Hunting for daylight

 We are half way through the winter and I noticed that days are finally getting longer. Somehow, the biggest demotivating factor for me when it comes to winter cycling (or bike-commuting to be specific) is not snow (since we didn't have any this year) or low air temperature (proper clothing solves this problem) but the lack of daylight.

My bike is equipped in a decent lighting system, I think. I use a powerful 300 lumen light installed on handlebars and two red taillights: one of them I put in steady mode, while the other one is blinking. Still, this doesn't solve the problem of riding in darkness since this issue is not about the the lack of visibility at night. This is a more mental issue - I just don't find it particularly enjoyable to navigate through darkness of the night on my bicycle. I guess part of the reason why we ride bicycles is the feeling of being outside, closer to nature, and not being enclosed in a tin can (read: a car). Darkness negates this advantage.

It is nice that now when I leave my office at 17:00 it is still a little bit bright outside. Unfortunately, by the time I get home it gets completely dark again but still, more daylight is a sign that days are getting longer and spring will come.

Boys bikes, girls bikes (and vacuum cleaners too)

Reading through some bicycle blogs I came up with the following conclusions:

1. How many cycling women name their bikes? Many. How many guys do that. Close to none.
2. Who shows a highly emotional attachment to their bikes. Mostly girls.
3. Who treats their bicycles more as tools? Mostly guys.

0% of beauty. 100% of utility.

This all comes down to the basic difference between men and women. Guys are more rational, girls are more emotional. And you can easily see it in bicycling as well.

Usually, guys don't "love" their bicycles. They just use them. Beautiful lugwork, unique paint color or fancy styling mean less to them. Guys just need a fast and reliable bike. Girls, on the other hand, seem to pay more attention to the beauty of bicycles (Surely, there is nothing wrong with that!).
Sure, I like good looking bicycles just the same way I like good looking cars. But since my bike is mostly just a tool, I mainly need it to be reliable, comfortable, and easy to use just like my car, camera or a... vacuum cleaner.

This is exactly what Mikael from Copenhagenize blog noticed. Most of people in this world treat bicycles same way they treat their vacuum cleaners - they use them as tools. In fact, most car drivers use their cars the same way. Sure, some develop a closer bond with their vehicles and the same way there is probably a small number of people who have a similar bond with their vacuum cleaners (or any other object of desire). Still, for most of us, those are just tools without any deeper meaning.

Velouria, from the Lovely Bicycle, argued with Mikael's post on utilitarian side of bicycles. She believes that bicycles are much more than just tools and it is possible to develop a some sort of romantic relationship with your bike, but not with your vacuum cleaner.

I have to say that I sort of agree with Mikael. Maybe this is our guys' point of view. Ask people in China, the country with likely the highest number of bicycles in the world, how many of them developed a romantic relationship with their bikes. I bet you would get mostly negative answers since Chinese treat their bikes as transportation vehicles and don't spend their days contemplating beauty of their bikes.

For most of us bicycles are "vacuum cleaners". They are utilitarian objects. For some of us (minority), bicycles are something more. And others will not understand why someone would ride a vintage, lugged bike named "Polly" with a wicker basket on handlebars and a matching saddle.

Filling the gap

As I mentioned before, today at 7pm Town of Arlington will hold a meeting to discuss the Arlington Center Safe Travel Project. I was supposed to show up but unfortunately, I have to pass this time. I got some ugly cold last Sunday. This is what happens when you stop bicycling for two days ;)

I read about the meeting and the project first on Biking in Heels blog. Following those links you can find out more about the project here and see the presentation of several different options that will be discussed.

For those of you who do not live in my area I will try to outline the situation. The Minuteman Bikeway is a popular recreational path that connects several towns northeast of Boston. It starts in Somerville, passes Cambridge, enters Arlington, Lexington, and then continues through Bedford ending in Concord. It is 26km (16mi) long and is the safest way of reaching all these towns by bicycle. In Arlington Center the Bikeway has to cut across the very busy intersection of Rt60 and Massachusetts Ave.

