This is always super fun. Meet at Green Street Orange line stop in JP tonight @ 8pm.
See you there:
http://halloweenbikeride.net/
Costumes encouraged.
Ride in solidarity with Occupy Boston. Who’s streets?
As anyone who lives in Boston and has visited New York knows: New York is better.
Architecture: The best we can do is Copley Sq. (an absolute treasure) but when held in comparison to the best of NYC, we lose. Olmstead blessed both our cities with his creative energies, but I think that Central Park bests the Emerald Necklace (especially when Boston makes little effort to connect the gems).
NYC Subway vs. the T: service after 11pm, thank you.
Pizza: have you had a “grandma slice” in Brooklyn? N. End Regina’s is good, but that’s all we’ve got
Rock scene: Brooklyn, enough said.
Arts: we call it “ahts”.
The one exception to this hierarchy is sports franchises (of course), but otherwise there is no contest. Case in point: NY has Janette Sadik-Khan, we have Nicole Freedman. Ms. Freedman has done some admirable things for this city over the past (5?) years—especially considering the cycling infrastructure in Boston in the previous millennium—but when compared to JSK there is no contest: we have Hubway and suburban tourists who haven’t been on a bike in 20 years deciding to give it a go on the Greenway in order to get from Faneuil Hall to Paul Revere’s house, and a city government that cowers to the townies in Charlestown that are unhappy with bike lanes because they weren’t consulted prior to their installation; NY has protected bike lanes down 9th Ave (among others) and challenges nimby opposition to them (as they did during the ruckus that was caused after lanes were put in along Prospect Park). We re-pave Columbus Avenue through the South End (it’s currently in process) and leave in place a 3-foot wide section of cobblestones that if removed would allow the city enough room to install a protected bike lane that connects the SW Corridor with downtown. But cobblestones make the city feel so “antique-y” I can hear them say…
Frank Bruni has a piece in the Times today extolling the virtues of cycling and it is a refreshing break from the vitriolic provincialism that our local rags have attempted to hold up as journalism. If you are not familiar with Janette Sadik-Khan, I highly recommend you also read this New York Magazine profile from 2009. The citizens of Boston consider themselves more enlightened than those in the rest of the country, yet our city is so rarely at the vanguard of urban thinking. Perhaps it’s just the execution of contemporary urban planning, as plenty of urban ponderers are based here but it is rare that Boston is the place where their ideas are experimented with. NYC has always been the place that gets shit done. New York confronts the same issues of political obstinacy as Boston—only they are an order of magnitude larger in NYC than they are here. Why we can’t be in front of NY on bicycle infrastructure is beyond me. We live in a smaller city with a highly progressive political base that would appear to be game for a change.
“Oh, but the weather is terrible here, much worse than NYC and our streets were designed for cows (or cars according to Brian McGrory).” Minneapolis and Chicago have more bike commuters as a percentage of population than us and far worse weather. So does Portland for that matter, but PDX is another story entirely.
When Nicole Freedman was first hired as the Boston Bike Czar, many of us in the local urban cycling community were ecstatic that such a position even existed in the city, and we were happy to have anyone that gave a shit about cyclists’ concerns. Perhaps it’s time that we (the Boston cycling community that is) demand more from the official that occupies this office. Why should we be content to just have a warm body in this position? There is no identifiable vision coming from the office. We deserve more. We deserve someone that challenges the status quo and fights for progressive urban solutions to distinctly urban problems. I’m sure there is a job at Alta Planning waiting Ms. Freedman on the other side of her public service anyway.
I appreciate what Nicole Freedman has done for the local cycling community, but to paraphrase Lloyd Bensten, “Ms. Freedman, you’re no Janette Sadik-Kahn”.
Well, this is a strange world we live in: I just picked up the police report from the BPD and it contains the name and address of the person who ran me and a bunch of other cyclists down on Friday night. Wouldn’t you know it, I’m “friends” with this person on Facebook. It’s a very distant connection, and I haven’t had any contact with this person in at least 15 years other than accepting their friend request. They “friend-ed” me if that makes any difference. Anyone who is on FB knows that you are “connected” to tons of people to whom you have no real connection.
