Fear

It was the Halloween night last night. It usually means that kids are coming for candies and there are all possible horror movies played on TV. I am not American so I don't know what exactly the point of Halloween is, but I guess it is supposed to remind us that death is around the corner and we should live in fear. In a funny way, of course.

When it comes to cycling, we somehow really like to think that fear should be the integral part of cycling experience. Still many Americans believe that cycling is dangerous and in general should not be attempted without protective clothing and helmets (Let's forget about performance/sport cycling and focus on vehicular cycling for a while).

Maybe the case with fear of cycling is a bit like the problem with fear of flying. We all know that far less people die every day in plane crashes than in car accidents, yet many of us experience some hard-to-explain hysteria when sitting on a plane. We could argue that this statistics is not valid here since many more people drive daily than fly. We would have to then look at a place where people drive to work as often as they cycle, like Holland. Let's take a look at this graphics:

Cycling safety in various countries (Source: http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1079.html)

Well, it turns out that the percentage of trips done on a bicycle in the U.S. is only around 1% compared to 27% in Holland. Yet somehow, America leads with 110 deaths per billion kilometers cycled, compared to only 19 in Holland. So it looks like it is not simply a matter of scale. Somehow the Dutch managed to make cycling safe. How?

In the 60' citizens of Holland became richer and richer. This means that they could afford more cars. And large cities in Holland became flooded with cars. Public city space was converted into much needed parkings and bike lanes were reduced. Sounds familiar? Pretty much like in the U.S. right now. More cars, more drivers, richer citizens... They must have been very happy, right?. Or maybe not so much, since they quickly noticed the increase in fatal accidents. In 1971, 3000 people died on Dutch roads, including 400 children.

So what did the Dutch do to reduce number of fatal accidents and make cycling safer? Judging by our American standards, they should have probably given helmets and reflective vests for free to every biker. It looks like that was not the case since only 0.1% of cyclists in Holland wear a helmet. If you don't trust these numbers, you can see it for yourself:

Can you count how many bikers wear a helmet in this video? None. Zero. Not even one. Weird, right? Based on the above graphics U.S. should lead the world in bicycle safety since 38% of all cyclists wear a helmet. If this is not the case why do we live in fear and gear up for cycling, while the Dutch just simply take their bikes everywhere not fearing any danger?

The answer is in this excellent post by Kim Harding. Basically, in the U.S. we are trying to fix the situation by penalizing its victims, while in Holland they really got the to root of it. It is like sweeping all the dust under the carpet. Yes it is faster and easier this way and it gives you a feeling that room is clean. But is it really? So instead of educating drivers, building infrastructure, and motivate people to use other means of transportation, we prefer to spread the fear that cycling is unsafe, and all who cycle must be nuts because real Americans should only drive.

This means that unlike the Dutch, we take a "backwards approach to road safety", which in my area results in 1 crash every 1030 cycled miles.

Commuter's cyclocross

I have just experienced something I would call a commuter's cyclocross. Last Saturday night we had a severe snow fall in New England. While Boston was hit with just a few centimeters of snow, a bit further north in New Hampshire it was already close to 40cm. But this amount of snow is not unusual here. We New Englanders know to expect it and know how to deal with it (i.e. we either shovel or go lazy way with a snow blower). Still, it came quite early this year, in October. This means that most leaves were still on trees. It also means that it is still relatively warm out here (above zero degrees), which makes snow wet and heavy.

It turned out that this combination was quite deadly for many trees around. Falling trees pulled power lines so many people were left with no electricity and, even worse, no TV ;) I also lost a half of a tree on my front yard.

Today's weather was supposed to be pretty nice so I decided to bike to work. Usually, in the morning I take the road, but in the afternoon, I like to take a longer forest path that goes a bit around through Lexington and then merges with Minuteman Bikeway. This way is longer but nicer and I can stay 100% away from cars. Today, it turned out to be a mistake. I regret I did not take my camera to take better pictures and I had to rely on a cell phone.

