Did She Or Didn't She--Vote?

 Late yesterday, I zigzagged between Brooklyn and Queens on Tosca, my Mercian fixed-gear bike.  I sometimes take rides like that with no particular destination, and turn wherever something looks interesting--or, sometimes, just to take the path of least resistance (less traffic, a better-looking road or just inertia).  Rides like the one I took yesterday inevitably lead me along streets never frequented by hipsters or the bourgeoisie and never visited by tourists.  Those streets are also among the increasingly-small number of byways not enclosed by towers built from beige Lego blocks, black metal bars and windows designed for people to look at, but not see themselves.

One such street--Borden Avenue--parallels the Long Island Railroad tracks in Hunter's Point, about five kilometers from my apartment.  It's still an industrial area, and sometimes interesting graffiti-murals (like the lamentably-gone Five Pointz) can be found.  

While pedaling along Borden, I chanced upon something I would have expected to see on Five Pointz but, surprisingly, graced a billboard.

I have to admit that I felt a bit of shame.  Sojourner Truth, Alice Paul and Ida B. Wells are familiar names to me, but until yesterday, Mabel Ping Hua-Lee wasn't.  All of them fought for human rights, specifically for women and people of racial "minorities."   The sad part is that, among them, only Ms. Paul (who died in 1977) lived long enough to fully benefit from the legislation for which she fought.  

Sojourner Truth was born into slavery and died decades before the 19th Amendment became law.  Ida B. Wells lived to see it, but not the civil rights legislation of the 1960s.  Ms. Ping Hua-Lee apparently (I'll explain) lived long enough to enjoy the right to vote and to be a benificiary of civil rights legislation--but it's not clear as to whether she could, or did, take advantage of those rights.

Ms. Lee was born in China but came to New York as a child when her father, a missionary of the Baotist church, was sent to take over a church in Chinatown.  The neighborhood--now endangered as a result of pandemic--could just as well have had a wall around it.  Back then, it was much smaller.  Some people, especially the women, almost never left their homes because of the hostility they faced and, like Lee's mother, had bound feet that made walking difficult.  And, in contrast to today (or, at least, say, a year ago, before the pandemic), tourists rarely visited, except to gawk.

Moreover, Lee's father was unusual, not only for being a minister, but because he was able to enter the United States at all.  The Chinese Exclusion Act was passed about a decade and a half before he arrived, but a few people like him--diplomats and other educated professionals--were sometimes allowed to emigrate.

Lee quickly took to the educational opportunities available to someone of her intellect and talents.  She attended Erasmus Hall Academy, whose alumni include Beverly Sills and Barbara Streisand and whose most illustrious dropout is Bobby Fischer.  After graduating Erasmus, she would attend Barnard College and become the first Chinese woman to earn a PhD in the United States--in economics, from Columbia University.

What she is best known for is her leadership in the suffragist movements, especially her role in the massive 1912 march.  Energized by these experiences, she wanted to return to China and spark a similar movement.  But those plans were thwarted when her mother fell ill and her father died.  Although she wasn't a minister, she became the director of his church and used her position as a platform to advocate for gender and racial equality.  Interestingly, she believed that Protestant theology could be used to advance causes of social justice, knowing full well that one of the goals of the Chinese Exclusion Act was to help keep a white Protestant majority in the United States.  Of course that, thankfully, failed:  Most of the mass immigrations that came from southern and eastern Europe between 1880 and 1919 wasn't Protestant. (Catholics and Jews, oh my!) 

Little is known about Mabel Ping-Hua Lee's later years.  She is believed to have died in or around 1966.  It's not clear as to whether she ever became a citizen--and, thus, whether she exercised the right to vote for which she fought!

Now, in case you were wondering:  After I got home from my ride and ate some vegetarian nachos I made for supper, I did a Google search on Mabel Ping-Hua Lee.  I often do such things after rides and, in the days before the Internet, I'd go to the library the first chance I got after riding.  You might say that bicycling has caused me to continue my education!

A Path From Work

Two of my uncles and my maternal grandfather worked on the Brooklyn waterfront docks. I don't think they could have envisioned anyone going there for a leisurely late-afternoon walk or bike ride.  They probably would have thought such an undertaking in the dead of winter was sheer insanity:  After spending the day working outside in the cold, they wanted to ensconce themselves in the warmth of their apartments and the suppers my grandmother and aunts cooked.  

