genec

https://lajolla.patch.com/groups/arou...cross-la-jolla

Orange bikes showed up in various places around town... where I noticed them was along a 50 MPH arterial road that has bike lanes and bike paths on either side... I quickly thought they were some sort of advocacy to get motorists to watch for cyclists... but no, apparently just some gorilla ad for a gym... sigh.

Jeeze ride a bike and skip the gym.

CB HI

Unintended consequences, the bikes may still remind motorist to watch for cyclists even if that is not the intended purpose.

I share your disappointment at the misuse.

Honolulu had a guy buy a bunch of X-Mart Lowrider bicycles and locked them up all over town on the sidewalk bike racks. He had signs on them asking people to pay him to put their advertising on them. Honolulu has tight sign laws and this guy was looking for a way around the laws. After a week of them taking up good lockup spaces, many asked the city and police to remove them. Of course the homeless began stealing them - easy targets. But the guy gets all up in arms and claims the cyclist that asked the bikes be remove, as the one stealing them.

Yeah right, like any of us would want that junk.

bmontgomery87

fixed.

genec

Actually I do that.... to get an upper body workout when the ocean is too cold for me to swim in.

But of course the irony that I see is folks driving to the gym to ride the stationary bikes.

genec

Yeah I like the unintended consequences... but I asked my wife as she was driving if she noticed the bikes... "No, what bikes." So I wonder if other motorists notice them. And they will be going away, so the positive aspect is short lived.

bmontgomery87

^^I know what you mean. I used to see a lot of people driving across town to walk on treadmills, ride stationary bikes, etc. Always seemed silly to me.

dynodonn 

As autocentric and non motorized road user unfriendly some locales can be, I can see why a number of people choose to drive to a location where they can exercise.

I-Like-To-Bike

Maybe those folks read BF posts and got scared out their wits by the constant refrain about murderous, criminal, and "distracted" drivers running down cyclists throughout the land.

CB HI

At least it keeps them off the weights that I want to use.

Myosmith

Funny

turbo1889

What really gets me is the people that own both a riding lawn-mower and a treadmill and have both in their homes, especially when they have like only a 1/4 acre worth of grass to cut.

(big long sigh) Only in America (shake head).

ItsJustMe

I think you mean guerrilla ad. Though from the looks of some weightlifters I've seen...

CB HI

They can watch "The View" while on the treadmill and still walk slow enough to not sweat.

I-Like-To-Bike

Why does other people's lawful behavior or their possessions "get" YOU? (Shake my head.)

Does it affect your/or anybody else's bicycling safety or advocacy efforts?

turbo1889

Nope, its actually none of my business, and you have a legitimate point about that. Still makes me shake my head though.

bluegoatwoods

That's not hard. It worries us when we see our neighbors degenerating. (Who appointed me to be the judge of humanity??!! ...I'm self-appointed.)

They are degenerating. Physically and mentally. And it will affect us. Already has, for that matter.

But if this helps, I don't propose writing laws to deal with it. I don't think that can be done realistically.

But I still worry. And I still resent it.

FBinNY 

squirtdad

Saw the same thing last summer where I live. Marketing for Orangetheory fitness.

Keith99

Strange coincidence. Orange is the color of choice for bike racks shaped like bikes near me.

I was going to say in Los Angeles then I realized the ones I see all the time are near Warner center at the main hub for the Orange Line.

Rollfast

Our particular gym was much better when it was a hamburger place run by an really nice elderly couple who actually shoveled sidewalks properly and retired when they felt like it after 50 years. I never fail to holler that I'm out and about while they are broke and going nowhere fast.

Rollfast

Never fear, they have ethanol to wreck the mower and force them to ramp it up on a trailer every 5 weeks when the alcohol ruins the motor. Nobody said exercise is dead there.

turbo1889

Actually motors in and of themselves run much better on alcohol fuel then on comparatively very dirty gasoline regardless of type of alcohol (there are multiple different alcohol fuel chemistry, ethanol is only one of them) cleaner exhaust with less pollutants and cleaner engine that runs at cooler lower temps and actually produces more horsepower. The problem is in the fuel delivery system the materials that certain components in that area (mainly hoses, seals, and gaskets) are made of materials designed to be gasoline tolerant not alcohol tolerant both of which do nasty things to those kind of components but in different ways and most materials for those components that are gasoline tolerant are not alcohol tolerant and vic-a-versa with only a few select materials that are tolerant to both. Run gasoline in a fuel delivery system designed for alcohol fuel and it can wreck it, run alcohol fuel in a fuel system designed for gasoline and it can wreck it. There are some fuel delivery systems made with materials that are tolerant to both but that is not very common. Believe me its not the alcohol per-say that is the problem, I used to run high test pure alcohol racing fuel systems both aviation and ground vehicle and I can assure you alcohol is actually the superior fuel, its just your fuel system has to be built to use it (or properly converted).

Long story short, the correct way to say that would be they run ethanol in a riding lawn-mower with a fuel system that is designed for gasoline (and actually designed not to be compatible with alcohol fuel) and it wrecks the fuel system on the motor. Doesn't wreck the motor, just the fuel delivery system (which of course means it don't run but its not the motor itself that gets wrecked).

I've got a couple 2-stroke chain-saws right now that I run on mixture of pure 190 proof ethanol and bio-diesel and they run great on it and have for several years. BUT I properly did a full conversion on their fuel systems to be fully compatible with alcohol fuel. Had to do it in my case since I use multiple cords of self-cut fire-wood for winter heat every year and the exhaust fumes from regular gasoline 2-stroke chainsaws were making me so sick I would vomit and couldn't hardly stand up with a pounding migraine headache. I seem to be more sensitive to being up close and breathing those kind of fumes from a dirty gasoline 2-cycle (even the modern ones that aren't as bad) then most people. Don't get sick anymore cutting my firewood after changing over to alcohol fuel with the bio-diesel mixed in for 2-cycle lube.

Rollfast

Not in 89 RON regular unleaded. And my late father's biggest thrill as a gas station operator was filling Former Idaho Governor Cecil Andrus' tank back in the early eighties. Briggs and Strattons ain't no chainsaw motor, they aren't even the same kind of engine.

MMACH 5

Apparently, they just opened one, here in Plano (wealthy suburb of Dallas). The orange bikes are showing up around here, now.

Rollfast

Call them and explain to them that if they were actually serious about bikes and not just being gimmicky they'd do something to help people own THEIR OWN bikes, like support a cycle rebuilding charity like Boise Bicycle Project over here that is a non-profit organization dedicated to fixing bikes and getting them to riders of all ages.