Current situation in Arlington Center (Source: Arlington Center Safe Travel Project)

As you can see in the graphics above, both ends of the path (marked blue) are on the opposite sides of the intersection with no facilities  connecting them for a safe passage. I have to admit that I often end up using sidewalk (unfortunately, illegally) to get to the other end of the path. The project proposes several solutions (see presentation link above) from which option 5 is the most revolutionary.

Option 5 (Source: Arlington Center Safe Travel Project)

In this option, the path will be extended along the sidewalk on the northeast side, then continue though a bicycle-only crossing and eventually merge with the southeast end of the Bikeway. In order to fit a double-wide (to travel in both directions) bike lane along Mass Ave, some parking spaces will have to be removed. Personally, I like this option as it guarantees a safe passage for cyclists (designated crossing, bollards along the Mass Ave section), while maintaining status quo for motorists (except removed parking spaces). If you browse through the presentation you will notice that Option 4 is a bit less radical and parking spaces are saved at the expense of the median dividing the traffic in the middle of Mass Ave.

However, there is also Option 3B, which I find particularly pleasing:

Option 3B (Source: Arlington Center Safe Travel Project)

What you see here is a design that is maybe a bit easier to accept for motorists since all parking spaces are saved, but it divides the bike path into separate lanes on both sides of Mass Ave. I already expressed my feelings about Massachusetts Ave. It is wide enough to accommodate bike lanes. This design is, in my opinion, the best option. Not only it merges both loose ends of the Bikeway but it promises bike lanes on Mass Ave. Unlike in the above graphics, hopefully those lanes would be eventually extended also to the east, in Cambridge direction.

Two not-your-average-bicycles

I usually don't write about other people's bicycles but these two are so different that I think they deserve a closer look.

Helen Skelton's Antarctic bike

You probably have heard this news already. Helen Skelton is attempting to reach South Pole by bike (and a kite-ski as well). In order to fight hurricane winds and sand-like snow surface, Hanebrink/Fortune prepared a special bicycle for her, which actually looks a lot like their regular electric all-terrain bicycle, sans electric power, of course. They claim that the goal was to keep the bike design simple and maintenance-free. I am not going to describe it in detail since you can read more about it here. In general, it features 20" wheels, Brooks saddle, extra-large Power Grips on pedals (to fit Helen's polar boots), a long-travel suspension fork, and a single mechanical disc brake in the rear.

Helen's polar bicycle (Source: bbc.co.uk)

Looks interesting, but what makes me wonder is if a suspension fork is really needed on this bike, which was supposed to be as simple as possible. Suspension means extra maintenance.

Also, the size of wheels seems a bit surprising, since I would think that larger wheels will be easier to ride. However, since each tire is really fat (wide) and weighs about 3.5kg (8lbs), larger diameter tires would be even heavier. Maybe this is why wheels are so small.

Marek Jurek's folding bike

This story is also very new but you may have not heard about it yet. Marek Jurek is a person from Poland who was not happy with folding bicycles available on market (Bromptons, Dahons, etc.) and decided to build one himself (The need is a mother of all inventions). He completed the first prototype that looks like this:

Marek Jurek on his bike (Source: gazeta.pl)

What you see a ultra-short wheelbase, large-wheel, front-wheel drive, folding bicycle. I have to admit that the design is definitely original. Jurek's bike has 29" wheels and cranks mounted to the front hub (with a single-speed planetary reduction of 2.8:1). But it is not your childhood's tricycle since front wheel does not turn. Instead, the whole bike frame is articulated. Steering is controlled by two steel cables running from the handlebars to the frame pivot. According to Jurek, his bicycle has some unique advantages over regular city and folding bikes:

• it has a much more comfortable riding position that is somewhat similar to the one on a recumbent bike, yet more upright,
• it has large wheels and is faster than most small-wheel folding bikes,
• it has a very short wheelbase and is extremely maneuverable,
• it is much easier and faster to fold than all folding bikes - all you need is to grab the frame and the whole bike folds in half.

