While reading this thread I've been asking myself why I didn't ride my bike to junior and senior high school in the 60's. I had a bike and would sometimes go on long rides, the longest 110 miles.

It was only about 2 miles to school, though uphill (Queen Anne in Seattle). Maybe that had something to do with it. I honestly can't remember ever even thinking about it. It seems odd now. We would carpool to school, but I usually had to walk home.

Maybe a bike lane on the main route would have made a difference, but I doubt it. I'm guessing it was because NO one rode a bike to school then... at least no one I knew. I don't remember seeing bikes in racks. Maybe the only riders were guys in the science club. Dunno.

What I DO know, is that if it was 'cool' to ride to school, if friends rode their bikes, I would have cycled to school. Also, if my parents or the others who I got rides from had said, 'No, I'm not driving you to school. Why don't you take your bike?' I probably would have biked it. But I'm just guessing.

Again, it really puzzles me that I have no recall of ever even considering riding to school.

Most excellent post! I'm glad I brought it up.

It is even stranger than I realized because I just recalled that about this same time, I had to take a weekly trip to the University of Washington. I had to go by bus which meant a transfer at downtown and a miserable 45 minute trip.

After the first bus ride, I decided to bicycle to the appointments. 17 minutes. From then on I cycled there.
Still didn't ride to school. WTF?

Okay, one quick dip into P&R, if you will indulge me.

This is simple. By far the biggest driver in this is that we have long had an apparently easy way to get around. People are not stupid. People are efficient. We have believed that cars are the easiest and cheapest and most efficient way to get around so long that cars (and car culture and car infrastructure) seems like human nature now.

When that no longer appears to be the case for us, we will look farther afield for ways to get around. And restructure our lives around that. I would guess that bikes will be a large part of that.

Perhaps we are seeing some rumblings of that now. I suspect we are. But the real changes are still waiting for us.

jim

I think that's it. The first time since childhood I rode my bike every day was in grad school. Only had one car and my (now ex) wife needed that for work. So I biked. Liked it. Got so I didn't even think about taking the car, even when it was available.

Now, I have the choice between a car, 2 motorcycles, and 3 bicycles.

Necessity or lack of easier options is probably the number one reason people start bicycling (until they get to the 'fitness' age). Then they may continue for other reasons. I suspect the politics of environment issues and such is the least important factor.

My town here in Texas is very car-centric, very little room to bike, very few sidewalks either, and that tells a lot. We are an oil town traditionally. Last year when oil got expensive, you saw a few more bikes, but they are gone now, just the few immigrant folks going to work in the AM.

Back in the "boom" all us hippies rode bikes to college and around town. My wife and I married (1977) and rode to work, maybe a 5 mi. trip one way for her, me a little farther. That all ended in 1980, I ride a motorcycle to work now.

My 14 yr. old and I ride at night for fun, he is considering becoming "counter-culture" flannel shirts etc, so his bike should be in regular use for a while.

Always good follow up a good post

make up thumbs, one for each of us

Southern California is a funny place for cycling. It should be great. It absolutely should at least be good, if for no reason other than the weather. You know what? It sucks.

There is too much vehicular traffic and the drivers disrespect cyclists BIG TIME! It is actually dangerous to ride in the streets along side the cars.

I live near the beach with the famous Marina Del Rey-to-Palos Verdes "bike path". It is over-run with pedestrians, skaters and skateboarders. In Hermosa Beach, they actually have a place where they periodically outlaw biking - signs and flashing red lights, included. I contrast this with other cities where they close the streets to cars to allow cycling. Here they close the bike path to allow everything else. There are so many places to walk, why wouldn't they reserve just this one venue for cycling? Disrepect for cycling is the answer.

There's always the convergence factor. More and more people seem share the following:
- want to keep fit
- want to save some money
- love to ride a bike
- want to adopt technologies that are ecologically sound

The list goes on. When all of these meet in the middle, you head out to the driveway on your way somewhere and say to yourself, "Maybe I should take the bike".

Add to the list ,often its far quicker. Driving a car into York city(UK) center is a silly idea. Riding a bike is what people do, or park 1/2 mile away and walk. My folder takes me right in to town goes with me instead of being lock up. Its been for lots of coffees! It is for me the fastest and easiest option for a 2 mile journey in to town.

Of course it could be the 4-5 dollar a gallon gas, too

I recently converted someone to cycling and they love it. They're a college student about to turn 23 in a few months. I built up a Nice mixte "Open Road" Cromoly bike with a decent set of wheels, Deore DX, bar end shifters, and fenders. They prefer it to the bus and driving now, just like I do. It's even a hilly area, and they look at the hill climbing as a challenge to be met. They had never had a bike with drop bars before, and it was a little difficult at first. I offered to change the bike to upright bars a little while later, and I got an enthusiastic "No way!",,,,BD

I am not sure I agree 100% but do agree there are challenges.

I think it ismore complicated than bring back lugged steel frames or blaming the MTB.