For that matter, my grandfather and uncles probably could not understand how physical activity could be a way to "relax" at the end of a day.  To be fair, grandpa's last gift to me was a bicycle--albeit one I wouldn't be able to ride for a couple of years--and my uncles lived long enough to see that I would not give up two wheels and two pedals the moment I was legally old enough for four wheels and one pedal with a motor.

Then again, they might have thought it odd that someone would construct a bike and pedestrian lane along the waterfront where they unloaded ships--or that anyone would make a trip, whether by bike, bus or car, to it--and pay money to shop in the stores or eat and drink in the cafes around it.  

Really, I had to wonder what they would have thought of me, spinning my pedals along a path that zigs and zags around places where drinks are poured and shopping carts are unloaded--in the very places where men like them hoisted crates and even railroad cars from ships.

What might have been the strangest thing of all, to them, about the ride I took late yesterday is that I actually find beauty in those places--such that I would stop to take a photo of two bare trees in a copse of steel and brick at the time of day when they would have left the Red Hook twilight's metallic haze  for the incandescent glade of their kitchen tables.

Fewer Bikes In A Dutch Lane?

A city wants fewer cyclists to use a bike lane.

Yes, you read that right.  Oh, but it gets better:  that city is in what is often seen as one of the world's most bike-friendly nations.

That country is the Netherlands.  The city in question in Utrecht; the bike lane, alongside Vredenburg, is said to be the busiest in the nation.  It was widened a few years ago; even so, it's not enough to meet the demand.  

So many cyclists ride it because Vredenberg path is the main east-west corridor the city center.  As in many older cities, there simply aren't many options available:  Other streets dead-end at rivers, canals, railroad tracks or other natural or artificial barriers.  (This is also true in some older areas of cities like New York and Boston.)  In some places, it isn't possible to build bridges or other ways to navigate those obstacles--and, in some of the more historic and scenic areas of a city like Utrecht, it's too expensive or people understandably don't want to do such a thing.

Also, as the author of the Bicycle Dutch post points out, just as "we all know that more asphalt isn't the answer to too many cars," it's "probably also not the answer to too much cycling."  In other words, old European cities like Utrecht have very limited amounts of space on which to build anything, so adding more pavement would defeat one of the purposes of encouraging people to ride:  reducing congestion. The city is thus looking at other possible solutions, which including the closure of some streets to motor traffic and turning them into bike routes. Another suggestion includes using a former railway bridge as a crossing for cyclists.  

At least it seems that the city is trying to create a comprehensive plan to make movement from place to another safe, convenient and sustainable. Too often, American cities build bike lanes or other transit facilities without a coherent scheme.  That, I think, is why too many bike lanes are poorly constructed and maintained and don't offer useful routes, or even connections to other forms of transportation.  

From The Heights To The Cutoff—And Joe

Sometimes, when I ride through the industrial areas of Queens and Brooklyn, I feel like an archaeologist.

Tuesday afternoon I took Negrosa, my vintage Mercian Olympic, for a spin along some landmarked blocks in central Brooklyn.  I hadn’t planned to ride anywhere in particular; I just found myself spinning my pedals out that way.  

Brooklyn has, probably, the greatest concentration—and some of the best examples—of brownstone houses. Long-since-gentrified (and bleached, if you know what I mean) neighborhoods like Park Slope and Carroll Gardens regularly (during non-pandemic times) witness throngs of architecture students and tourists savoring the details of those buildings.  But some equally-beautiful areas like Stuyvesant Heights are less known because they are “off the beaten path. Stuyvesant Heights is still mainly an African- and Caribbean-American neighborhood.  Hmm...Could that be a reason why tourists (or White New Yorkers, except for those in the know) don’t beat a path to it?

These houses on Decatur Street have details even more intricate than what I saw every day when I was living in “the Slope.” 

I would love to see this neighborhood to keep the characteristics—including some interesting shops and cafes—that make it worth seeing.  But I hope it doesn’t turn into a masoleum, I mean museum or, worse, a Brownstone Theme Park.

