Originally Posted by
chipcom
They're not.
Heck Dave, you and I live only about 40 miles from each other and our commutes are as different as night and day. You are pretty much in the city with a nice paved MUP for much of your route that is under 10 miles if I recall, while I am out in the country traveling 25 miles to a small town over narrow roads with no shoulders for the most part and drivers doing 45-60mph. Your Breezer is perfect for your commute, my touring bike - with rack, fenders, lights, etc., is better suited for mine. Of course I do like to use the road bike (the only bike I have without fenders) on those nice summer days, and this time of year I cut down my commute by driving part way and riding the rest on the flat-barred, studded-tired, fendered snow bike.
I don't consider such things like lights, racks and fenders as only for 'commuter specific' bikes, rather I consider the lack thereof as only for 'racing' bikes.
This has got to be a terminology problem since few are following my impeccable logic!
There's the superbeasts, which naturally includes Chipcom, as he was previously decorated with super powers a while back, who travel 25 miles on their bikes to their jobs, and then there's nerdy dudes like me and Pee Wee Herman who hop on their fancy bikes complete with windmills and tassles hangin' out the ends of the handlebar grips, riding down short MUP trails to their jobs. I presuppose most are like me but many say otherwise. I guess it's possible that there are so few of us in total that a goodly percentage are like Superchip. I dismissed it earlier.
Perhaps I'm talking about Utility bikes. Not really sure. But the bike category the OP was discussing is well equipped old style Dutch bikes. Great for short to modest commutes or errands, while wearing everyday clothes. My bike, for the most part takes on the function of a car (even though I own two of them they are generally used by my wife and my kids). Regardless, the OP's post is a good one and I enjoy his website. His list of bikes is of great interest to me, in that if these kind of bikes catch on we could make a dent in this car-centric world of ours. I can't imagine many Pee Wee Herman types like me gettng on board Chipcom's style of commuter bikes to go 25 miles to work. Yet, I can imagine lots of everyday folks getting off their fat arses in everyday clothes and getting on a Breezer style bikes and tooling around, doing small tasks and losing some weight. Yeah, I know most say get a bike like that out of the dumpster for this, but not me. There are plenty of safe neighborhoods in which you can park a bike and go in a store and come back out to your bike, assuming you locked it in a nominal way. These bikes are lots of fun.
BTW, Chip, I had a heck of a ride in today. Rocky River was over its banks in spots and the road was closed due to the river flood. As you know, there's been lots of rain lately. Yet there was a fresh coat of snow and ice on everything. I rode the MUP and enjoyed the snow crunching under my studs untill I noted that I was riding through some puddles right into a raging river! I turned around and went on the road for that part of the ride. Later, on another section of the MUP where the road was also closed, I wondered why it was since there wasn't much water blocking it. That's when my bike started bouncing--the MUP and road, it turns out, were covered with sand and muck, all formed in wavy ridges, that were an inch or two high. This went on for a while. It was kind of awesome. It's amazing how much water (and sand, twigs, and the like) goes down a river.