I immediately recognized the site of Tag #7, but didn’t have time to get there before Joey Mac. Lucky for me, he and his crew chose a nearby site for #8, right in my neighborhood, and I stopped by on Tanya’s bike, on my way to drop it off at Full Moon for a tune up and to pick up my own bike, complete with new fenders. (Apologies in advance for the blurry cell phone photos…my camera died 2 days ago.)

This is near the corner of South Avenue and Gregory Street, near Lux.

And here is your next target…

p.s. In other news, Kyle at Full Moon says that there will be a TNUA ride tomorrow night, New Year’s Day. What a way to start your New Year!

Jason Crane asked me to pick up this bike from the 2nd hand bike mission (I am not sure what they call themselves now, but they sell some bikes to fund the non-profit) while we was out of town. That was over a month ago, Jason’s been really busy with the move and hasn’t had a chance to pick it up. I hate seeing a good bike not getting used, so I have decided to designate this bike the Official Rocbike.com Cruiser until Jason comes back for it. It has already made its appearance at a few of the Wednesday Night Cruises, as well as Critical Mass and on a couple Bike Photo Tag missions. If you want to take it for a spin join us any wednesday night for a cruise! I am sure that Jason would approve.

It took a team of four riders cruising around town to some rockin beats on the radio to triangulate the position of target #7, but we found it, on the corner of South and Alexander (across the corner from our favorite tex-mex place).

We posed for a shot, Eric, Nick, Myself and Killmore, but as we were setting up, Karl walked by with Fred so they joined us for the portrait:

So we took off from there and before long came across the faux storefronts of a turn of the century town. So here it is, Bike Photo Tag target #8, good luck and happy hunting!

Eric was trying to send a telegraph

The streets in the city of Rochester are pretty much empty of motorists in the evening, which makes for excellent bike riding conditions.

It was on a lovely evening last weekend that I grabbed a photo of myself at the location of Bicycle Photo Tag #6. The purple-walled spot in Manhattan Square Park is now a construction site (I believe they’re renovating the ice skating rink, which makes me sad, because I enjoy ice skating there).

It was on this very night that I came across some hippies celebrating the solstice. Jump onto your bike, find this town square, snap a photo, and you will win the next round of Bicycle Photo Tag!

Thinking about switching from car to bike as your commuter machine, but holding off until Spring before you do it? Here are ten good reasons to make the switch this season:

1. No need to brush/scrape your windows
   Unless your car is perpetually stored in garages, one of the worst parts of winter driving is frequent window brushing and scraping. Some motorists cut corners on this important step and dangerously operate at reduced visibility. A bike’s complete lack of windows makes visibility a non-issue.
2. You can skip shoveling the driveway
   Unless you’re expecting company, there’s little need to shovel, blow, or plow the driveway if your bike is your mode of transportation. Spend that time you saved in the morning reading the paper, or in the evening cozied up by the fire.
3. Bikes never get stuck in the snow
   Digging your car out of its on-street parking or making it over that hard packed snow at the end of your driveway can build character, but why bother when you can ride a vehicle that you can walk or carry if the going gets tough?
4. Biking: a low-cost winter sport
   Cars can get you out to remote mountains so you can pay to strap fiberglass to your feet and fall down them. But what if you could avoid the price of lift tickets and season passes and still get your fill of quickly moving past snow-covered stuff? While you make your way to work? Bikes can help you with that.
5. Pumping gas is a bad excuse to stand still in the cold
   Have you ever filled your tank with less gas than you usually would, just to get out of the cold? Bikes don’t have gas tanks, and the time you spend outside is time when you’re active and generating more than enough heat to stay comfortable.
6. Avoid “Winter Weight Gain“
   You are a beautiful person no matter how much you weigh, but excess weight can lead to chronic health problems and lower activity in the winter can also contribute to “seasonal affective disorder.” Ride a bike to help avoid these winter problems.
7. Studded tires rock
   Studded car tires are popular in Scandinavia, but in the U.S. they’re often illegal due to the road damage they cause. Studded bike tires are unregulated and easy to come by in regions with snow and ice. I’m pretty sure a bike with studded tires is one of the best things imaginable for handling icy roads.
8. Losing control of a bike is a bit less scary than losing control of a car
   Drive or ride around after a big snowstorm and you’ll see cars in ditches, left abandoned after their operators lose control. You can’t just bail when your 2 ton cage hits some ice and starts recklessly sliding about. While it’s not always fun to bail from a bike, it’s certainly much easier, and both bike and operator often come out fine in the end.
9. Bikes are easier to maintain
   Winter can be a real disaster to cars. Combine repeated freezing/heating of the vehicle with road salt and other melt chemicals — it’s easy to understand why cars in colder climates depreciate faster. Bikes basically just require a quick rinse after the ride an an occasional deep clean and oil change (on your chain) to keep in good working order.
10. Bikes let you enjoy the season
    Winter is beautiful. Why experience it through fogged up windows with the radio blaring when you can be out in the middle of it all? There is a lot to enjoy: the invigorating cold air entering your lungs, the sights of your town blanketed in white, the satisfying sound of your bike crunching snow. Winter is often ignored because people are too cold and depressed to pay attention. Biking gets you out there and keeps your blood flowing.

