Bike items that have little to nothing to do with DC

Many Many Many cool public bike designs from the Copenhagen Bike Share design competition. The bike pictured was one of the winners, but more for it's innovative docking system than for the bike.  The docking system is a pole and two bikes lock to it with a cable. Any additional bikes lock to the outside ones in a chain. You always take the outside bike.

Richard Layman writes about the Wisconsin Transportation Plan.

Citizens should have access to a transportation system that allows them to choose whether they want to drive, take the train, ride the bus, bike or walk. Our system currently provides people with some choices beyond automobiles, but we need to expand and improve those choices to respond to the growing demand from those who can not, or choose not to drive.

Transportation For America has a report entitled Dangerous by Design about how many roads place moving cars above the safety of pedestrians and cyclists.

On the upside, he could've been on a crowded bus.

LA may not have an NFL team, but their cops can tackle just as well as NYC cops.

USNews' 15 Cities for People Who Hate Driving and Long Commutes includes many bike friendly towns, but as you can guess from the title post, none in the DC area.

Schwinn and the Nobel Prize for Economics

[Oliver] Williamson has studied why businesses organize the way they do.  He worked for the Justice Department on antitrust matters in the 1960s, and his work has made a deep imprint on that area of law.

"The most concrete and earliest problem he tackled is why do we see the organizational forms we do," said Scott Masten, an economist at the University of Michigan. Why, for example, do some firms buy supplies on the open market, others buy them through long-term contractual relationships, and still others have their suppliers of raw materials under the same corporate umbrella?

In 1967, the U.S. government accused the Schwinn bicycle company of anti-competitive behavior for refusing to sell to discount retailers and restricting its sales to independent franchisees that charged higher prices.

Williamson argued that contrary to the government's reasoning, there was an economic rationale to the behavior: Schwinn could ensure that those selling its products offered high-quality service, protecting the company's reputation. And that signing contracts with franchisees could be more efficient than operating stores itself.

"If potential customers are told, 'I bought a Schwinn bike and it was a lemon,' but are not advised that the bicycle was bought from a discount house and misassembled . . . customer confidence in Schwinn is easily impaired," Williamson wrote in his 1998 book "The Economic Institutions of Capitalism."

Key Changes to Denver’s Bike Ordinances:

Three Feet to Pass: Language was included to mirror State law requiring that drivers of vehicles provide at least a three-foot separation between the right side of the driver’s vehicle, including all mirrors and projections, and the left side of the bicycle at all times.

Right to Ride on Roadways: Language requiring bicyclists to ride on adjacent pathways if available was eliminated from the City code.  This makes it legal to ride a bike on any Denver roadway.

Riding to the Right & Bicyclist’s Judgment: Language was amended to allow bicyclists to use their best judgment on how near to the right side of the roadway they should ride. This will encourage bicyclists with differing levels of ability in variable road conditions to ride their bike in the manner that is most safe for the bicyclist.

Riding on Sidewalks for the Purpose of Parking: Denver law will now allow bicyclists to ride on the sidewalk not in excess of 6 miles per hour if they are within one block of the location where they plan to park their bike.

Lamps & Reflectors: Front and rear light requirements were amended to match state requirements.  Front (white) lights must be visible to 500 feet.  Rear (red) reflectors must be visible for 600 feet when illuminated by motor vehicle head lamps.

After NYC DOT removed bike lanes in Williamsburg, activists went in and painted them back. The NY Post continues with it's Hasidic-Jews-hate-scantily-clad-women-on-bikes story as the reason for the lanes removal, but it's a little less sensational than that.

But when the bike lanes were finally painted, problems appeared almost instantly. The lanes did not look like the ones in the pictures. They ran along both sides of the street, surprising even cyclists. And the signs that accompanied them did not just forbid parking, but all stopping at any time. Hasidic Jews charged the city first posted the laws banning parking on Kent at 6:30 a.m. on Saturday, when observant Jews are forbidden to drive and that traffic agent ticketed their cars. Businesses charged that the new bike paths prevented them from legally using their loading docks.

Cleveland cyclists fight to add an active transportation lane to the new I-90 bridge.

NPR on Cargo Bikes, via GGW. 

Bicycle Boulevards in NYC

Comments

[Lucre]

The "he could've been on a crowded bus." link is broken.

[Washcycle]

Thanks. I fixed it.

[Contrarian]

I like the "riding on sidewalk for the purpose of parking" law. Good idea!

[guez]

See BikeSnobNYC's analysis of the Williamsburg bike lane wars:

http://bikesnobnyc.blogspot.com/2009/12/weird-world-of-bike-advocacy-mourning.html

Some highlights:

"If Time's Up really wanted the Hasidim to accept the bike lanes they'd try to make the Hasidim understand the bike lanes. Unfortunately, this would require that they in turn try to understand the Hasidim. However, this is far too time-consuming, and it would cut into Time's Up's busy schedule of putting on 'Doggie Pedal Parades' and sending people in polar bear costumes to Copenhagen."

"When you attain a certain level of self-importance you honestly begin to believe that simply amplifying yourself is all you need to do to make people agree with you. When some people say they want 'livable cities,' what they really mean is that they want cities in which everybody lives the same way that they do. Really, one person's 'livable city' is another person's uninhabitable hellhole."

[Washcycle]

I'm sympathetic to the neighborhood's complaints. It sound like it wasn't handled well. And while I think painting in bike lanes is a clever PR stunt, I think it's best reserved for areas where the DOT is failing to serve cyclists and I don't think NYC DOT or DDOT qualify.