Being old enough to have seen a lot of this (USA centric) bikes have always followed styles/trends kids want what is perceived to be cool. The difference I think is that since the mid '60's many styles and trends have not been practical as transportation. I personally would put the inflection point at introduction of the schwinn chopper bikes. Before that bikes were pretty much.... single speed coaster or English racer (3 speed). Most kids had baskets on their bikes....and it wasnt geeky.

the choppers were pure style, and fun to wheelie, but not fast or good for long distances. Then came the 10 speed craze, then mountain bikes, then bmx, then cruisers and now I am hearing that kids are wanting the fast ... road bikes. A lot of style, a lot of specialization, and some better suited than others for going places.

Quality/cost is an interesting aspect. The $90 ten speeds of the early 70's were heavy and had lots of steel (ie ready to rust parts) but on the whole they were better built and more reliable then todays low end big box bikes. On the whole I think people were spending more money relative to the costs of the time for low end bikes than than they are for low end bikes today. And a big box bike that dies quickly can't be used (I have neighors who have several big box mountain bikes...all dead due to low end components failure)...what is working is a single speed cruiser and an old trek hybrid

Location makes difference.....we have a lot of streets that are very bike comfortable...but there are others I avoid.

I think overall hyperwareness of "dangers" in the world affect how parents deal with kids and freedom....ie we let our 12 year old bicyle 1.5 miles to a summer camp (local streets, cell phone, saftey lecture, very 'safe" area, business close etc) and many parents i know are horrified at the concept.

But on the whole, it think the key thing is example..... I commute when I can, and my son commutes with me (even if he has bailed this week due to homework and being a wimp about the cold ) I do as many errrands as I can on my bike and often my son is with me...so he is familar with the concept of a bike as transportation, not just fun or workouts.

And exposing kids to efficient bikes helps also. I fixed up an old univega for my son....he thought it was just "dad being a bike nerd" and vowed to only ride his BMX, until he rode the univega..and realized a how fast it was (fast always is cool) and how much easier it was to commute and he hasn't ridden the BMX since

On the whole, I am seeing more kids biking to school this year...... so i don't think it biking is dying get...it is just waiting for a new cool cycle.

You had me at "inflection point".

jim

I live in Dallas and I have never seen so many bikes on the road, and path and sidewalk as I have this last year. I think this is part due to the Lance factor brought on by the latest TdF but we have also seen a huge spike in organized rides and I don't mean the typical "roadie" rides you see at your LBS where everyone is riding the latest hideous looking "wonder" frame that looks like a NASCAR reject and walking in moon shoes. There are now several casual rides here each week that are composed of the non-licra crowd who are riding for social purposes. Most of those are on vintage or crazy looking bikes with a few mountain bikes thrown in for flavor. Women comprise about 50% of those rides, which is good for any sport. We even have a monthly "Critical Mass" ride now which is more of a Tour of Downtown that is very peaceful and quiet for that matter. Heck, we have a single speed/fixie ride every Monday night even and the turn our has been amazing.

Our public transist just now installed bike racks on all the buses (yes we're a bit behind the times in some areas) and we have a few city council members who are becoming very vocal about making Dallas more cycle friendly. In fact we had "Bike to City Hall" event yesterday and several city council people rode and spoke about their plans for improving cycling opportunities. The local paper printed a nice article on the event today.

We have also had city council members tour cities like Portland recently in an attempt to figure out what works and why. Our previous city "bike coordinator" was a controversial figure and not well liked by anyone outside the "take a lane" licra crowd. His replacement is a hit so far.

My buddy at the LBS tells me business has never been better.

Cycling is alive and blooming in Dallas, Texas.

ps. councilwoman Angela Hunt is HOT and I would love to go on a licra ride with her!



Chris

Chris,

I can't agree more.
I can hardly drive around Frisco on the weekend without taking out at least 2 or 3 cyclists.
(Ok, only kidding, that would be my cager neighbors)
in all seriousness I see at least a dozen riders every weekend morning (and not riding together),
we are having a boom out here. We have "Share the Road" signs now, and I note that there seem
to be more bikes in the bike racks at the elementary schools in the subdivisions.
I've even started to see some bikes locked up outside the local Kroger and folks getting on
them with a few bags of groceries.
Cycling is definitely on the upswing here in Northern Texas.
Marty

You know what? I like that bike. I wouldn't mind having one of those for flat, around town riding. I read the write up at the link. I cannot figure out if it is a fixed gear or a single speed freewheel. The text uses both terms. I would want a freewheel.

Specs seem pretty straightforward:

Portland continues to amaze me last week the city updated the Bicycle Master Plan. Among other things they are:
Expanding the network of planned bikeways from 630 to 930 miles. Have a target 25 percent of commuters on bicycling by 2030.

But are the specs correct or is the write up correct. They contradict each other with respect to this feature.

Most fixie bikes come with a flip-flop hub, notched and lock-ring thread on one side and freewheel threaded on the other, so you can have both.