Likewise, I could see this railroad underpass—under which I passed on my way home—turning into what many of us hoped the High Line would become.  The Montauk Cutoff, as it’s called, bears striking resemblances to The High Line before it became  catwalk for the well-heeled high-heeled:  Like the HL about 20 years ago, the MC is a weed-grown railroad right-of-way previously used by freight trains making deliveries to and from an old industrial area that’s starting to de-industrialize.

As I understand, the MC belongs to the Long Island Rail Road. (Yes, the LIRR still spells “Rail Road” as two words, just as they did in 1834!) Some reports say the Rail Road wants to add some trackage and connect it to their recently-expanded Sunnyside Yards.  Others say it’s structurally unsound and will be torn down.  Then there are stories that some city or state agency or investors want to acquire it and create a High Line, especially since some of the industrial sites could become upscale residential and commercial areas.

Me, I’d love for it to become a High Line for the people. It would include a bike lane (of course!), green spaces and art studios, galleries, craft shops, educational centers and cafes that could represent the many communities of Queens, the most culturally and linguistically diverse county in the United States, if not the world.

(Examples of the diversity include members of Central American indigenous groups who may or may not speak Spanish and Africans who might speak Wolof or some other native language and practice a religion far older than Christianity or Islam.)

Hmm...If someone takes me up on my idea, there might be a plaque or something with my name and likeness. Perhaps someone would look at it and wonder who, exactly, Justine was

just as I wonder what happened to Joe, or whether Marty and Janet stayed together. I mentioned these bits of graffiti on the Review Avenue wall of the Calvary Cemetery eight years ago.  I first saw it many years ago—if I recall correctly, with my family, on our way to visit relatives who were living in Queens.

I never know what I’ll unearth on a ride!

This Isn't An Experiment

Some people simply cannot abide any toe-clip overlap.  Me, I can stand a little, depending on the bike and how I'm riding it.  But this is, shall we say, a bit out of my range.

What's worse is the way it was achieved, if you will:

I'm thinking now of Rigi bikes from about 40 years ago. Its creators made the wheelbase shorter by splitting the seat tube in two--rather like the top tube on a mixte frame--and running the wheel between the smaller tubes:



I've heard of a bike that does the same thing with the down tube:  The front wheel runs through it.  I don't know how one steer such a machine.  The only possible use I can see for it is a motor-paced time trial.

Now I'll dispense with the levity:  As you probably have surmised, I didn't try to alter Arielle's geometry. Rather, it happened--in front of a nondescript tenement on Bonnefoy Avenue in New Rochelle.

I was pedaling, at a pretty good pace, home from Connecticut.  Well, I thought I was going home:  I hit something and, the next thing I knew, I was getting stitched up.   Then someone in the New Rochelle hospital decided I should be observed in a trauma unit, to which I was sent. 

Poor Arielle.  As for me, I still feel pain on the sides of my neck down to my shoulders.  Oh, and I have a headache and have been tired.  A trip to the drugstore felt like a century or a marathon.

When I got home, my face looked as if someone had superimposed a railroad map over a satellite image of the Martian surface.  It's a little better now, but I don't think I'll be modeling for Raphia any time soon.

I hate asking for money, but I think the real pain will begin when I see what my insurance doesn't cover.  So, I've set up a GoFundMe page.

I hope, more than anything, to be back in the saddle soon.  Until then, I'm going to catch up on some reading, writing and a project.  And Marlee is going to catch up with, well, the cuddles she misses when I'm out of the house!

Thank you!

At The Right Angle

In a few posts, I've complained about poorly-conceived, -designed and -constructed bike lanes and paths.  They lead to nowhere and expose the cyclists to all sorts of hazards.

Sometimes those hazards are embedded in the lane or trail itself.  Among the worst are railroad tracks, especially if they run parallel (or nearly so) in proximity to the cycling route.  Ideally, tracks and lanes (or paths) should cross at right (90 degree) angles or as close to it as possible. 

If the tracks cross at a more oblique angle, the  tires can graze against the rails, or get lodged against them, and send the cyclist tumbling to the ground.  That's happened to at least half a dozen riders on the Centennial Trail where it crosses the Burlington Northern-Santa Fe tracks in Arlington, Washington, 64 km north of Seattle. At that point, the trail crosses the tracks at an angle of less than 45 degrees--or near the one o'clock position.  (A 90 degree angle crosses at the 3 o'clock position.)

