should praise the god of “economic growth” makes no sense in terms of the real world. Economic growth depletes the world of its non-renewable resources, most notably oil. Besides, there are already six billion people on a planet that was probably built for about two billion, and it was the abundance of cheap oil that made possible the population bubble in the first place.
So I see these hard economic times as not just a cycling down that will swing back up again. I believe capitalism as we know it (meaning the big stock market casino) is over. What I imagine taking its place will be a poorer, simpler time. There will be fewer people, more of whom will be riding bikes and trains. Instead of eating packaged supermarket food shipped from California, they’ll be growing food in places like (my favorite fantasy) the power line green belt along the Chief Sealth Trail right in my neighborhood, Othello. Instead of living in big houses on great polluting lawns sprawling out into infinity, they’ll be living in small apartments in places like the Othello town center, chatting with their neighbors and walking in Othello Park. They’ll use trains and bikes for transportation, not cars. That I hope is what will become of folks like us who have invested our hopes and dreams in a simpler form of city life.
But what will become of I-5 and other big freeways in the USA? Maybe poor street vendors will spread out their wares for sale on them like in India. As for the big houses way out in the suburbs, new urbanist, James Howard Kunstler projects they’ll be slum tenements housing several families who cultivate the lawns for food. Bleak as this sounds, it’s better than more big phony economic bubbles pumped up by greedy capitalists and waiting to burst again.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Being Futurewise: Transit Oriented Communities
I once had a history buff for a coworker. The walls of Henry’s (not his real name) office were plastered with his treasures, namely laminated newspaper clippings from before WW2. Henry was an oldie like me. Like me, he could remember a world without freeways, car oriented commercial strips, or suburban sprawl. Like me, he did not drive to work. But instead of biking he took the bus from the north end of the city and transferred downtown to another south bound bus. His commute took over an hour each way but that gave Henry plenty of time to read history books.
When we were first becoming acquainted Henry asked me if I was interested in history. I had to think about this. I read history only as it relates to other interests like creating a global democratic government, replacing the automobile with bikes and transit, etc. “Actually, I’m more of a futurist than a historian,” I said.
I told him about how I was working with a neighborhood planning group to make sure a pedestrian friendly town center would be built around a future light rail station in my neighborhood. I described how our ugly piece of commercial strip with its acres of parking lots would one day resemble a transit village like the many that line rail systems in major transit cities like Copenhagen and Singapore. There would be lots of bikes parked at the station. People would leave their cars at home and walk to the trains stopping at coffee houses and park benches to chat or read newspapers.
“Like in the old days,” sighed Henry. (So much for my claim to being a futurist.)
Our long awaited light rail system in the Seattle/Puget Sound region is scheduled to begin running in July of this year, 2009. My neighborhood has a plan and design guidelines which have attracted developers who want to replace our yawning parking lots with attractive mixed use residential and commercial buildings with stores along the sidewalks and housing above__like in Copenhagen and Singapore,
Like Henry you have to look at history to see why so many US cities like Seattle have been uglified with parking lots, strip malls, big box stores, and CO2 emissions that create global warming. New Urbanist, James Howard Kunstler summed it up in one phrase, “zoning laws.” After World War II our cities created zoning to make everything convenient for the automobile. They made it illegal to build pedestrian friendly places like the old main streets of America’s small towns or the transit villages of Copenhagen. For miles our major arterials had to be built wide to accommodate fast moving traffic and zoned “C1” (one story commercial with acres of parking required) Sorry no residences. Who would want to live there anyway?
In the past decade, some neighborhood planning in Seattle has been directed toward reversing this trend. The plans allow zoning “overlays” for denser pedestrian oriented places. The idea is that people will want to live near light rail stations with community gardens, public parks, stores along the street.
A Washington organization called “Futurewise” has proposed a state law, HB1490 Transit Oriented Communities which embodies a complete reversal of post World War II zoning regulations. Motivated by Futurewises’ mission to reduce urban sprawl, the proposed bill requires neighborhoods within a half mile of light rail stations to build denser town centers like the one planned for my neighborhood. It would require 50 dwelling units per acre in larger urban growth centers like downtown and the University District. Other station areas have to adopt plans with similar effects, namely the building of denser, mixed use residential and commercial town centers. There will be no minimum parking requirements in the future town centers. HB1490 is therefore the complete antithesis of zoning ordinances that created “car world,” and urban sprawl. If this new zoning law succeeds half as well as the old ordinances that have so uglified the American landscape, we will be living in a futuristic world that will be more like the good old days.
.
When we were first becoming acquainted Henry asked me if I was interested in history. I had to think about this. I read history only as it relates to other interests like creating a global democratic government, replacing the automobile with bikes and transit, etc. “Actually, I’m more of a futurist than a historian,” I said.
