Last night I was stopped by police. It was about 1AM and I was coming back from Manhattan heading to a bar on 21st St. I needed to buy some groceries and passed the Trade Fair on 36th Ave. I went up on the sidewalk to look inside, trying to decide whether it was worth…
Read more
Sydney, city of beachesand beach cricketand the view from our friend’s apartment. We were warned that when it comes to bikes, Sydney is no Melbourne. “Bollocks,” exlaimed P. Lynn Miller of CTA fame (Chainlink Transit Authority). Or he said something like that in an accent that perhaps could only come from an Australian immigrant originally…
Read more
Things picked up a bit in Melbourne, bike wise. I couldn’t score free bikes (actually I probably could have, but hadn’t yet thought of my Australian bike connection), and renting bikes is crazy expensive. $50 per day. It costs more to rent bikes than rent a car. What’s up with that? But we wanted bikes.…
Read more
It may not be life changing, but the monthly email for the city is kind of reassuring. You can sign up here. I *did* learn that the city is putting up some covered bike racks. I like them simply because they’re very conspicuous. But I’ve never understand why people are so worried about bikes getting…
Read more
Can I say enough good about the new Pittsburgh bike map? I love bikes. I love maps. The designer was nice enough to chime in on a comment below (confirming the Ware-eskian influence). He has built a better bike map. I only hope the world comes beating a path to his door.This map isn’t just…
Read more
I just got back from Pittsburgh, I city I didn’t know at all. Thanks to this blog, I was able to meet some of the fine journalists at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and talk about my upcoming book (don’t worry, I’ll tell you, too, when it’s out in May). I have this thing for rough-around-the-edges (post)…
Read more
Nothing like a little body-on-car contact to remind you you’re alive. So a little before midnight I’m biking on 59th, crossing Madison. I’m one lane from the left. There’s a black stretch limo to my right (never where you want to be at an intersection, but there’s a lot of traffic). The limo starts turning…
Read more
Instead of just complaining, I thought I’d actually be constructive and show what we want (that’s the royal we, of course). [Before you go on, take a quick and wild guess as to how many north/south traffic lanes there are spanning the width of Manhattan at 57th St.] As it stands now, every time I…
Read more
We went to see David Byrne talk about bikes. At Town Hall and part of the New Yorker Festival. It was nice. Certainly a preaching-to-the-choir kind of event. But I enjoyed it. What I liked: That 1,200 people would pay $25 to see David Byrne talk about bikes. Jan Gehl’s spiel about biking in Copenhagen.…
Read more
The only way any city can really become bike friendly is to provide bike paths that get you from point A to point B. Not bike paths, but separate bike lanes. A lot more people would bike if they could where they’re going without having to fight traffic for the bulk of their trip. Traffic…
Read more
Recent Comments