The Endless Season—And War

 Spring may not have “officially” arrived. 

I woke up just before sunrise, which arrived an hour later than it did the other day because of daylight savings time. Could that have been a reason why dawn today gave a hint or tease, depending on your point of view, of the season people are anticipating more than any other in recent memory.

More snow has fallen and ice has covered local waterways this year than in the past few; people seemed to get sicker and age more.  Of course, weather and epidemiology aren’t the only reasons why this winter has seemed so brutal and endless. Pundits have chattered about our chances of “entering” “another” war; the truth is that this country hasn’t not been in one, declared or not, at least since World War II. Even if he hadn’t attacked Iran, the Fake Tan Fūhrer has been at war—with the people of this country. 

Some have fought against him and paid dearly.  Others are looking for refuge. Either way, they want this winter of discontent to end.

Solo Near Winter’s End (I Think)

The roads are free of snow and ice, finally, but full of sand and salt. The skies were overcast,  but the temperature reached 50F (10C). I took my longest ride in weeks, to Fort Totten and back:  about 45 miles (70km).  

In spite of the mild Saturday, I saw very few people out: not many people drove, even fewer walked, cycled or scootered (Is that a real verb?) and I had Fort Totten to myself, save for a young man who climbed the fence between the main path and the water.

Although what I saw along the way—all familiar—and the weather were nothing like what I experienced in Japan, I was somehow reminded of my trip there.  Perhaps seeing this on the water’s edge had something to do with it:

Why They Don’t Ride To Work

 

In earlier posts, I have written “lines of paint does not a bike lane make,” or words to that effect.  Ron Johnson’s article in Momentum magazine concurs with that—with caveats.

Johnson reports that, according to a study published in The Journal of Cycling and Micromobility Research, some 61 percent of paint-only bike lanes—that is, those that are not delineated by a physical barrier, or separated altogether, from the roadway—are on “high stress” roads which, Johnson explains, are “fast multi-lane corridors where traffic speed and volume make riding uncomfortable for most people.” That, in itself, is problematic, but what makes the situation particularly vexing is that about 77 percent of all US bike lanes.According to my trusty iPad calculator (You don’t want to rely on my math skills!), 46.97 percent—nearly half—of all American bike lanes are paint-only and on “high stress” roads.”

With all due to respect to John Forrester and his crusading for “vehicular cycling,” people who haven’t ridden since they were kids, or recreational riders who want to commute or otherwise use their bicycles as vehicles, aren’t going to cycle in or near traffic if they don’t feel safe. And those are the very people—in addition to brand- new cyclists—we need if cycling and other forms of “micromobility” are to be seen as viable alternatives to automobiles.

Of course, some of the offending “lanes,” particularly those in large cities with extensive networks of streets, are the result of planners who aren’t cyclists. In such environments, there may be alternatives, such as quieter side-streets, to a poorly-conceived of -constructed bike lanes, But in many rural areas, particularly in the South and non-coastal West, the “high-stress” road is the only one connecting one village or county to another. There is also little or no mass transportation, which all but forces people to rely on that “high-stress” road, whether they’re on two, three, four—or no (i.e., pedestrians) wheels.

People in such environments will eschew cycling or other non-motorized transportation as long as there’s nothing but a line of white paint between them and SUVs and semis doing 70 MPH, whatever Mr. Forrester might’ve said.

Was He A Provocateur?

 This is why you should get your news from more than one source.

No, I am not going to talk about the attack on Iran, although that is definitely an example of why.

Rather, I will mention something that happened in Brooklyn last night. It doesn’t have the same ramifications as the war Fake Tan Fũhrer started, but it does have implications for relationships between drivers and cyclists, based on common assumptions about the latter.

According to a Yahoo News story, a sixteen-year-old boy allegedly held onto a  B6 bus as it moved along Bay Parkway near East Second Street. ABC-7 News says he appeared to be holding on, which is somewhat different (in legal terms as well as semantics) but conveys more or less the same impression to most people. The New York Daily News headline, on the other hand, claimed that the boy “interfered with the driver’s route.”

(All italics are mine.)

Whatever happened, the driver—42-year-old Michael Brown—and the boy got into an altercation.  Now Brown is under arrest for punching him in the face, leaving him with a broken nose.

If we can accuse the boy of anything, it’s recklessness and maybe stupidity.  But neither makes him any worse than any other kid. (Confession: I did similar things at his age, and even later.) And it certainly doesn’t warrant what Brown did.