I told him about how I was working with a neighborhood planning group to make sure a pedestrian friendly town center would be built around a future light rail station in my neighborhood. I described how our ugly piece of commercial strip with its acres of parking lots would one day resemble a transit village like the many that line rail systems in major transit cities like Copenhagen and Singapore. There would be lots of bikes parked at the station. People would leave their cars at home and walk to the trains stopping at coffee houses and park benches to chat or read newspapers.
“Like in the old days,” sighed Henry. (So much for my claim to being a futurist.)
Our long awaited light rail system in the Seattle/Puget Sound region is scheduled to begin running in July of this year, 2009. My neighborhood has a plan and design guidelines which have attracted developers who want to replace our yawning parking lots with attractive mixed use residential and commercial buildings with stores along the sidewalks and housing above__like in Copenhagen and Singapore,
Like Henry you have to look at history to see why so many US cities like Seattle have been uglified with parking lots, strip malls, big box stores, and CO2 emissions that create global warming. New Urbanist, James Howard Kunstler summed it up in one phrase, “zoning laws.” After World War II our cities created zoning to make everything convenient for the automobile. They made it illegal to build pedestrian friendly places like the old main streets of America’s small towns or the transit villages of Copenhagen. For miles our major arterials had to be built wide to accommodate fast moving traffic and zoned “C1” (one story commercial with acres of parking required) Sorry no residences. Who would want to live there anyway?
In the past decade, some neighborhood planning in Seattle has been directed toward reversing this trend. The plans allow zoning “overlays” for denser pedestrian oriented places. The idea is that people will want to live near light rail stations with community gardens, public parks, stores along the street.
A Washington organization called “Futurewise” has proposed a state law, HB1490 Transit Oriented Communities which embodies a complete reversal of post World War II zoning regulations. Motivated by Futurewises’ mission to reduce urban sprawl, the proposed bill requires neighborhoods within a half mile of light rail stations to build denser town centers like the one planned for my neighborhood. It would require 50 dwelling units per acre in larger urban growth centers like downtown and the University District. Other station areas have to adopt plans with similar effects, namely the building of denser, mixed use residential and commercial town centers. There will be no minimum parking requirements in the future town centers. HB1490 is therefore the complete antithesis of zoning ordinances that created “car world,” and urban sprawl. If this new zoning law succeeds half as well as the old ordinances that have so uglified the American landscape, we will be living in a futuristic world that will be more like the good old days.
.
Monday, February 16, 2009
It's Always Warm There and Other Myths about Bicycling in Florida
Myth # 1: It’s Always Warm There
Well, most of the time. But on our first day at my brother’s condo in Indian Shores near Tampa, Mother Nature sent the Pacific Northwest weather gods down after us. It poured rain as the palm trees bent low in the wind. Then two big cold fronts chased each other down from the north. On the coldest nights temperatures dipped down into the thirties. Luckily we were snug in our Hilleburg four season tent made in Sweden. But days were mostly nice. The coldest reached into the fifties with clear sunny skies, but by the time we reached Miami, our bare limbs were browning in warm sunlight.
Myth #2: Bicycling Is Very Popular in Florida
Floridians were aghast when my husband, Dick, and I told them we were cycling Highway 41 (called the Tamiami Trail) from Tampa to Miami. They were even more stunned when we explained that our Bike Friday Project Q tandem (made in Eugene, Oregon) could be disassembled and packed in our trailer which becomes a suit case to be checked on an airplane.
In Seattle the popularity of cycling is manifest in groups of six to twenty bikers groomed in flashy jerseys skimming along Lake Washington Blvd. and headed out for a fifty mile round trip training ride in preparation for the annual summer 10,000 cyclist strong Seattle to Portland mob scene.
We did see a number of bikes in Florida, lots of them racked onto the backs of RV’s. Such bikes tended to carry old ladies like me on evening spins around RV parks. We only saw one other bike traveler. He was loaded up and headed for the Everglades. Bikes weren’t even allowed on the Skyway Bridge crossing Tampa Bay so my brother was kind enough to drive down there in his van and ferry us across.
The most avid cyclists we met were my brother, Tim, and his friend, Barbara who, like us, are no spring chickens. We had to put out some effort keeping up with them on the Pinellas Trial, a 35 mile county bike path. But Barb wore a T shirt that read “I biked the entire Pinellas Trail--and it only took me four years.”
The unpopularity of cycling was expressed in gestures and taunts from passing motorists on a northerly stretch of Highway 41. “Get on the sidewalk, you jerks!” Never mind that the sidewalks in that seemingly endless commercial strip of road weren’t wide enough for our trailer. At regular intervals, phone poles grew out of the so called sidewalks which often deteriorated to muddy foot paths with no curb cuts at intersections. So we biked as inconspicuously as possible on the far right side of the street. Even so, one man jumped out of his car and yelled, “No one can get around you.” Never mind that it was a six lane boulevard.
The popularity of Florida style cycling was best displayed in tourist Mecca’s like Sanibel and Naples where families and elderly couples pedaled leisurely along networks of bike paths through woodlands often headed for nature parks or beaches. We also found some nice wide shoulders for cycling on a six mile stretch of bridges to Sanibel Island. Infinite panoramic views like the ones from that bridge, of the Gulf and coastal islands, are some of the cycling’s greatest thrills. Also farther south through the Everglades there was less traffic and some decent shoulders where we felt safe and unharrassed.