Jurek's bike, folded (Source: gazeta.pl)

Those (discussion in Polish) who had a chance to ride this prototype bicycle claim that indeed, it is easy to control on turns and maintaining a straight riding direction requires only a brief learning. Interestingly, in order to facilitate turning, Jurek's bike features rotating pedal platforms:

Rotating pedal platforms on Jurek's bike (Source: forum.masa.waw.pl)

I think the design is really smart and innovative but it would be great to see it equipped in fenders, some guards on both sides of the front wheel to keep mud and water off rider's pants, a rear (or front) rack, and maybe a 3-speed front hub. It would be great to see this vehicle in production.

The 3-feet rule

This morning, on my ride to work, I noticed a higher-than-usual number of drivers who seemed to forget about the 3-feet rule: a safe distance to pass a bike. Three feet is just barely a meter - still too close to a cyclist, in my opinion, but not much of change in direction from driver's perspective. Even though, many drivers still fail to obey it. Maybe I should blame it on chilly winter morning, making everyone lethargic and slow to start up?

The route I take has some nice shoulders, divided from traffic lanes by white lines. This makes them look like some informal bike lanes and very suitable for bicycling. I tend to ride just on the outside of the white line, which means that I stay off the traffic lane but still very close to it. This way I don't block the faster traffic but I am more visible to drivers. The lanes are so wide that cars don't even have to enter the opposite lane in order to pass a bicycle. They usually just more more toward the center line.

I remember that my childhood bike in Poland had this funky orange arm attached to the rear rack to force passing bikes and drivers to maintain the distance. It turned out I can still easily get it from Amazon. It is called Safety Wing.

Safety Wing (Picture from urbanvelo.org)

But then, after reading about it on Urban Velo, I figured that Ghost Rider's solution (see comments at Urban Velo) is much, much better.

Ghost Rider's "Safety" Wing

Wide road, but where are the bike lanes?

I don't visit Massachusetts Avenue in Arlington too often. My daily commute takes me a different route. However, I always wondered why this main street has been built so wide. Since I don't have a better picture, I will use Google Maps street view:

The truck in lower photo is a good reference scale. You can easily tell that Mass Ave is wide enough to be a high-speed expressway, not a busy street in a thickly-settled area. I assume that the Town of Arlington must be saving on paint since the width of this road is asking for painting two lanes in each direction yet what we get is a simple two-lane street. With lanes so wide that they could be runways for Cessnas. The result is predictable: most drivers treat this street as a four-lane street with some virtual lane lines. This situation is not limited to Arlington area. Neighboring towns (Lexington) didn't bother to paint designated traffic lanes either.

Biking in Heels blog reported that the Town of Arlington will be holding a meeting on January 10th (More about it soon) to discuss some ideas of connecting two loose ends of Minuteman Bikeway that has been separated by the always-busy intersection of Arlington Center (Mass Ave and Rt 60). Maybe this would be an opportunity to mention the lack of bike lanes along Mass Ave as well? The width of this street is ideal for designated bike lanes, with enough space for car parking and four lanes total. If we plan to redesign the main Arlington intersection why not to think about the rest of the main street at the same time? Especially, that Mass Ave could be an ideal bike way for many citizens with its multiple businesses along and straight-route connections to Cambridge and Lexington.

2012

The new year of 2012 finally arrived. It is time to think of any bicycling-related resolutions. I have just three:

1. Put Dr. J. on a bike. He will be old enough to get familiar with it.

2. Ride a 140+ km route from Arlington to Cape Cod.

3. Explore more of northwestern towns by bike (Bedford, Concord, Carlisle).

Looking back, I think that 2011 was a pretty good year. Our family grew: Dr. J. was born, I revisited bicycle commuting with a new, more comfortable bike, and I started this blog as well.

I am looking forward to the new year and wish all of you car-free roads, scenic rides and more bicycling fun.