Recognizing the problem, the Arlington City Council has just awarded a contract to realign the trail so that the trail, which heads north, would turn east about 15 meters (50 feet) from the tracks so that it can cross at a 90 degree angle.

City engineer Ryan Morrison says the project will take about two to three weeks, and that it will timed to coincide, as best as possible, with improvements Burlington Northern-Santa Fe has planned for that same area.  That means the work will start around late May or early June.

 

The Real Joke

I thought it was a joke: “Bicycle tour of historic Venice set for Jan.21. Once, many years ago, I visited “La Serenissima” and discovered the semi-hard way that such a thing is not possible.

At least, you can’t do a bike tour of what people think of as “Venice”.  The folks who pose next to their wheels for their Instagram selfies on Ponte dei  Sospiri didn’t pedal there—not legally, anyway.  In fact, they couldn’t have brought their bikes their legally in any fashion.  Wheeled vehicles—including cars, trucks, motorcycles, scooters or even skates, as well as bicycles—are not allowed in the city’s historic center.  Exceptions are made for wheelchairs and other devices to help the disabled, and cops tend to look the other way for young children on toy bicycles or tricycles.
When I say I learned the “semi-hard” way, I mean that I’d heard and read about the ban but, being young, I thought I could find a way around it.  Or, I’d ride until I was stopped. You might say that I was living by the belief that forgiveness is easier to get than permission.

I disembarked from a train at the Santa Lucia railroad station.  A friendly attendant carefully brought my bike out of the baggage car.  I wheeled it from the station, across the Calatrava Bridge to the Piazzale Roma, one of the entrances to the historic center.  

There stood two carbineri.  One waved his finger.  The other pointed to a railing where other bikes were locked. I nudged a couple of those bikes to clear a space for mine.

While you can’t ride in the city center, you can take some nice spins on the “mainland,” across the lagoon from the city.  If you had your heart set on riding, though, it can be a little sad:  You’re looking at the places where you can’t ride.

On the other hand, Venice’s city center isn’t a bike-friendly place.  The streets are even narrower than those of other European cities and are almost always full of tourists.  Also, to get to or from almost anyplace in the city, you have to cross a canal.  That means crossing one of the bridges, most of which are arch-shaped and accessible only by stairs. You’d probably spend more time carrying or pushing your bike up or down stairs than riding it!

Such is not the case in another Venice: the one in Florida. Unlike the Queen of the Adriatic, the Shark’s Tooth Capital of the World (!) does not have a network of canals in its center, though many private properties, as in other parts of Florida, have canals—mainly for drainage or irrigation—running through them.

As far as I know, bicycles have never been banned in the town by the Gulf of Mexico.  So the announcement is not a joke.  The real joke, I believe, is calling Venice, Florida “historic” when its namesake in Italy has stood
for more than a millennium and a half.

Their Side Of The Tracks

Most days, my commute takes me along an industrial stretch of East 141st Street that dead-ends at Park Avenue.

It is not, however, the Park Avenue that comes to most people's minds:  the one lined by canopied buildings to which well-dressed residents are escorted from taxis or limousines by white-gloved concierges.  Rather, it is the Park Avenue bound by the Metro North commuter railroad tracks after it crosses the Harlem River from Manhattan into the Bronx.

As I pedaled down 141st Street, I saw, those bicycles parked by the railroad tracks.

That, in itself, was unusual, as the few bikes one sees in the area are locked to light poles or sign posts.  But, in a move so cinematic it couldn't have been scripted, I turned to my right and saw this:

Those young men are living in that tent, by the tracks, and use the bikes to get around--just three blocks from the college.  At the end of a street where construction materials and chicken tenders are made.  Next to the tracks where trains, at that very moment, were ferrying commuters from Greenwich and Rye and Mount Kisco to Grand Central Station, where they would board subways and hail taxis to the places where they work and get paid.

Most likely, none of the passengers saw the bikes, the tent--or the men who ride those bikes in search of food and bottles, cans and other castoffs to sell.

4-1/2 Ft.

Probably the most famous objet d'art that has anything to do with cycling is the "bull" Pablo Picasso fashioned from a bicycle saddle and handlebars.  