.Myth # 3: There’s Nothin’ Out There
“Where you folks headed?” asked a local hopping out of his pick-up at a gas station.
”We’re taking this road all the way to Miami.”
“There’s nothin’ out there,” he grunted.
“We’ve heard there’s lots of wild life.”
“Oh, I guess you’ll see a few birds.”
That was the understatement of the year. What we actually saw was a bird watcher’s paradise. Great flocks of white egrets would suddenly rise like storm clouds out of grassy wetlands. Ahingas and herons stood on stilts of legs in the marshes, their long graceful necks poised to suddenly dart out and stab a fish. Flocks of wood storks, white with black tipped wings, and pink rosiette spoon bills perched in trees along side the road. Pelicans flew overhead in formation like stunt planes at the fair. Sometimes we stopped for short hikes along board walks where alligators lurked in dark pools of mangrove swamps. Once we saw a great horned owl perched regally on high. I felt so sorry for people charging by in cars. You must move slowly to see things.
Myth # 4: Lodging is Outrageously Expensive in Florida
I suppose there’s some truth in that. But at the beginning of our trip, my dear brother, Tim, and his wife, Linda, put us up for a few free nights in their condo at Indian Shores. Then we avoided hotels, particularly fancy ones in prime tourist traps although a couple of times we had to resort to private camp grounds which could cost up to $65 a night. But we loved the Florida State parks with their stately royal palms and grassy spaces. These places with fellowship, fun, nature hikes, ranger talks, ice cream socials warm showers, continental breakfasts and more can be enjoyed at the reasonable price of $20 per night. Since we had no automobile, we were allowed to stay for free a couple of nights at Collier Seminole Park as guests of another couple. We also lucked out with some free nights camping out in lovely primitive sites beside the road.
Our final three nights were also cost free thanks to the generosity of our friend, Lucy, in Miami. Her beautiful Spanish style house is located on a park surrounding a lake with a ten mile bike path running around it. Complete with man made white sandy beaches, the place is quite the tropical paradise. Lucy has the house up for sale at $255,400. She wants to move back to cold, rainy Seattle where the average home costs about $150, 000 more than that. Anyone want to cash in their chips and trade them for a winterless life?
Myth # 5: We Biked All the Way from Tampa to Miami
Actually the tow bar of our trailer broke in two outside the Miccosukee Cultural Village on our last day so Lucy drove about 20 miles out and picked us up. Don’t blame the mishap on Bike Friday. That delicate little piece of aluminum tubing has hauled our stuff thousands of miles across many lands. Besides the Company has since replaced the six year old part with a new one at no cost.
Myth # 7: Alligators are Green
Actually they’re black.
Well, most of the time. But on our first day at my brother’s condo in Indian Shores near Tampa, Mother Nature sent the Pacific Northwest weather gods down after us. It poured rain as the palm trees bent low in the wind. Then two big cold fronts chased each other down from the north. On the coldest nights temperatures dipped down into the thirties. Luckily we were snug in our Hilleburg four season tent made in Sweden. But days were mostly nice. The coldest reached into the fifties with clear sunny skies, but by the time we reached Miami, our bare limbs were browning in warm sunlight.
Myth #2: Bicycling Is Very Popular in Florida
Floridians were aghast when my husband, Dick, and I told them we were cycling Highway 41 (called the Tamiami Trail) from Tampa to Miami. They were even more stunned when we explained that our Bike Friday Project Q tandem (made in Eugene, Oregon) could be disassembled and packed in our trailer which becomes a suit case to be checked on an airplane.
In Seattle the popularity of cycling is manifest in groups of six to twenty bikers groomed in flashy jerseys skimming along Lake Washington Blvd. and headed out for a fifty mile round trip training ride in preparation for the annual summer 10,000 cyclist strong Seattle to Portland mob scene.
We did see a number of bikes in Florida, lots of them racked onto the backs of RV’s. Such bikes tended to carry old ladies like me on evening spins around RV parks. We only saw one other bike traveler. He was loaded up and headed for the Everglades. Bikes weren’t even allowed on the Skyway Bridge crossing Tampa Bay so my brother was kind enough to drive down there in his van and ferry us across.
The most avid cyclists we met were my brother, Tim, and his friend, Barbara who, like us, are no spring chickens. We had to put out some effort keeping up with them on the Pinellas Trial, a 35 mile county bike path. But Barb wore a T shirt that read “I biked the entire Pinellas Trail--and it only took me four years.”
