Going After The “Fat” Of The Netherlands

A Dutch woman once explained her country’s liberal social environment to me. It was the first to legalize same-sex marriage, she said, for the same reason it legalized marijuana and sex work.  “We like order,” she told me.  “It’s part of our Calvinistic heritage.” Although she, like many of her compatriots, are no longer religious, the theologian’s way of thinking “still guides us.”

That reasoning seemed counterintuitive until she offered this:  “If people are being who they are aren’t hurting anyone else, why should they be made into criminals?” and therefore “outsiders.”  To maintain order, “include everyone.”

That desire for orderliness took a turn someone like me would expect—and wish for—in Rotterdam.  In one of the world’s busiest ports, authorities seized a shipment of 16,500 electric “fat bikes” from China. Another 1000 were taken from a nearby distribution warehouse.

As the name implies, such machines have wide tires and low-slung frames that cause them to resemble low-slung motorcycles.

European Union regulations limit eBikes to speeds of 25 mph (16mph). The “fatbikes,” however, have software and other components that can be easily manipulated to make them go much faster.

Apparently, nobody anticipated the arrival of those bikes. And, when the Netherlands mandated helmets for motor-scooter riders, many—especially teenagers—switched to “fatbikes,” for which there is no helmet requirement.

So now Dutch and European authorities are not only looking at headgear policies, but also to more clearly define different categories of two-wheeled vehicles. Would that authorities in my hometown of New York (and my home country of the United States) gain some of that Calvinistic penchant for making and maintaining order.

Will The CCC Be KO’d?

 The Community Cycling Center turned 30 years old in July. It helped to make Portland, Oregon synonymous, not only with cycling, but with non-profit cycling advocacy.

It may not, however, make it to 31. The organization is in a severe financial crisis that may be a reason why it has had six executive directors in the past five years. Its directors say the CCC can survive only if it receives $115,000 in donations during the next three weeks.

So how can such an organization, with its well-re bike shop, be in such dire straits—in Portland?

According to the CCC, its troubles began during the COVID-19 pandemic. While demand for bikes, parts and services surged, lockdowns ruptured supply chains, making parts and accessories difficult, if not impossible, to find. At the same time, donations to nonprofit organizations like CCC dropped, in part because people were out of work.

But a document provides other reasons that would elicit “I told you so”s from the editors of the Wall Street Journal. One is a “top heavy”  organizational structure. According to the doc, there are too many leadership positions that could be filled with lower-paid workers.  Another reason cited is employees who are kept year-round and provided with benefits and yearly cost-of-living increases.

Now, if you have been reading my blog for a while, you have probably guessed-correctly—that I am all for shop employees, or any other workers, making a living wage and not having to worry about financial ruin if they’re sick or hurt. That it’s cites as a cause of CCC’s crisis points to an inherent dilemma in the bike industry: In most places, it’s seasonal and for all but the mega-retailers, most of whom are now online, profit margins are small and overhead costs are high, hence the low wages paid to mechanics and other employees. The lack of pay (and, in most shops, benefits) is probably why the retail bike industry isn’t seen as a career option to anyone who doesn’t own the business.

I am not familiar with CCC’s administration. I suspect, however, that one reason why it has “too many” full-time leadership positions is that, like other community-centered nonprofits , it’s trying to promote opportunities for people who might not otherwise have them. I would hate to see any organization give up on such a worthy endeavor, but I imagine that it’s not easy to sustain.

Sometimes They’re Righr

 A letter to the Baltimore Banner’s editor illustrated, for me, a problem in the planning and public perception of bicycle infrastructure.

I am not familiar with Baltimore. From reading Dr. Mark Braun’s letter, however, I get the impression that the city’s bike lanes are as sporadic and episodic as they are in other American locales.

Dr. Braun, who describes himself as a new resident and avid cyclist, says that he cannot understand why residents object to one proposed bike lane, but completely understands why they object to another. 

Photo by Daniel Zawodny

About the latter, he says two roads that would connect parts of other bike trails are “overbuilt” and would be “incredibly unsafe for children or inexperienced riders. He says the former is a much better choice, as it is a four-lane road where traffic is light but fast, which encourages drivers to speed. A bike lane along that road, he argues, would result in “decreased vehicle speeds” and provide “direct access” to two parks.

In other words, he is saying that on the road where a proposed lane has raised objections he can’t understand, the lane would actually make the road safer for traffic as well as cyclists. And, he understands the objections to the other proposed route for essentially the same reason.

Such considerations never seem to factor into decisions about where and how to build bike lanes in American cities. That, I believe is one factor that causes planners to create bad bike lanes and for non-cyclists to object to good lanes for the wrong reasons.