Here’s a challenge for bicyclists, especially of winter variety.

Too often we’re figuratively tangled in our own spokes. We forget about the transportation matrix we depend on: the policies that determine motor traffic conditions, for example; or the state of mass transit. And we’ve got a special responsibility to grapple with issues that affect our transport cousins: pedestrians, in-line skaters, bus riders and rail passengers, wheelchair users, et al. So let me throw this at you:

With substantial snowfalls coming our way, many people will effectively be immobilized. We all know the reason. The sidewalks will not be shoveled, so pedestrians and people in wheelchairs (or those with other mobility challenges) will be forced to stay indoors or take their chances on the street.

As non-motorized folks we can appreciate the situation. We know everything is not okay just because the salt trucks and plows do the minimum so cars and trucks and Hummers can get where they’re going. We understand that basic rights – of free association and public participation – are at stake here. And that many people, sometimes including ourselves, are being denied these rights.

I was thinking about this as I waited for the bus this morning at the corner of Monroe and Meigs, ready to put my bike on the rack and take a leisurely, affordable ride out to Pittsford and the Nazareth campus. Well, the Monroe-Meigs eastbound stop is right in front of a Rent-A-Center, as good an example of predatory, parasitic capitalism as anything. And the RAC guys are living up to their seasonal tradition: they seem to have a hands-off policy regarding snow removal, and so their stretch of public sidewalk is often impassable – even though their customer base must be long on pedestrians.

But RAC is not alone. Up and down Monroe Avenue, and in most other commercial and residential areas, non-shoveling is the great leveler. Businesses large and small, prosperous and struggling, worthy and wretched, all – or many, at least – leave the sidewalk heaped with snow, which then turns to ice, which then turns to slop.

I’ve seen people go head over heels as they tried to negotiate these sidewalks. Now, I’m not one to pump the personal injury lawyers, but you’d think some enterprising client would at least try to take a shovelphobic merchant to the cleaners.

A myth has been circulating that the city sidewalk plows do the job, and no further attention is required. No way. The municipal code makes it clear that owners or first-floor tenants are responsible for removing ice and snow so sidewalks are not hazardous. But there’s no enforcement – not even an educational campaign, nor so much as a fleeting public service announcement. What gives?

This issue is a big one to disability-rights activists. Not long ago (last winter?) some activists took City Hall folks on a little reality tour of snowbound walks and bus stops. Nice photo-ops for the officials. But where’s the progress?

I’ve got this dream that bikers will become the vanguard on this issue. Groups like Critical Mass could swoop down on lazy merchants and institutions (including not-for-profits that should know better) and read them the mobility riot act. We could press for better bike-locking/storage facilities while we’re at it. Maybe we could bring our own shovels to clean the walks, and throw the stuff up on the offenders’ porches or whatever. A simple transfer of wealth. Surely no businessperson could object to that.

Another concern: I often see plowing contractors illegally pushing snow out from driveways and parking lots onto the public street. Any winter biker knows this can create a real hazard – dense snow and ice packed against the curb, to the point that the bicyclist’s travel lane is blocked. We should be addressing this problem, too.

I love snow, actually. It’s simply beautiful. I’m looking forward to a great x-c- skiing season. Might even get the snowshoes out soon. And I’ll be churning through the drifts on my Kona (and keeping upright on the black ice, courtesy of my new Nokian studded tires). But I really hate it when human carelessness allows the snowfall to hurt the vulnerable.

Today Carectomy.com features the Twike - a hybrid human/electric vehicle that blurs the lines between bike and car. You (and a passenger) can pedal a Twike like you would a recumbent, or you can let the Lithium Ion battery do the work for you. Either way, the Twike captures energy given off from your obscene level of self-righteousness to propel you with absolutely zero emissions.

Before you start dreaming up romantic Twike dates and luxurious all-weather cross-country tours (I’ve already worked through about 7 different Twike fantasies), have a look at the price tag. Unfortunately, the US dollar isn’t doing well these days, and according to the formula on their web site this little European contraption will set you back over $30,000 (the luxury version costs over $50,000). Oh Twike, I await the day that you are mass-marketed.