The unpopularity of cycling was expressed in gestures and taunts from passing motorists on a northerly stretch of Highway 41. “Get on the sidewalk, you jerks!” Never mind that the sidewalks in that seemingly endless commercial strip of road weren’t wide enough for our trailer. At regular intervals, phone poles grew out of the so called sidewalks which often deteriorated to muddy foot paths with no curb cuts at intersections. So we biked as inconspicuously as possible on the far right side of the street. Even so, one man jumped out of his car and yelled, “No one can get around you.” Never mind that it was a six lane boulevard.
The popularity of Florida style cycling was best displayed in tourist Mecca’s like Sanibel and Naples where families and elderly couples pedaled leisurely along networks of bike paths through woodlands often headed for nature parks or beaches. We also found some nice wide shoulders for cycling on a six mile stretch of bridges to Sanibel Island. Infinite panoramic views like the ones from that bridge, of the Gulf and coastal islands, are some of the cycling’s greatest thrills. Also farther south through the Everglades there was less traffic and some decent shoulders where we felt safe and unharrassed.
.Myth # 3: There’s Nothin’ Out There
“Where you folks headed?” asked a local hopping out of his pick-up at a gas station.
”We’re taking this road all the way to Miami.”
“There’s nothin’ out there,” he grunted.
“We’ve heard there’s lots of wild life.”
“Oh, I guess you’ll see a few birds.”
That was the understatement of the year. What we actually saw was a bird watcher’s paradise. Great flocks of white egrets would suddenly rise like storm clouds out of grassy wetlands. Ahingas and herons stood on stilts of legs in the marshes, their long graceful necks poised to suddenly dart out and stab a fish. Flocks of wood storks, white with black tipped wings, and pink rosiette spoon bills perched in trees along side the road. Pelicans flew overhead in formation like stunt planes at the fair. Sometimes we stopped for short hikes along board walks where alligators lurked in dark pools of mangrove swamps. Once we saw a great horned owl perched regally on high. I felt so sorry for people charging by in cars. You must move slowly to see things.
Myth # 4: Lodging is Outrageously Expensive in Florida
I suppose there’s some truth in that. But at the beginning of our trip, my dear brother, Tim, and his wife, Linda, put us up for a few free nights in their condo at Indian Shores. Then we avoided hotels, particularly fancy ones in prime tourist traps although a couple of times we had to resort to private camp grounds which could cost up to $65 a night. But we loved the Florida State parks with their stately royal palms and grassy spaces. These places with fellowship, fun, nature hikes, ranger talks, ice cream socials warm showers, continental breakfasts and more can be enjoyed at the reasonable price of $20 per night. Since we had no automobile, we were allowed to stay for free a couple of nights at Collier Seminole Park as guests of another couple. We also lucked out with some free nights camping out in lovely primitive sites beside the road.
Our final three nights were also cost free thanks to the generosity of our friend, Lucy, in Miami. Her beautiful Spanish style house is located on a park surrounding a lake with a ten mile bike path running around it. Complete with man made white sandy beaches, the place is quite the tropical paradise. Lucy has the house up for sale at $255,400. She wants to move back to cold, rainy Seattle where the average home costs about $150, 000 more than that. Anyone want to cash in their chips and trade them for a winterless life?
Myth # 5: We Biked All the Way from Tampa to Miami
Actually the tow bar of our trailer broke in two outside the Miccosukee Cultural Village on our last day so Lucy drove about 20 miles out and picked us up. Don’t blame the mishap on Bike Friday. That delicate little piece of aluminum tubing has hauled our stuff thousands of miles across many lands. Besides the Company has since replaced the six year old part with a new one at no cost.
Myth # 7: Alligators are Green
Actually they’re black.
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Biking Through a Winter Wonderland
Does somebody out there bike in snow? I can’t remember ever trying it, even as a kid growing up in St. Louis, MO. I recall seeing some people doing it in Germany, but I’m unlikely to attempt it now that I’m an old lady with a little ball of metal for a hip joint.
In Missouri we kids mainly biked in summer. In winter we dreamed of sledding through a White Christmas. Every few years our dreams came true, and we had snow for Christmas. Sometime since I came to the Pacific Northwest about 2/3 of a life ago, I gave up dreaming of a White Christmas. Seattle didn’t know much about snow. Maybe once or twice a year some sloppy white globs flew around in the air never reaching the ground. Sometimes it did cover things with that wet gray slush they sacrilegiously dubbed “snow.” Usually by the end of the day, the street gutters were little streams and rain was coming down as usual.
As for me I long since gave up dreaming of a White Christmas where your gloomy mundane winter world is transformed into something mystically white and “scintillating from a million diamond points.” Why wish for something that isn’t going to happen? That’s the surest route to unhappiness. In fact I made up a song:
I’m dreaming of a wet Christmas
Just like the ones I always get
May your days be merry and yet
May all your Christmases be wet.
After all one advantage of rain over snow is that you can put on a layer of Gortex and off you go to do your Christmas shopping by bike.