I quickly realized that my way back home would mean mostly carrying my bike over fallen trees turning it into a "fully-loaded cyclocross". Not much fun, I have to say, since my bike with panniers must weigh close to 17kg. A bit further down the path, the situation was even worse:

If you are not sure where actually the path is, in these pictures, don't worry. I couldn't find it either. I found out that many small trees around were nearly wiped out by the heavy snow, while larger ones collapsed completely blocking my way.

I eventually got the the Minuteman Bikeway, which was a bit cleaner, but still a true obstacle course.

What worries me that my usual shortcut through the forest is not used by bikers at all. I haven't seen there a single biker so far. It is just a narrow path, which means that it may not be cleaned quickly from all those fallen branches, and who knows, I may even have to wait till the next year. In the meantime, I would have to find another route. I guess this means back to vehicular cycling for now.

First snow

It snowed last night for the first time this season. It was warm enough during the day for all of that snow to melt completely. But this is what I found in the morning:

Looks like winter will be here pretty soon. I had some errands to run today and it would be actually easier and faster to do it driving. But then I saw the iced windshield of my car and instead of scraping it, I decided to bike to work. It was a pleasant ride despite a fairly low temperature.

Critical Mass done wrong

This happened a while ago but I still would like to comment on Boston Critical Mass that took place in June. First, take a look:

Maybe for these cyclists blocking a major intersection seemed like a good idea, but it was nothing else but showing that cyclists in Boston are just a bunch of egoistic a**holes. It is essentially like going on war with drivers. Is this what we really want?

I cycle as much as I drive and I can't understand the point of this action. I always thought that the purpose of a Critical Mass is to show how many cyclists are there in the city and that these people also deserve certain facilities like bike paths, parking racks, etc. Is this how we want to raise awareness? Through aggression? We keep doing it and Boston drivers would definitely hate us more.

Rain

I am glad I decided NOT to bike to work today. This waterfall pouring from the sky would definitely not make cycling fun. Some people don't mind it. I do. Since I bike-commute mainly for fun, I still have a hard time finding it when riding in rain. It is not about the bike, as bikes can be pretty well protected from atmospheric precipitation by fenders, internal gearing hubs, full case chainguards, disc or drum brakes, etc. It is not even about clothing as you can use waterproof pants, jackets, rubber shoes, etc. It is mostly about... the glasses. I wear glasses and in rain they quickly get foggy and wet. I can't see a damn thing.

Commuter races

I have just looked at EcoVelo and they write about yet another commuter race, this time in Bristol, UK (Original text here). The outcome was exactly as expected: cycling is the fastest option. But... (there are many "buts" here):
- the test was done during rush hour in heavy traffic,
- it was in the city center,
- the distance was only 5.5km (3.5mi).
No wonder that the cyclist won (17min.) and the runner finished second (28min.). Third was the bus (39min.) and then the car (53min.). It took the driver 53 minutes to drive 5.5km!

This is exactly why all these commuter races stop making sense at some point. They all show the obvious that could be figured out without the race happening at all. No wonder that in such a heavy traffic and short distance cycling is the best option.

Comic strip from http://www.yehudamoon.com

But what if we try something different? Let's see:
- test done in the suburbs,
- distance of 10.5km (6.5mi),
- very light car traffic, even during rush hours,
- almost no public transportation.
Yes, this is how my work commute looks like, as I described it before. In the morning it takes 15min. to cover this distance by car and 25min. by bike. There is a bus line, but it goes around other towns and takes 19min. between the closest bus stops. I would have to walk 42min. from/to the bus stops. The total travel time by bus would be over 1hr. I haven't tried running, but it is not going to be faster than driving or cycling.

This is my point here: of course, bike is faster in a heavy car traffic. But I would love to see more commuter races done in different scenarios when results are not always that obvious.

Bikes around the world - part 2

New York, USA

Dublin, Ireland

Cape Cod, USA

Bermuda

New York, USA

Berlin, Germany