I hope the boy is OK.  I worry, though, that whatever he did could reinforce stereotypes too many people—including, possibly, Brown—hold about cyclists.

,

And I Can’t Even Train One!

 Including Marlee, I have had six, and lived with eight, cats in my life. I have also petted, played with and fed others— more than I can count. But I have never been able to get even one to ride a bicycle.

Who trained them? Or did these fabulous felines teach themselves? Inquiring minds want to know.

Riding To The Rappers

 Sometimes I get on my bike just to ride. Other times, I have a route and destination in mind. But I don’t always know what I’ll see along the way.

As I the Randalls Island Connctor, I heard music on the Bronx side. That’s not unusual; I figured it was coming from somebody’s car. But then I heard…rapping.  And it didn’t sound recorded. So of course I had to check it out:

The words they chanted, shouted, stage-whispered and simply spoke resonated, not only because of their rhythms and rhymes: They were as skilled as any I’ve heard, but they didn’t come cheap:  The pain and frustration—and triumphs—pulse from them.

But even though their raps dealt with events in the artist’s lives and the world today—or, at least, they could have been today’s stories—I had the seemingly-odd sensation of going back 40 or 45 years.  I soon realized why:  Those young men with old souls were doing like the early hip- hop djs:  They set up sound equipment in a public space (the corner of East 132nd Street and Locust Avenue, to be exact) and opened themselves up to whoever chanced by.

The main differences were that the man who was the actual or de facto sound engineer was using a laptop which, of course, nobody had “back in the day.” And he didn’t have a turntable, which almost everyone had.

I will definitely check out their YouTube channel (Punchline Academy). Will I encounter anything like that impromptu concert on a future ride?  Before today, I probably would have said, “no.” But after today:  “I’ll never know!”

This, Again?

 Just what we need:  More snow!

Just two days after our previous snowstorm.

I think we’ve had more of the white stuff this winter than in the past ten combined!

Trying To Slip By

 The sartorial customs of ICE made me realize that, except during cold weather, I rarely see a cyclist’s face covered. The SS wannabes are trying to avoid recognition; while most cyclists I’ve met aren’t actively seeking it, few are hiding.

There are exceptions, though:

Rear cyclist:  Are you working on your aerodynamics?

Front cyclist:  No, I just don’t want to be recognized in the photo,

Those Aren’t The Only Medals They Deserve

 This month—February—is Black History Month. And, at this moment, the Winter Olympics are taking place in Italy.

It’s difficult not to notice that more Black athletes have been competing—and winning— during the past few Winter Olympiads.  While Erin Jackson didn’t make it to the podium this year, she won the gold medal in speed skating’s 500 meter event. Elena Meyers Taylor won a gold medal in bobsledding this year, at age 41, after taking home two bronze and three silver medals over the the previous three Olympiads.  The US hockey team won this year’s gold medal with its first Black player, Laila Edwards, scoring a goal against rival Canada in the opening match.

But, to me, one of the most successful Olympic athletes of any race, nation or time is Lauryn Williams. She earned a silver medal in the 2014 Sochi Games’ two-woman bobsled event— after winning a silver medal in the 2004 Athens Summer Games and gold in the 2012 London Summer Games as a track athlete. Quick, name another athlete who won medals (gold, no less) in both the Winter and Summer Games.

Speaking of Summer Games, one of the most memorable victories was by a silver medalist: Nelson Vails in the 1984 Los Angeles games. Fellow American Mark Gorski won the gold in that year’s sprint. What made Vails’ finish so memorable was that he and Gorski rode such a good race—and that Vails was the first African-American to win an Olympic medal in cycling.

One reason why Vails’ medal, and his other victories, were so important is that they came in a sport, and in venues—like those of the Winter Olympics—in which most competitors and spectators were White. After Major Taylor—one of the greatest cyclists, athletes and human beings who ever lived—cycling went into a long, steady decline in North America. Its main events and competitors for the next seven decades were in Europe and Japan. When the ‘70’s North American Bike Boom helped to revive bike racing in the US, most of the new competitors were White suburban college students for a variety of social and economic reasons.  I think Nelson Vails helped to show young Black would-be athletes and White audiences that Blacks could, and would excel in sports other than those stereotypically associated with them, like basketball, (American) football, track and field (especially the sprint events) and boxing.*

*—Don’t get me wrong:  I think they’re great sports. I am simply happy, or at least hopeful, that they won’t have to be the only ones accessible to Blacks or, for that matter, Whites or anyone else from lower socioeconomic backgrounds.