But this year, the closest to my 70th birthday, Mother Nature gave me a surprise Christmas present. It was a White Christmas exceeding all my childhood dreams. It started snowing in Seattle around the middle of December, and we had snow enchantingly filling the air and mantling the earth until the day after Christmas. A few days before Christmas we went to Lopez Island which is one of the most beautiful places the human species ever inhabited. We walked around peering across shimmering silver inlets through screens of falling snow as this already gorgeous place converted to a world of unimaginable splendor with white garnishing forested islands and blanketing rolling fields. Later we went to our family cabin on Hood Canal, ate Christmas dinner and exchanged gifts while watching snow filling our meadow.
I can hear some of you scoffing, “Bah humbug! Snow’s a nuisance!
I have to admit there were a few minor inconveniences in addition to not being able to ride my bike. Seattle garbage trucks were grounded and trash blew all over the city. The transit system was paralyzed. My husband had to shovel our sidewalks several times and lie down in the snow to put tire chains on and off the car. I was a bit skittish about walking in the snow for fear of falling and throwing out my fake hip, but I used hiking poles and stayed unsteadily erect. I guess the hardest part was that on Lopez the pipes froze for a couple of days, so we had to melt snow for water and use imaginary toilets outside in Winter Wonderland. But I have always found inconvenience to be a side effect of adventure
After Christmas the gift melted like ice cream in August. It was refreshing to get out and safely run some errands on my little black Dahon. But guess what! White feathery looking stuff is falling thickly again outside my window. It’s at least covering the lawn and some of the tree branches if not the street. In the morning we’ll see if it’s really snow or just water running in the gutters.
Anticipate, however, my next blog which, if all goes as planned, will be about our upcoming tandem bike trip later this month in Florida. So much for White Christmases and Winter Wonderlands.
P.S. I would love to hear what you think of snow and whether or not you bike in it.
In Missouri we kids mainly biked in summer. In winter we dreamed of sledding through a White Christmas. Every few years our dreams came true, and we had snow for Christmas. Sometime since I came to the Pacific Northwest about 2/3 of a life ago, I gave up dreaming of a White Christmas. Seattle didn’t know much about snow. Maybe once or twice a year some sloppy white globs flew around in the air never reaching the ground. Sometimes it did cover things with that wet gray slush they sacrilegiously dubbed “snow.” Usually by the end of the day, the street gutters were little streams and rain was coming down as usual.
As for me I long since gave up dreaming of a White Christmas where your gloomy mundane winter world is transformed into something mystically white and “scintillating from a million diamond points.” Why wish for something that isn’t going to happen? That’s the surest route to unhappiness. In fact I made up a song:
I’m dreaming of a wet Christmas
Just like the ones I always get
May your days be merry and yet
May all your Christmases be wet.
After all one advantage of rain over snow is that you can put on a layer of Gortex and off you go to do your Christmas shopping by bike.
But this year, the closest to my 70th birthday, Mother Nature gave me a surprise Christmas present. It was a White Christmas exceeding all my childhood dreams. It started snowing in Seattle around the middle of December, and we had snow enchantingly filling the air and mantling the earth until the day after Christmas. A few days before Christmas we went to Lopez Island which is one of the most beautiful places the human species ever inhabited. We walked around peering across shimmering silver inlets through screens of falling snow as this already gorgeous place converted to a world of unimaginable splendor with white garnishing forested islands and blanketing rolling fields. Later we went to our family cabin on Hood Canal, ate Christmas dinner and exchanged gifts while watching snow filling our meadow.
I can hear some of you scoffing, “Bah humbug! Snow’s a nuisance!
I have to admit there were a few minor inconveniences in addition to not being able to ride my bike. Seattle garbage trucks were grounded and trash blew all over the city. The transit system was paralyzed. My husband had to shovel our sidewalks several times and lie down in the snow to put tire chains on and off the car. I was a bit skittish about walking in the snow for fear of falling and throwing out my fake hip, but I used hiking poles and stayed unsteadily erect. I guess the hardest part was that on Lopez the pipes froze for a couple of days, so we had to melt snow for water and use imaginary toilets outside in Winter Wonderland. But I have always found inconvenience to be a side effect of adventure
After Christmas the gift melted like ice cream in August. It was refreshing to get out and safely run some errands on my little black Dahon. But guess what! White feathery looking stuff is falling thickly again outside my window. It’s at least covering the lawn and some of the tree branches if not the street. In the morning we’ll see if it’s really snow or just water running in the gutters.
Anticipate, however, my next blog which, if all goes as planned, will be about our upcoming tandem bike trip later this month in Florida. So much for White Christmases and Winter Wonderlands.
P.S. I would love to hear what you think of snow and whether or not you bike in it.
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Bike Shops for a Better World
My husband and I once took a bicycle tour of Soweto, the famous township in Johannesburg, former home to Nelson Mandela. (But that’s another story) Today I’m telling you about Afribike, www.Afribike.org/ , the nonprofit organization the conducted the tour. We met these amazing folks at their display booth during the World Summit on Sustainability in 2002. Afribike’s motto is, “Freedom is nothing without access.” Its purpose is to promote biking, not over driving a car, but rather over walking. That’s because thousands of South African women have to walk miles every day touting huge bundles on their heads and babies on their backs. To help these women out of poverty, Afribike gives them a course in bike repair and, at low cost, sells them a bike and, if needed, a small bike trailer. With this advanced transportation technology, the women can go to college, commute to jobs, take their children to day care and do all sorts of errands for which many American moms think vans and/or SUV’s are indispensable.
