I commute by car
 

If this is you, please don't get mad, this was well-intentioned!

https://bicycleobsession.files.wordp...inal.jpg?w=768

I don't get the humour.:foo:

Never heard of "n+1?"

He's simply trying to stir the pot.


Folks: Don't feed him.

Some threads can initiate productive and valuable discussions. Not everything in internet is about trolling and controversy.

So the topic is why do people commute by car when they have perfectly good road bike with which they can ride to work?

I don't drive to work. I ride my road bikes to work. With fenders when its wet. With fenders and disc brakes when it rains heavily. No fenders when it's warm and dry.

What's productive and valuable about you telling people (with a caricature) that they're going to work wrong, and owning a bike wrong too?

I commute by car because a century a day on major state highways would get old in a hurry...

... and if this is you, OP, please don't get mad; it was well-intentioned.

The corollary to that is that some is.

htfu. :d

Can someone explain what the "joke" is? It's just kind of making a statement, which may or may not be true. Usually with a comic, there is some kind of joke or witty play on words. I mean yeah, some people only ride their bike as a means to exercise, train, and race. I'm not sure where it is written that one must use a bike for those things AND commuting? But still...if this is what qualifies as humor, I'm just not getting it.

Soon as they finish some missing gaps of trail, that would cut my route from 45 or so miles to about 33 miles from home doorstep to work lobby on segregated pathways, I may well do so!

Don't feel bad. There is no humor to get.

+1

It's a strawman, based on the unstated premise that being a cyclist somehow implies accepting that driving is to be avoided.

I prefer to keep driving and cycling issues separate and distinct. There's no reason that one can't do both or neither.

If no one is getting it, it means the cartoon is ineffectual. I just wanted to point out the problematic mentality that sees bikes firstly as working out machines and secondly as vehicles (the opposite of how Danish or Dutch see it).

I am not saying the bikes should be seen in a certain way, I am just wondering if you have experienced first hand the positive impact the bike has on your body, town and environment, why you wait for the weekend to park your car? If all those athletic cyclists you see on Sundays were commuting daily, our cities would be transformed into Copenhagen or Amsterdams by now.

I dislike communicating ideas through cartoons specifically for that reason. I took it to mean the guy was a pretentious blowhard who was bragging that his bike cost far more than his car, so he'd rather keep the bike in good shape and drive the car all the places bad things could happen...

Ditto. Google maps comes up with 43 to 46 miles each way for bike-friendly paths. I'd have to bike through the city, and I'm guessing 4+ hours, all said and done, each way. HTFU indeed.

I've thought of doing it though, like on employee appreciation day, or bike to work day (did that come yet this year?).

On the good side, I typically do rides at home where I can go for an hour and not unclip. I think last weekend I did a 90 minute ride without ever unclipping. Quiet roads, quiet life, etc.

*

I see the humor in the cartoon. It's in the same vein as people driving to the gym to ride the exercise bike. [Of course there can be valid reasons to do so, but there's irony there for most people who do so.]

There are better ways to "initiate productive and valuable discussions" than to mock people.


-Tim-

It is, and it's because you apparently believe that everyone on this forum and in the U.S. views bikes firstly as means of exercise and secondly as vehicles. (Or are you advocating that false premises to stir the pot?) You also include the issue of bike value, which is independent of how one sees the primary role of a bike. What that cartoon really seems to be saying is "I drive to work because I am a bike snob who owns and expensive bike that is reserved for training.", not "I drive to work because I don't view any bike as a transportation vehicle."


I just turned 52. Last July I bought my first car for myself ever. Back in '95 I bought a car for my mom. She used it primarily and I would sometimes use it on the weekends. When some idiot kid hit it while it was parked it was over 18 years old and had just over 108K miles on it, and that was with three regular users during its life. Between '83 and '95 neither I nor anyone in my family owned a car. My current car has fewer than 2,400 miles on it. Hundreds of those miles were logged during two longish (for me) trips.


I regularly ride to work much of the year. When I don't ride to work, I walk or take public transportation. For several years, I commuted via bike-train-bike to another state three times/week in virtually all sorts of weather. I have taken three extended bike tours, including one of nearly four months across the U.S. and then some. In all, I have more than 15K miles of loaded touring under my belt. And no, I am not Danish or Dutch.