There are others, of course, including Marcel Duchamp's bicycle wheel.  On the other hand, we don't often hear about performance art based on bicycles or bicycling.

Now an artist and librarian based in Oakland, California plans to help fill that void.

Lisa Conrad plans to cycle across the state of Nebraska from Thursday, 30 May until 15 June.  She will be accompanied by other artists who plan to traverse the state from west to east.  After the Cornhusker State, they plan to ride across Iowa. 



Now, they are not the first cyclists to ride across either state.  What will be different is their route, which will trace abandoned railroad tracks and the gaps between them.  The purpose, she says, is to explore the role of the railroad in the making of the United States, in particular through examining the tension between the romance of the rails and the reality of making them, which was often exploitative, to put it mildly.



While she doesn't mention anything about it, the ride/performance piece--called 4 -1/2 ft, after the standard width of a railroad track--the  coincides with the 150th anniversary of the Transcontinental railroad. 

This isn't the first such ride for Conrad and the other artist-cyclists.  Previously, they did a similarly-themed ride across Washington State and Northern Idaho, and another through Montana into Wyoming.

You can learn more about 4 -1/2 ft at their website.

Crossing That Bridge--If You Can Get To It

Two years ago, the new Kosciuszko Bridge opened between Queens and Brooklyn.  While I didn't dislike the look of the old span, industrial and utilitarian as it is, I think the new one is much more pleasing to look at, especially at night.

One thing that neither span had, though, is access for cyclists or pedestrians.  Even though I subscribe to John Forester's idea of "cycles as vehicles", at least to a point, there was no way I would have ridden across either span, even if it were permitted.  There are simply too many vehicles driven by impatient people across a roadway that, in spots, has rather poor sight lines.  And while I normally feel confident about truck drivers, too many rigs cross the bridge on any given day, which is to be expected when industrial areas line the shores of Newtown Creek, the body of sludge and slicks spanned by the bridge.

The new span is really one of two that was planned.  The other is set to open later this year and include a  20-foot-wide path for cyclists and pedestrians in either direction.  That sounds good, right?

Well, it is, except for one thing:  How do you get to the bridge?  I have ridden the streets that lead to it many times, as they are only about 5 kilometers from my apartment.  I actually like some of those streets, as they wind through a patchwork of old industrial sites, graveyards, disused railroad tracks and the turbid creek. But other streets are simply narrow and warren-like conduits for short-tempered drivers.

That is why I have mixed feelings about the New York City Department of Transportation's plans to build a network of bicycle and pedestrian access lanes on the streets that approach the bridge.  The DOT's reports say that some of the streets are "overly wide".  They are indeed wider than other city streets.  But when you consider that much of the traffic consists of trucks, it's actually a tighter squeeze than people realize.  And there are places, like this stretch of 43rd Street in Queens, where there is "no way out":

I actually have ridden there, with caution.  A "lane" separated from motor traffic by only lines of paint would actually put cyclists in greater danger, as such lanes seem to engender a false sense of safety in cyclists and encourage more aggressive behavior on the part of motorists. And the "sidewalk" on the left side leads from a lane of traffic to an entrance of the Queens-Midtown Expressway. I know:  I took it by mistake!

And I am not impressed with the DOT's plans for other streets in the area.  Given the agency's track record, I don't expect that the "network" they plan will provide safe, meaningful connections from residential areas, schools and workplaces clustered just below Queens Boulevard.  Unless there is a network of paths that is as well-planned as the motor vehicle routes to the bridge, I don't think this new network will encourage anyone to ride for transportation:  People who aren't already regular riders simply won't feel safe, with good reason.

For The Skyway, Higher Goals Than For The High Line, I Hope

There are many definitions of a "true New Yorker."

Here's one:  We don't go to the Statue of Liberty, and we wouldn't be caught dead in Times Square (at least in its current iteration)--or on the High Line.

I took a walk up on the High Line once, shortly after it opened.  At the time, I was recovering from my surgery and couldn't ride my bicycle.  I liked the idea of taking an old industrial railroad viaduct and turning it into a venue lined with art, plants and unusual buildings, from which one could take in some stunning views of the skyline and even the sky itself.

The next time I went, a few months later, I was on my bicycle.  I knew riding wasn't allowed, but I discovered that you couldn't even bring your bike onto the High Line.  And I wasn't about to lock it up on the street.