If you were one of the other cyclists that was hit and need the information, please let me know. I have also retained counsel and will be proceeding with a suit against the perpetrator. My lawyer has agreed to take the case on contingency, and has offered to represent others if they are interested.
As for the ongoing issue of police indifference, stay tuned…
Last night while riding my bicycle with a group of friends, I was violently assaulted. I was almost killed and my bicycle was run over by the offending vehicle who INTENTIONALLY tried to hit me. Fortunately I am alive. Here is my bicycle:
Smushed Brooks
While I have yet to get my frame checked out, it appears to be OK. The saddle is obviously toast. My Planet Bike Superflash got splayed on the road, but was fully functional after putting it back together. My bombproof rear wheel that was hand built by the people at Bikes Not Bombs and probably has around 10,000 miles of Boston riding on it is out of true, but amazingly it’s not that bad and I think it’s salvageable. I was even able to ride home (not having a rear brake helped as the wheel wobbled from side to side). Not being able to sit down the whole way was a bit of a struggle.
I discovered a video on universalhub that an onlooker posted to youtube of 30 seconds preceding the incident:
Comm Ave & Harvard Ave Corking
Regardless of your view of corking, the ensuing reaction of the driver (which is not caught on video, at least not that I know of) is obscene.
I am actually visible in this video NOT corking the intersection, but rather standing on the far corner (I pop in and out of the frame around the 19s mark, wearing white pants, black shirt, black helmet, basket on the front of my bike with a blue jacket in it). After the circling started to dissipate I proceeded through the intersection on Harvard Ave. It was after I was about 100 feet down the road that I heard the roaring of the engine and turned around to see this homicidal maniac zig-zag at the group of people that were still behind me riding. When I saw that he was coming straight at me, I quickly hopped off my bike into oncoming traffic to avoid being hit. My bike went in the opposite direction and within a second he drove over it. Luckily I am fine, my bicycle not so much.
The car was a grey Honda Civic. In fact the license plate (as given to me by an onlooker who saw the whole thing) is MA 53we31. The cops didn’t seem to really give a shit. I had to propose that they take down my contact info after one of them just got in his car after yelling at other cyclists who were imploring them to do something. Unreal. I called the Allston branch of the BPD later in the evening to follow up and they told me to call back in 48 hours. Nice. There is a person who attempted to kill dozens of citizens out there driving the roads of Boston. Whether you are in a car, on your bike, or walking, this should horrify you.Fortunately I have in-house counsel (read: wife) and will most certainly be pursuing all avenues of the law that are available to me.
To those that encourage violence against anyone, bikers or not: Fuck you.
If you have more info/pictures/video hit me up in the comments. If you want to turn this into an indictment of critical mass, don’t bother because I won’t post your comments. CM or not, no one deserves to be assaulted in this way, and the BPD needs to start focusing on the real problems on our roads: cars. Enough of the bogus capitulation to automobile interests, and ticketing of cyclists. Should cyclists behave better in general? Sure, but let’s not lose sight of the bigger picture: cars kill people.
A few weeks ago, a skinny stripe of paint appeared on the SW corridor path. I assumed it was someone who felt like riding around dribbling paint from their bike, and that maybe it was the beginning of something bigger.
Then yesterday I read this article in the NY Times about a Brooklyn-based graffiti artist named Momo that has scribbled his name along the sidewalks across Manhattan in a very similar fashion. His tag stretches from one side of the city to the other. I have not had a chance to explore whether the paint here extends much past Mass Ave. Has anyone else noticed this paint on bike paths (or sidewalks or streets) in the city?
Here’s a map from the Times:
And here is an image from the Times of his paint drips, looks pretty similar to the image above:
I made the following comment in response to a post on BostonBiker, but I’m reposting it here for people who do not read the comments on his posts:
For background, this article appeared in the Globe yesterday.
As much as I want to be excited about this, I can only react with disappointment. As I noted at the end of May (http://rollinginboston.bostonbiker.org/2010/05/28/wheres-the-bike-share/) it’s been pretty obvious that the bike share program is getting off to a rough start. I’ve been willing to give Nicole and the rest of the Boston Bikes people (including I guess Mumbles) the benefit of the doubt that there was a good reason for the delay. Their inclination to hold off on starting the program until it can be launched with an adequate number of bikes is a good one, but 500 bikes is not even remotely close to enough.