Sorry, but this thread is a total fail, whether you are trying to troll or not.


Buh bye.


P.S. I find mocking a particular choice ironic coming from someone who recently started a thread telling people to be themselves.

Eloquent in its brevity.

There's an obesity epidemic, but not a not getting around epidemic. This ^ isn't a problem at all.

Also, people are allowed to decide for themselves what's important to them. Getting to work by one means instead of another doesn't have to be everybody's reason for living.

The problem is that there is no “problematic mentality that sees bikes firstly as working out machines and secondly as vehicles.”

Most people find cars necessary because they are

A.) a Lot faster,

B.) Basically weatherproof,

C.) Can carry a lot more,

D.) Can carry passengers safely

E.) Do not depend on the very energy that user might need when he/she arrives at the destination.

I can go on quite a ways further if you like.

I was car-free for a Long time. I know whereof I speak.

I had friend who had kids. Kids, and full-time jobs. You work it out.

I was in Great shape. I simply would have failed otherwise, because to get to work when it is a longish ways away in 95-degree heat and humidity, work a ten-hour shift, a ride home, and do it again six days a week, interspersed with necessary errands .... would kill people who were not really fit.

And unless you are pretty fit to start with, you can’t start. You can’t “ride into it ...” Call your boss and say, “Hey, I am really tired, so I’ll take the day off, right?”

Fact is for most people the bicycle is NOT a valid mode of transport.

In a culture designed around cycling, in a city designed around cycling ... maybe it could work. How many of those Dutch grandmothers need to travel 60 miles to work each day and bring home a 20-lb bag of rice and a gallon of milk?

I can carry 100 lbs on my bike—not rapidly, but I can haul it for a while. And on some weekend trips to get pool chemicals, grass seed, fertilizer, tools, lumber, hardware, and groceries I put way more than that in my car.

Considering both weight and bulk .... every tried carrying 8-foot-long 4x4s? I can carry one at a time, I have tried two ... it is never safe.

I could pay money for a trailer and carry all that easily I guess. But if on that same weekend I wanted to drop my lawnmower off for servicing .... there is a twelve-hour day on a bike, hauling a heavy load.

Also, once I load my trailer at one store ,... how do I secure all that stuff at the next store?

I use a car, I can do it in a few hours and actually use the stuff I bought when I get home, as opposed to falling out with a quart of Gatorade.

Yeah, Uh .... No.

See, those mythical Dutch cities developed in very limited spaces starting when “transportation” meant “I wish I had a horse.” Their cities are built on a different scale and on a different plan.

As noted above, it is not unusual for people to have to do sixty-mile commutes.

The biggest thing which you apparently cannot grasp is Time.

A doctor wants to show up at the office fresh and clean, and clear-headed. he cycles sixty miles, he needs a shower a big breakfast, and a nap. Plus, he has just spent four hours cycling. he works eight hours, so that is fourteen all in .... and rides home, for eighteen hours,.. That leaves him six hours to shower again, eat, see his family, run whatever errands he needs, and do his continuing education—keep up on all the new drugs and procedures patients will be asking about because of the stupid TV commercials.

That all takes more than eight hours .... so now what? He works every other day? Yahoo! He is a bicycle commuter so now he makes half as much money and helps half as many patients!

You do know there is a forum for the fantastical and unrealistic, right? “Car-free living” is crying out for you.

By the way ... how far do you commute each day?

Why you have to be so aggressive? I understand that this might offended you, but I don't think any of my responses were disrespectful towards drivers or cyclists who commute by car.

And No, I don't believe people in US see bikes firstly as means of exercise and secondly as vehicles. In contrary, bike culture in US is waaay bigger than in my country. When I said people, I meant people in general, not specifically people in US (Where I haven't lived one day to know of). Your anger didn't let you see what I wrote clearly.

Absolutely. It was just a way to provoke a discussion about the importance of commuting by bike in cities where cars overwhelm the streets. It wasn't intended to enforce a specific view.