So I returned another day, sans bike.  I found myself hating the place, but not only because I couldn't ride my bike.  What I realized is that the High Line is just another tourist trap offering a sanitized view of the city--except, of course, for the part where you get to see inside the apartments that line part of the High Line.  I'm long past being titillated by what people do in their own rooms, on their own time!

Anyway, other cities are starting to think about ways they could use abandoned or disused railroad trestles, elevated highways and other kinds of viaducts.  One of those cities is at the other end of New York State: Buffalo.

Like other industrial towns in the "Rust Belt", the Nickel City has gone through some very hard times.  That has left abandoned and seemingly-obsolete structures.  They won't lure young people with education or money back into town unless they're used in appealing ways.

 

One such structure is the city's Skyway.  Slated for demolition, it's now the subject of a $100,000 contest for alternative ideas.  One such idea is to turn the old highway into an urban linear park for "use by bicycles and pedestrians, like the High Line."

The local news media report, of course, has misconceptions about the High Line.  Now, if they actually allow bicyclists on the Skyway and make it truly pedestrian-friendly--unlike the High Line, which is clogged with herds of tourists that move at an amoebic pace and stop for sunbathing and "selfies"--they might have something that could help turn Buffalo into a livable, sustainable city.

This Isn't What We Mean By Track Riding

I admit that I grumble when a railroad crossing gate drops in front of me.  I guess I should be happy that such guards exist, though:



Surprisingly, that near-fatal encounter took place in Geleen---in the Netherlands, where we might expect such a crossing to be guarded, and a cyclist to know better.

Now I'm going to lecture you, dear reader:  Be careful at railroad crossings.  I admit, I'm saying so for selfish reasons:  I want you to come back and read this blog again.  Really, though, I don't like to see cyclists turned to road kill (track kill)?

To The Beach--By Bike Or Train? Why Not Combine Them?

After work, I did what a lot of other people are doing this week:  I took a trip to the beach.  It's the last "unofficial" week of summer; after Monday--Labor Day--most people will be back at work.

Of course, you know I rode my bicycle to the beach--Orchard Beach, to be exact, as it's the one nearest my job. Other people did, too, but others drove or took the bus.  Still others took the train to beaches on Long Island--or the subway to the Rockaways and Coney Island.

It's probably no surprise that during cycling's first heyday--roughly the last decade of the 19th Century and the first decade of the 21st--people cycled to the beach, especially to Coney Island.  The Ocean Parkway Bike and Bridle path--the oldest extant bike lane in the US-- was constructed during that time.  Also, during that time, construction of the subway system began.  There were, however, smaller, independent railroads that ran from Manhattan and the nearby areas of Brooklyn to the beaches. Some of those railroads later became part of the city's and region's mass transit system.

At that time, it was even possible to combine bikes and trains on a ride to the beach.  Well, sort of.

The Boynton Bicycle Railroad linked the southwestern Brooklyn neighborhood of Gravesend with Coney Island.  It ran for only two years, and inspired a few other short-lived imitations, it is commemorated with Boynton Place, at the intersection of West 7th Street and Avenue X, in Gravesend.

So, what made it a "bicycle railroad"?  Well, it ran on two wheels on a monorail.  So, you may ask, how did it keep it balance?  Well, there were rubber-faced trolley wheels on top of the trains that guided the train along a rail that ran fifteen feet above the rail on which the "bicycle" train ran.

When it debuted, the trains could achieve speeds of 80 mph.  The following years, technical improvements upped the maximum velocity to 100 mph.

The Boynton Bicycle Railroad, as shown in an 1894 issue of Scientific American

Inventor E. Moody Boynton said his intention was indeed to marry a new technology of the time to a newish one:  the bicycle and the railroad.  He was convinced that his system was more efficient than conventional railroads because there was less friction on a single than a double track.  The speeds of his trains seemed to make his case.  Still, he couldn't find investors--possibly because the automobile was on the horizon-and neither the Boynton nor the other "bicycle" railroads survived past the middle of the first decade of the 20th Century.

It could be said, however, that his idea lives on in modern monorail and light-rail systems.  Perhaps one day tourist hubs will have "pedi-trains", much as some places now have "pedi-cabs".