Afribike’s supply of donated used bikes comes in shipping containers from places like New York and London. Now and then one of the shipping containers is reincarnated as a small bike shops in a village or township and staffed with an Afribike trained mechanics who now has a job.
But nonprofit bike shops are not confined to the developing world. There are two on my way down town. I stop often at Bike Works www.bikeworks.org in the Columbia City neighborhood. It’s located in a small New England style house. Fronting on the sidewalk is its garage which has been converted to a store front with a big window full of bikes and all sorts of accessories from head lamps to chain grease to derailers. From this shop, Bike Works conducts normal day to day business for customers like me who push their bikes in from the street. Bike Works is where I have had most of my former repairs done. If I have to leave my bike there for extended repairs, it’s only a ten minute bus ride home.
But Bike Works has a higher purpose than just replacing my brake pads. A stairway leads up from the shop to where a room of the house has been converted to a class room. Kids and adults come there and learn to fix bikes. After a child takes the course and volunteers seventeen hours, they get a free bike. People from all over the city and beyond donate old bikes which Bike Works volunteers repair. Some of the refurbished bikes are sold in the shop, but many go to nonprofit organizations like Tree House and Fair Start that help poor kids. Thanks to Bike Works some poor children may find bikes under their Christmas trees.
Bike Works also partners with an organization called, The Village Bicycle Project a nonprofit organization similar to Afribike. Bike Works donates used bikes which the VPP ships to places like Ghana and El Salvador. The Project conducts a day long bike maintenance course for poor villagers. Anyone who completes the course gets a bike for half price.
Also on my way downtown on 14th Street just north of Jackson is a store front dubbed The Bikery. The shop consists of one lofty spacious room. Along its walls are large clearly labeled wooden boxes of carefully sorted bike parts, one box for derailers, one for chains, one for seats, etc. In the center of the busy room are several bike mechanic stands, most in use. This bike shop has no paid employees. Everyone is a volunteer.
I have not yet taken advantage of The Bikery’s services. That’s because you have to fix your own bike. Surely any self respecting old lady on a bike should try it sometime. The rental of a bike stand costs only $5.00 per hour and there are always expert mechanics on hand to help. My temporary excuse is that my Dahon folding bike is quite new and (knock on wood) does not yet need repairs.. In fact, I was a bit embarrassed about my shiny, new and expensive Dahon parked by the The Bikery door. The Bikery’s purpose is to make bicycling accessible to everyone at low cost. The most expensive bike in there costs $100 and can be paid for at least partly with volunteer hours.
But I have other excuses for owning this fancy bike in a world of poverty and want. Dahon is my accommodation for being an old lady with a piece of metal instead of a real ball joint in her hip. Besides my bike cost a lot less than a car and is friendlier to the planet.
Afribike’s supply of donated used bikes comes in shipping containers from places like New York and London. Now and then one of the shipping containers is reincarnated as a small bike shops in a village or township and staffed with an Afribike trained mechanics who now has a job.
But nonprofit bike shops are not confined to the developing world. There are two on my way down town. I stop often at Bike Works www.bikeworks.org in the Columbia City neighborhood. It’s located in a small New England style house. Fronting on the sidewalk is its garage which has been converted to a store front with a big window full of bikes and all sorts of accessories from head lamps to chain grease to derailers. From this shop, Bike Works conducts normal day to day business for customers like me who push their bikes in from the street. Bike Works is where I have had most of my former repairs done. If I have to leave my bike there for extended repairs, it’s only a ten minute bus ride home.
But Bike Works has a higher purpose than just replacing my brake pads. A stairway leads up from the shop to where a room of the house has been converted to a class room. Kids and adults come there and learn to fix bikes. After a child takes the course and volunteers seventeen hours, they get a free bike. People from all over the city and beyond donate old bikes which Bike Works volunteers repair. Some of the refurbished bikes are sold in the shop, but many go to nonprofit organizations like Tree House and Fair Start that help poor kids. Thanks to Bike Works some poor children may find bikes under their Christmas trees.
Bike Works also partners with an organization called, The Village Bicycle Project a nonprofit organization similar to Afribike. Bike Works donates used bikes which the VPP ships to places like Ghana and El Salvador. The Project conducts a day long bike maintenance course for poor villagers. Anyone who completes the course gets a bike for half price.
Also on my way downtown on 14th Street just north of Jackson is a store front dubbed The Bikery. The shop consists of one lofty spacious room. Along its walls are large clearly labeled wooden boxes of carefully sorted bike parts, one box for derailers, one for chains, one for seats, etc. In the center of the busy room are several bike mechanic stands, most in use. This bike shop has no paid employees. Everyone is a volunteer.