The Color And Name Of Justice

 Today is Mardi Gras. The traditional colors are purple, green and gold. Why? Gold represents power, green stands for faith and purple, justice.

Now you know why I have four purple bicycles and have long been drawn to the color.  All right, I didn’t know about the symbolism when I was a kid. Or maybe I did, subconsciously…

And perhaps that knowledge, conscious or not, guided my naming myself Justine. My mother told me, long before I began my gender affirmation process, that she would’ve given me that name had I been assigned the female sex at birth.

Knowing that made my gender affirmation (what was previously called the “gender transition “ or “sex change”) seem even more like justice after the decades I lived as male. Thus, my name and favorite color, which I love for their beauty, seem completely just on Mardi Gras, and every day.

If Only They Could Be Heroes

 Today is Presidents’ Day here in the US.

Last week, on Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, I ranted about how I believe it’s so unfair that, on this day, he has to share the spotlight with the likes of Warren G. Harding, Richard Nixon and the Fake Tan Fūhrer.

Speaking of whom: After a year of his second term, almost everything that came before it seems like lifetimes, even eons, ago. If you’ll indulge me a cliché, it seems like we were living in a different world just over a year ago.

Now, if you really want to see a different world, check this out:

Now, Bill Clinton isn’t my favorite President even if I voted for him twice.  But he was so many things FTF isn’t: intelligent, articulate and someone who, at least sometimes, tried to build a legacy that wasn’t only about himself. It’s hard to believe that he, his successor (George W. Bush) and FTF were born within the span of a few weeks in 1946.

What makes the photo seem even more like a glimpse into a vanished reality is the other person in it. Remember when Lance Armstrong was hailed as a hero? There were whispers about his use of performance-enhancing substances and how he bullied his teammates into covering for him. 

I am long past looking at athletes as heroes, or even role models, save for a few, like Simone Biles, I fully respect as people for their courage and integrity.  Would that we had such a President!

He Carries Roses. I See…

 Today is, of course, Valentine’s Day. 

Like many holidays that have been co-opted by capitalism, current celebrations seem to have little or no apparent relation to whom the day was originally dedicated. At least, almost no one is thinking of that person while sharing a romantic dinner or buying or giving cuddle toys, chocolates and roses.

(Call me sick or whatever you like, but when I see a dude walking down the street with a bouquet of roses, I can’t help but to think that within an hour and a half, a woman will be flat on her back.)

Anyway, St. Valentine was, according to at least one story, a priest or bishop who secretly married soldiers, in defiance of Emperor Claudius II, and aided persecuted Christians.  While imprisoned, he was said to have restored the sight of his jailer’s daughter and wrote her a letter signed, “From Your Valentine.”

That deed and others were deemed miracles, and were among the reasons why he was beatified. But his continued defiance of the emperor led to his execution in 270 CE, which the church saw as martyrdom and another factor in his canonization.

Now, I can understand making him the patron saint of lovers because he married those soldiers and showed his love (which some have speculated as, umm, not entirely Platonic) for the jailer’s daughter. But what any of that has to do with candy and flowers or candlelight dinners is beyond me.

In case you were wondering, I took a ride today—solo.  It was great.

Riding With Abe

 On this date in 1809, Abraham Lincoln, the 16th US President, was born. Even if biographies portray him as a better President or person than he actually was, I can imagine him spinning in his grave if he could see the current occupant* of the office and residence he graced.

When I was in elementary school, Lincoln’s birthday was a national holiday, as George Washington’s (22 February) was.  Now we have “Presidents’ Day,**” which will be observed on Monday.  

Given that he was assassinated in 1865, it’s unlikely that he mounted anything we would today recognize as a bicycle.  But it’s fun to speculate on what it might’ve looked like if he had:

* —I refuse to put the name of the White House squatter current occupant in the same sentence with Lincoln.  Abe doesn’t deserve that.

**—I hate the term because it implies that we are honoring all of them, including Andrew Jackson, James Buchanan,  James Polk, Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, William McKinley, Warren G. Harding, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush and you-know-who.

Call Tnem What You Will, They Were First

 As I’ve lived deeper into midlife, I care less about genres of cycling. Turns out, I’ve practiced most of them, consciously or not, sometimes even before they were named as such. For example, I rode on trails and other non-paved surfaces years before I heard about “mountain biking” or “gravel riding,” let alone saw bikes made specifically for them.