Offering An Illusion Of Safety

Sometimes there just isn't a better way.

I am reminded of that whenever I ride along the North Shore of Long Island and eastern Queens.  The area offers much, from mansions and country clubs with the Gatsby vibe to picturesque towns like Roslyn (where, incidentally, Gabriela Mistral--the first Latin American and fifth woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature--spent her last few years) as well as tidal wetlands, beaches, bird sanctuaries--and cliffs.  Best of all, there are actually some nice roads for cycling and a few bike lanes, including one that winds along the bay near Udall's Cove Park. 

Cyclist riding on Northern Boulevard near the Little Neck Bay bridge

The problem is in getting there from my part of Queens.  I know a few decent routes that will get me to Bayside, about 20 kilometers from my apartment.  Little Neck Bay, an arm of the Sound, reaches into the neighborhood, and you have to cross it in order to get from Bayside to Little Neck and Nassau County.  Oh, I could get around that body of water if I take a detour southward--one which I actually don't mind, as there are some quiet side streets and a rather nice park (Alley Pond) along the way.  I don't mind, as long as I have enough time or am not trying to stay ahead of rain I didn't anticipate before my ride.


But if you want to go directly from western Queens, where I live (just across from Manhattan), there is only one choice if you don't want to swim or take the Long Island Railroad:  Ride the Route 25A, a.k.a. Northern Boulevard, bridge over Little Neck Bay.  

Northern Boulevard is a four-lane road.  For most of its length, at least in Queens and Nassau County, it is a commercial thoroughfare,  which means that it is heavily trafficked.  But even where it cuts through parks and nature preserves-- as it does on either side of the Bay bridge-- there is little if any respite from the traffic because, as it happens, highway exit and entrance ramps veer from and merge with the road near the bridge.

At 6:30 on a summer morning almost two years ago, 78-year-old Michael Schenkman was cycling eastward, in the direction of the bridge--ironically, on his way to the nearby Joe Michaels Mile Bike Path.   A black Chevrolet Impala traveling in the same direction on Northern collided with Schenkman, who died shortly afterward.  The driver, to his credit, remained at the scene.

223rd Street and Northern Boulevard, where Michael Schenkman was killed

After the crash, the city's Department of Transportation came up with a plan to create a bike lane on the north side of the bridge by taking out a lane of traffic.  The local community board approved it, but changed its mind just as the DOT was beginning to work on it last September.  Tomorrow, members of that board will march along the side of the bike lane project.  They--led by State Senator Tony Avella--want the DOT to scrap the lane and, instead, expand the width of the sidewalk so that it can be shared by cyclists and pedestrians.

As someone who has pedaled that stretch of Northern Boulevard dozens of times, I can say that those folks probably aren't cyclists it would be a terrible idea for everyone.  First of all, no one quite knows how wide the sidewalk would have to be in order to accommodate both cyclists and pedestrians--and whether it would mean new construction or taking out another lane of traffic. Either way, it would probably cost more than what board members claim--or, for that matter, the DOT's project.

Worse, though, is that the sidewalk crosses a highway exit ramp.  It's bad enough when pedestrians have to walk into the crosswalk with cars streaming on the ramp; I can only imagine the consequences if cyclists and pedestrians are forced to share that crosswalk!

Some experienced cyclists (like me) who are familiar with the area have learned how to at least minimize the risks while riding along the bridge and Northern Boulevard.  A shared sidewalk would give less-experienced cyclists (and those unfamiliar with the area) the illusion of safety, which can be worse than any hazard of the road.

The Future, For Now? Am I Responsible For It?

I'll take credit--but not blame.

No, I'm not channeling El Cheeto Grande.  Rather, I am here now to tell you that a line I tossed off in an earlier post has become a reality--better (or worse) yet, a business plan.

Last year I wrote about the then-new dockless bike share programs making their debut in China.  They have since appeared in European and North American locales:  In fact, there's talk of bringing such services to the Bronx and other parts of New York City not presently served by Citibike.

I called those dockless programs, which allow anyone with the company's app on his or her smart phone to pick up or leave a bicycle, "Uber for bicycles."