I have not yet taken advantage of The Bikery’s services. That’s because you have to fix your own bike. Surely any self respecting old lady on a bike should try it sometime. The rental of a bike stand costs only $5.00 per hour and there are always expert mechanics on hand to help. My temporary excuse is that my Dahon folding bike is quite new and (knock on wood) does not yet need repairs.. In fact, I was a bit embarrassed about my shiny, new and expensive Dahon parked by the The Bikery door. The Bikery’s purpose is to make bicycling accessible to everyone at low cost. The most expensive bike in there costs $100 and can be paid for at least partly with volunteer hours.
But I have other excuses for owning this fancy bike in a world of poverty and want. Dahon is my accommodation for being an old lady with a piece of metal instead of a real ball joint in her hip. Besides my bike cost a lot less than a car and is friendlier to the planet.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Cycling Through Hard Times
Hard times, like everything else, come in cycles. For instance, the end of daylight savings time and the cycle into darkness comes round this time of year as dependably as the death and taxes. This dark side of the sun cycle is tough on bicyclists. We have to go out again and buy a new head lamp which must be the world’s most popular target of theft. Then we have to check the rain gear to make sure its waterproofing survived the last cycle through the washing machine. For me the darkness cycle is pretty tough. I think I have what they call seasonal affective disorder (SAD). In summer I’m the happiest person on the planet. In winter I verge upon clinical depression-—except, of course, when I’m on my bike. It is impossible to depress while riding a bike. In fact, it’s hard to ride a bike without a smile on your face.
But sun and mood cycles are benevolent compared with the really hard ones, namely economic cycles. I was born in 1939 as the world was slowly cycling out of the Great Depression,and from the terrifying economic news these days, it looks like we might be cycling into another one. Judging from the length of the last Great Depression, my life cycle might be up before the hard times are over.
Throughout out my lifetime, there have been minor economic cycles of boom and bust, regulation and deregulation that unfettered the robber barons who then barreled right over the rest of us. Closely related to economic cycles are election cycles. As the Republicans cycled in and the Democrats cycled out, the ideology of deregulation and laissez faire capitalism usually rises while the social safety net tumbles. Maybe in a few days the Dems will cycle back in and clamp the breaks on today’s robber barons. I can at least hope.
But there are tougher cycles yet. Whole civilizations come and go as the major energy resources upon which they depend are depleted. Petroleum geologists believe our civilization is at the peak of its major energy source which will begin to decline. My children may live to see the fall of civilization as we know it. Those will be hard times indeed. Luckily my offspring are cyclists so not as petroleum dependant as many. Still no matter how hard times get on the down cycles, we humans seem to cycle right on through. We have our familial cycles of grandparents, parents and children. We have our friends, our communities, our love and faith in one another. We have our bicycles.
But sun and mood cycles are benevolent compared with the really hard ones, namely economic cycles. I was born in 1939 as the world was slowly cycling out of the Great Depression,and from the terrifying economic news these days, it looks like we might be cycling into another one. Judging from the length of the last Great Depression, my life cycle might be up before the hard times are over.
Throughout out my lifetime, there have been minor economic cycles of boom and bust, regulation and deregulation that unfettered the robber barons who then barreled right over the rest of us. Closely related to economic cycles are election cycles. As the Republicans cycled in and the Democrats cycled out, the ideology of deregulation and laissez faire capitalism usually rises while the social safety net tumbles. Maybe in a few days the Dems will cycle back in and clamp the breaks on today’s robber barons. I can at least hope.
But there are tougher cycles yet. Whole civilizations come and go as the major energy resources upon which they depend are depleted. Petroleum geologists believe our civilization is at the peak of its major energy source which will begin to decline. My children may live to see the fall of civilization as we know it. Those will be hard times indeed. Luckily my offspring are cyclists so not as petroleum dependant as many. Still no matter how hard times get on the down cycles, we humans seem to cycle right on through. We have our familial cycles of grandparents, parents and children. We have our friends, our communities, our love and faith in one another. We have our bicycles.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Back in the Saddle Again
“Back in the Saddle again. Out where a friend is a friend. Whoopy-ty-aye-ay I go my way. Back in the saddle again.”
When two months after the clavicle fracture, my no biking sentence finally ended, that old cowboy song burst joyously out of distant memory into the most brilliant sunlight of an Indian summer that I can recall in many years. The saddle refers to a horse, of course, but coincidentally, bike seats are also called saddles.
Recently converted to the bike-to-work religion, my friend Linda reclaimed the sweet little Burley (Birdy) folding bike she had lent me last winter to rehabilitate from my hip fracture. So I bought REI’s new model, the Dahon folding bike. A honey in her own right, Dahon is not very much like Birdy. She has her own peculiar personality and charm at half the price.