I spent last July in Paris and used Velib on a daily basis, and I have reports of my experience on my blog. At every station, at least 10-20% of the bikes were not functioning due to flat tires (which are not user repairable as it takes a special tool to remove the wheels in order to deter theft), wonky drive-trains or any of the other myriad number of things that can happen to a bicycle. Assuming the same conditions here, that would leave 400-450 bikes in circulation at any given time.
According to Wikipedia, Paris covers an area of around 41 sq. miles, with a population of ~2.2 million. Boston on the other hand, covers a similar geographical footprint (48 sq. miles) but contains a much smaller population (~600,000). If Boston were to implement a program with a similar bikes/population ratio, that would imply ~5,000 bikes here. The proposed bike share is an ORDER OF MAGNITUDE off. The geographical similarities however, remain. Paris has 750 stations. Boston is proposing 50. Again an order of magnitude difference. I noticed that the real benefit of the Velib system was the ability to return a bike nearly anywhere in the city, and that will be plainly impossible with the current proposal.
If this is going to be a system intended primarily for tourists, with bikes primarily located downtown, then Nicole needs to just state that. But don’t try to say that we’re going to have a city-wide system; it’s just not feasible unless a complete commitment is made.
If this is going to be tied to MBTA subway stops (not a bad starting point) then there are very few bike stations left for areas that are not at a subway stop (I’m thinking large swaths of Dorchester, Roxbury, JP, Roslindale, etc).
In summary, I completely support the effort to bring bike-share to Boston, but it is another case of Boston half-assing an infrastructure project that will ultimately leave many people disappointed and left out.
Come on out to Copley Sq. this evening to ride with ~300 cyclists through the streets of Boston. People generally start to arrive around 5:30, and the ride usually leaves by 6 pm. If you have never ridden in a CM before, a few details:
-There is no pre-established route
-It is easily the safest cycling experience you can have in the city, as cars are forced to wait for the large group of people
-It is extraordinarily liberating, and a fabulous way to enjoy the company of friends, and fellow cyclists.
-Contrary to popular belief, you do not have to ride a fixie, have tats, or be in college in order to fit in (in fact, I think one of the most common occupations of riders that I’ve encountered is lawyers…)
-It is a rolling celebration of everything cycling
see you there!
People, you need to seriously reconsider this riding with headphones in your ears business. It is crazy dangerous. As an owner of earbud headphones, I’m fully aware of how completely oblivious the wearer is of the outside world. Unless you can taste a car coming from 50 feet behind you, hearing is the most important sense (next to vision, of course) that one employs whilst riding. I have seen so many riders doing completely stupid shit because they are zoned out listening to the jamz. If I listen to music while riding, it’s only through the crappy speaker that is built into my phone. It’s not the most sonically pristine way to enjoy my music, but it does the trick and I retain my ability to hear one of those squealing CT1′s that’s about to come within 6 inches of my left side.
If a diminutive speaker just doesn’t cut it for you, splurge on one of those water-bottle cage iPod speakers, or better yet build yourself a car battery-powered PA speaker setup on a trailer.
The crazy thing is, so many of the people I see riding with headphones are also wearing a helmet. Without inciting another tired helmet debate, you should see there is a fundamental contradiction here…
We get pissed (rightfully so) when drivers are texting and chatting while driving, don’t you think we should try to keep our wits about us while we ride?
The work that was done on the SW Corridor last spring was pretty half-assed, so I was happy to see markings all along the path (at least from Stoneybrook to the South End) on my commute this AM. This work is particularly crucial for 4-season users of the path, as it is in the rough areas where ice tends to form in the winter.
Also, I came across the aftermath of a bike accident on the SW corridor this AM. I didn't see the rider, as he/she was already loaded in the ambulance, but the bike looked fine and the cop told me they were OK. Let's hope that's the case, feel free to post any updates if you have them.
Ride Safely.