I say that not to boast, but to say that I’ve simply loved mounting my saddle and spinning my pedals. In a similar vein, I feel fulfilled when I write and have stopped thinking about whether the words I set to a paper or screen are blogging, journalism, poetry or something else. Those labels, like, those for bicycle  journeys (which is what they all are, whether they bring you to the office or someplace “exotic”) are as arbitrary as the distinctions between races and nations.

I mention all of that because of something that reminds how I came to the attitudes I’ve just expressed from looking down on people with bicycles (I didn’t even call them “cyclists!”) who didn’t ride as long, hard or often as I did, on bikes that weren’t as nice as mine. Calling me a “recreational cyclist” (which no one did in those days, at least when I was in earshot 😉)was, to my mind, akin to branding me a dilettante.

These days, I’m simply glad to see people on bikes. I don’t even look down on e-bikes anymore, at least the pedal-assist models, because they keep many older riders (of which, ahem, I am not one ☺️) and people with disabilities on two wheels.

For that reason, I believe there’s an anniversary worth celebrating today.  On this date in 1878, the Boston Bicycle Club—believed to be the first organization in the US, if not the world, devoted to recreational cycling, was founded in the city for which it was named.  

BBC promoted cycling, organized community rides and established some of the first safety standards.  The latter was no small consideration, as cyclists were still on high-wheelers and “ safety” bicycles with two wheels of equal or nearly equal size were several years in the future.

Call them whatever kind of cyclists you will, but they sound like my kind.c

Watch Out For This Bill In The Hawkeye State

 Call me a paranoid conspiracy theorist.  But whenever I hear about any proposed bicycle-related legislation, especially in a “red” state, I translate “public safety” as “anti-bike.” 

At least, that was my reaction when I learned about HB 637, introduced two weeks ago in the Iowa State Legislature. If passed, it would effectively ban cycling on the country roads—one of the most appealing features of The Buckeyes State.

The bill includes this:  “a person shall not use a device on a roadway with a speed limit above 25 miles per hour.”  The bill’s definition of devices includes electric personal mobility devices, along with pedestrian conveyances such as wheelchairs, scooters and skateboards. And bicycles.

Given that most rural roads have speed limits greater than 25 MPH, the bill, if passed, would effectively make a ride in the countryside illegal. 

But it seems that whoever wrote the bill also wants to put a stranglehold on urban couriers and delivery workers:  “While using a device, a person shall not carry a package, bundle or article that prevents the person from keeping the person’s handlebars at all times.”

If what I have mentioned so far doesn’t sound ominous enough, consider that the bill also would require that all devices brake in a way that allows skidding.  Whoever wrote that part of the bill has never been on one of the mentioned “devices,” for anyone who has knows that safe stops don’t include skidding.  All modern bicycle braking systems—caliper or disc—are therefore designed for controlled stopping power.

The worst thing about the bill is that it mandates a criminal record for anyone who violates the ban on “devices” on roads with 25MPH+ speed limits. An infraction would result in a “simple misdemeanor” charge that carries a sentence of up to 30 days in jail and fines of nearly $900.

Fortunately, the bill’s passage has stalled, at least for now. The Legislature Public Safety Chair said it “needs more work” but offered no other insight into its possible future.

No More Ice Puns, Just Cold,

 Early this morning the temperature dropped to -2F (-18.9C) in my corner of the world. And the wind gusted to 30 MPH (50 KPH).

What Does He Call It?

 Why do some of us name our bicycles? Well, for some of us—for me, anyway—bicycles are companions in our journeys.  Thus, our bicycles have stories, and it only seems fitting that anything with a narrative, or narratives, should also have a name.

Our bicycles’ sagas include epic rides and errands, life-changing events and daily routines. Also, our bikes have, if you will, their origin stories, whether with robots in a Southeast Asian factory or a craft shop in Portland.  Or, in the case of one machine, specifically a “skyscraper” bike, its conception, if you will, took place in a Midwestern university’s engineering class.

Wynn Grame “saw an image” of a double-decker bike like the one he built “and it just stuck in my head.” Once friends donated bikes, he recalled, he “just had to do it.” And so his class project, and current mode of transportation, began.

From cutting up the frames to taking his first ride, Grame’s build took six weeks during which he squeezed in shop time while working on his summer internship and on weekends.