In lots of ways, Dahon is friendlier than Birdy. As I probably mentioned in early entries, cute as she is, Birdy won’t fit on a bus rack. She has eighteen inch wheels, too small for the slots, and her big chunky chain and derailer hang way low like cow’s udder at milking time. So there’s no way of putting her on the bus, short of folding her up.
Dahon has a tidy black business woman look to her. Her twenty inch wheels fit neatly into any bus rack. Her chain is barely visible, mostly hidden by a dainty chain guard. That same shiny piece of metal also hides Dahon’s hub shifter. There is no derailer to get in the way, even with my big old panniers fully loaded, of hoisting her gracefully onto a bus rack.
As for ease of folding there’s no contest. Some sadistic male engineer designed Birdy’s folding system. Several steps must be executed in a rigid sequence or you screw the whole thing up and have to start all over. Birdy’s main folding process consists of lifting the bike twice while folding each wheel separately inward and under. The front one has a tricky double hinge. With Dahon, you just release a lever on the bar and she basically folds in half. Even so, why fold? She fits on the bus rack unfolded. Just pull up in front of the bus and lift her on. I’m really very mobile with this bike.
Dahon has only one disadvantage. Her gear range is a bit narrower than Birdy’s. It’s pretty wide for a bike with only eight gears instead of twenty-one like Birdy. But I would judge from uphill pedal resistance that Dahon’s lowest gear is somewhere in the low mid-range of Birdy’s. Never mind. Dahon’s is adequate. I can pedal her right up to the top of Capitol Hill after the #48 bus lets me off at 23rd and John.
In fact, I’m sitting up here now having a latte at the Victrola Coffee Shop on 15th Ave. Be sure to check this pace out on a sweet sunny afternoon.
I have to admit that I didn’t come up here just for a latte. I had an appointment at Group Health this morning so I’m killing some time before my ride up Broadway to Yesler for my volunteer job as an English as a Second Language teacher. Then it will be back up to the top of Beacon Hill for a community group meeting this evening. There are lots of hilly days in my life as a biking old lady who refuses to quit. But as a friend of mine pointed out, “Hills are why they made buses.” I’ll be taking the #36 up to Beacon Hill for an evening ride along the Chief Sealth Trail with its great views of the mountains and the lake.
When two months after the clavicle fracture, my no biking sentence finally ended, that old cowboy song burst joyously out of distant memory into the most brilliant sunlight of an Indian summer that I can recall in many years. The saddle refers to a horse, of course, but coincidentally, bike seats are also called saddles.
Recently converted to the bike-to-work religion, my friend Linda reclaimed the sweet little Burley (Birdy) folding bike she had lent me last winter to rehabilitate from my hip fracture. So I bought REI’s new model, the Dahon folding bike. A honey in her own right, Dahon is not very much like Birdy. She has her own peculiar personality and charm at half the price.
In lots of ways, Dahon is friendlier than Birdy. As I probably mentioned in early entries, cute as she is, Birdy won’t fit on a bus rack. She has eighteen inch wheels, too small for the slots, and her big chunky chain and derailer hang way low like cow’s udder at milking time. So there’s no way of putting her on the bus, short of folding her up.
Dahon has a tidy black business woman look to her. Her twenty inch wheels fit neatly into any bus rack. Her chain is barely visible, mostly hidden by a dainty chain guard. That same shiny piece of metal also hides Dahon’s hub shifter. There is no derailer to get in the way, even with my big old panniers fully loaded, of hoisting her gracefully onto a bus rack.
As for ease of folding there’s no contest. Some sadistic male engineer designed Birdy’s folding system. Several steps must be executed in a rigid sequence or you screw the whole thing up and have to start all over. Birdy’s main folding process consists of lifting the bike twice while folding each wheel separately inward and under. The front one has a tricky double hinge. With Dahon, you just release a lever on the bar and she basically folds in half. Even so, why fold? She fits on the bus rack unfolded. Just pull up in front of the bus and lift her on. I’m really very mobile with this bike.
Dahon has only one disadvantage. Her gear range is a bit narrower than Birdy’s. It’s pretty wide for a bike with only eight gears instead of twenty-one like Birdy. But I would judge from uphill pedal resistance that Dahon’s lowest gear is somewhere in the low mid-range of Birdy’s. Never mind. Dahon’s is adequate. I can pedal her right up to the top of Capitol Hill after the #48 bus lets me off at 23rd and John.
In fact, I’m sitting up here now having a latte at the Victrola Coffee Shop on 15th Ave. Be sure to check this pace out on a sweet sunny afternoon.
I have to admit that I didn’t come up here just for a latte. I had an appointment at Group Health this morning so I’m killing some time before my ride up Broadway to Yesler for my volunteer job as an English as a Second Language teacher. Then it will be back up to the top of Beacon Hill for a community group meeting this evening. There are lots of hilly days in my life as a biking old lady who refuses to quit. But as a friend of mine pointed out, “Hills are why they made buses.” I’ll be taking the #36 up to Beacon Hill for an evening ride along the Chief Sealth Trail with its great views of the mountains and the lake.
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