Now--you guessed it--Uber is getting into the bike share business.  I am not surprised, really:  If the future is in driverless cars (the Force forbid!) or fewer or no cars, it makes perfect sense for the company to look at other forms of transportation.

Uber is doing something to many other companies failed to do:  look at the industry, not the business, of which they are a part.  Some business writer, I forget whom, said the real reason why the New York Central and Pennsylvania Railroads--at their peak, the world's two largest corporations-- are in the dustbin of history (Funny, isn't it, to quote Marx when talking about business?) is that they didn't realize that they were not just in the railroad business--which was dying in the US--but in the transportation industry.  So, by the time they merged, it was too late to save either of them.

One of the better analogies I can think of in the bicycle world is Schwinn.  They failed to see their role in the bicycle industry, which changed dramatically.  That is why the company started by Ignaz Schwinn in the 1890s didn't start making (or even offering) BMX or mountain bikes until other bike makers, some of them newcomers, had already taken hold of those markets.  The company's management seemed to think that its industry consisted of making and selling people the bikes their parents and grandparents bought--the only difference being that it added derailleurs and skinnier tires to the two-wheeled tanks they'd been making.  

Which reminds me:  For all of the Varsities and Continentals they sold during the '70's Bike Boom, they really missed the boat when, a couple of years in, college students and other young adults started to demand lighter bikes, like the ones offered by European and Japanese makers.  

At that time, the only really lightweight bicycles Schwinn offered were the Paramount and, depending on how you define "lightweight", the Sports Tourer.  The  former was beyond the means of most young people, while the latter was indistinguishable, appearance-wise, from the company's flash-welded bikes.By the time Schwinn started to offer the Japanese-made LeTour and Voyageur, in 1974, the Bike Boom had already crested and people who wanted lighter bikes had already bought Nishikis, Fujis, Motobecanes and Raleighs.

Anyway, it seems like Uber is not falling into the same trap as Schwinn or the railroads.  They are debuting their new share program in Berlin, Germany and, I am sure, will expand into other places.  With the popularity of dockless share programs and the company's name recognition, it seems like Uber has an unbeatable combination--for now.

It'd be nice if they give me credit, though--although it would be nice to be compensated at least as well as someone who created one of the world's most recognized logos.

Which Way Was He Supposed To Go?

Few things vex me more than a designated bike lane that's poorly designed, constructed or maintained--or that ends abruptly or simply doesn't go anywhere.

Such lanes are not merely annoying or inconvenient:  Riding them is, as often as not, more dangerous than sharing the roadway with motorized traffic.

That is especially true if the direction of the bike lane is not clearly indicated--or, as in one case in northern California, a new lane is under construction or has been constructed to replace an existing one, but there is no indication of which one the cyclist should use.

For Matthew James Newman, such confusion proved fatal.  According to his widow a lawyer representing the family, Newman was riding along Highway 29 when he came to a railroad crossing.  

The safest--really, the only safe-- way to cross railroad tracks is at a 90 degree angle. According to reports, there was no way to do that where Newman met his fate:  the road crossed at a "severe" angle.  When he approached, his wheel got caught in a flangeway and he was thrown off his bike, which injured his head.  He died the next day from his injuries.

Now, some might argue that he was at fault for not wearing a helmet. But the suit his family has filed alleges that Caltrans was at fault for not clearly marking the hazard. 

Actually, that intersection had been marked with a sign warning riders to get off their bikes and walk across.  At least it was until some time before Newman made his fateful crossing.  When that sign was taken down is not the main issue, however.  Rather, it is another sign that was or wasn't nearby:  one indicating whether a new route was open to cyclists.

According to the family's attorney, Bill Johnson of Bennett & Johnson LLP in Oakland, the new path still appeared to be under construction--at least to Newman. "It was ambiguous and confusing which route he was supposed to take," according to Johnson. "If you didn't make the right decision, you were in peril."

Had there been a clear indication that Newman should have taken the new path, he would have, according to his family and Johnson.  He had traveled the route he took once, years before, so he probably thought he was making the "safer" choice.  Apparently, though, during that time he'd forgotten about the way it crossed the tracks.  

In addition to Caltrans, the suit includes the Ghilotti Brothers Construction company of San Rafael.  Johnson believes they were doing work on the bike path at the time of the incident, and therefore shared the responsibility for warning of dangerous conditions.