Sometimes, our bike stories include learning something new, whether about a custom in some place where we take a ride or a skill which may or not be related to the bike.  In Grame’s case, it was something essential to the origin of his bike:  Before he started building it, he had never welded.  Not even once.

I have seen “crane” or “giraffe” bikes like his, but have never ridden one.  So it was very interesting to learn that, aside from the “cool” factor, there are benefits to riding his creation. It “offers excellent visibility on the road,” he explained, “because cars can see you immediately” and are “very cautious around you.”  Hmm…Does that make “blinkies” and reflective clothing unnecessary?

I’ll take his word for it and give him “props” for building a bike.  But with so many interesting stories already part of its identity, I wonder whether Wynn Grame has given his bike a name.

Are All E-Bikes Created Equal?

 This year, New Jersey passed a law requiring all e-bike users to have a driver’s license, register their bikes and haven insurance by 1 July.  It may well be the most restrictive legislation regarding e-bikes in the United States:  Unlike tiered systems in other jurisdictions, in which e-bikes are regulated according to their speed, power or whether or not they have a throttle or pedal assist, the Garden State’s regulation says, in essence, that all e-bikes are created equal.

Now some folks are saying that it violates one of the Declaration of Independence’s most basic tenets:  that all men are created equal.

No, the state hasn’t declared that e-bikes are people. Rather, immigrants’-rights groups are saying that the law will unfairly burden some of the people who most depend on e-bikes: delivery workers, nearly all of whom are immigrants, and people who live in areas without mass transit but who can’t afford a car or registration—some of whom are immigrants. And most of those couriers and people who commute are riding pedal-assisted machines that have lower top speeds than the ones that are basically just electric motorcycles.

Photo by Seth Wenig

Admittedly, some of those workers and residents are undocumented.  But given the current political and social climate, even those who are here legally and people who were born here to parents who are citizens (including yours truly) would rather minimize their interactions with government authorities.  I can understand their fears; I see ICE agents during rides or while running errands and worry that even someone like me is at risk of becoming the next Alex Pretti or Renee Good if one of those agents is hung over or otherwise having a bad day.  

The Other Ice

 Yesterday I wrote about my participation in a memorial ride for Alex Pretti, the intensive care unit nurse—and cyclist—murdered by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Minneapolis.

Say what you will about my mental state, but I have a difficult time using the word “ice,” even in reference to a frozen liquid: the way it’s been used for its entire history in the English language.

But today I will break the ice (pun intended) and talk about what I’ve seeing during the (admittedly little) cycling I’ve done during the past two weeks: the longest spell of below-freezing temperatures we’ve had in a long time. I don’t mind the cold so much, but the freeze also included a snowstorm last week and plowing of streets has been, shall we say, episodic. And snow has turned to ice, especially in the bike lanes.

Anyway, on Monday I noticed something I hadn’t seen in years:

Technically, the Hudson River isn’t a river where it separates Manhattan from New Jersey:  the water is brackish, in contrast to the fresh flow further upstream. So the Hudson’s New York City stretch, like the misnamed East River, which is really an inlet of the ocean, rarely glazes over (unlike many of my students’ eyes).

On the other hand, I suspect this body of water freezes more frequently:

Paine Lake stands next to the Paine House, where the author of “Common Sense,” an inspirational for American Revolutionaries, lived.  How we need him now, when the political climate is even more inhospitable than this winter’s weather!

Riding Against a Tide of ICE

 “The sharks are circling.”

On Saturday, a fellow cyclist made that comment in reference to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a.k.a. ICE, during the Alex Pretti memorial ride. She has family in the Minneapolis-St.Paul area, where residents, many of whom had not previously participated in a demonstration, are resisting vigorously and visibly. But the now-most-hated government agents in the USA are also accosting and arresting “suspicious” people all over the nation. My friendly acquaintance believes “it’s just a matter of time” before a “surge” comes to my hometown,  New York City.

Quite understandably, she and other riders didn’t want to be photographed.  While we want to show our solidarity, some fear—rightly—negative consequences given the current political climate and the industries in which some work. 

And some might become targets for looking “suspicious.” Given this Administration’s hostility to cyclists, spinning two pedals to propel two wheels instead of pressing one pedal to propel four wheels could be seen as a subversive act.

Perhaps it is. But if I am resisting anything, I am riding against the tyranny of automobiles and fossil fuels—which contributes to climate change and economic disparities that fuel (pun not intended) the desperate traffic that ICE is tasked with stopping.