Drop on over to Carectomy to see the cheesy video.

Sighs of bike longing,
No riding since November,
Where art thou, my quads?

My bike mechanic, Roger Levy of Freewheelers, puts a premium on cyclical cleanliness. By which I don’t mean he showers irregularly. No, he’s always reminding me and other customers of the importance of keeping a bike’s drivetrain free of dirt, grease, rust, etc., not for cosmetic purposes but to maximize mechanical efficiency and get the greatest mileage out of the chain, chainrings, and cassette.

It’s not rocket science, just a matter of using solvent (hopefully of the “green” variety, with citrus, etc.) to remove gunk and crud, followed by a temperature-appropriate lube. Some devotees remove their chains and bathe them in solvent, then use various secret potions on them. But mortals like me cut corners, simply to keep everything easy. And mostly it is.

But then comes winter, with beautiful snow that soon is “civilized” into dirt-packed browncake, and road salt that dissolves into amazingly persistent puddles of brine. And before you can say “relentless corrosion,” your bike is a mess that must quickly be dealt with.

What to do? I’ve only learned a few things by trial and error, but for what it’s worth, here’s my winter cleaning/maintenance routine:

First, I’m committed to washing off the machine every time it gets dirty – or even more often. This translates into a cleaning job after every ride, and occasionally a quick splash during the ride. The main thing is not to be afraid to apply clean water where needed. If you have a good quality machine (and especially if you’ve got alloy components, sealed bearings and other modern protective systems) it will take a good shower in stride.

I used to prop up my bike on end in the bathtub and then hose it down. This leaves much crap and oily residue in the tub, however, so I soon turned to method B: running the garden hose from my kitchen faucet out the front door and hosing the bike out on the lawn. (The exterior faucet is, of course, turned off for the winter to prevent pipe breakage.) Method B was less of a mess, but it still meant doing a multi-step operation.

Today I use the Lazy Man’s Shortcut: I prop the bike against the side of the house, then carry a large bucket (sometimes two) of warm tap water outside and carefully stream the water over all the dirty parts, including not just the drivetrain and associated frame sections, but also the brakes and brake pads and wheel rims. Generally there’s no need to wash the top half of the machine – unless you’ve gone insane and are riding without fenders, in which case there will be splash on practically everything, including yourself.
So that’s my method; I frankly don’t know if it’s the wisest way to cleanliness – could the volume/pressure of water cause more intrusion into the bearings, etc.? – but so far, so good. My bike continues to work just fine.

Of course, the re-lubrication step is important, too, especially regarding rust-prone parts like the chain. You can wipe the latter off with a rag or paper towel and then apply a very light oil with Teflon. (I’ve found that in winter, you do need oil to keep ahead of the rust – though oil does pick up road crud and frustrate your efforts to keep the drivetrain running smoothly.)

And where you store your bike in winter can be crucial. Granted, as a certifiable bike nut, I consider my machines to be fine sculptures and am convinced they grace my definitely-not-feng-shui’d living room. Guests often disagree. Maybe you have a partner or roommate who waxes homicidal at the thought of a bike indoors, even if housebroken (I mean the bike, not the roommate – or rather, as well as the roommate). But I would be remiss if I didn’t plead the case: a nice warm place inside is where your winterized bike belongs as a matter of natural right. If you keep it in a dank basement or garage or on the porch or out in the elements, both it and you will suffer.

There’s also the matter of defensive preparation. Steel frames, even good chromium-molybdenum alloy ones, can rust, and the worst rust grows from the inside out. But don’t despair. Just spray some light lube (even WD-40, which also works well on gear clusters/cassettes) inside the frame tubes, which you can access the interiors by removing the seat post and spraying downwards, or by unscrewing one or two bottle cage braze-on bolts and then inserting a slender tube (like the one that comes with a can of WD-40) in the holes and spraying inward for a few seconds.

I seem to remember reading somewhere that light oil can seep down into the bottom bracket and dissolve the vital grease therein; anyway, in general it’s a great idea to maintain a decent distance between light lubes and the heavy ones that are packed into bearings. But in practice, I’ve never had a problem with this – and I think that the key is to be moderate. Don’t try to float your frame in oil, on the inside or outside.

Adam’s Mustachioed Hero was easy to locate with the B&L building so prominently featured in the background. The problem was bringing decent photo equipment out in the snow and 10°F weather. But saturday afternoon, after hitting up some John’s Tex Mex, Karl, Nick, and I cruised on downtown to Washington Square Park, Karl with his fancy camera rig in tow, tripod strapped to his back, radio strapped to his bike rocking Nick’s latest D&B DJ mix. We posed for this shot:

I have Jason’s red Murray Cruiser while he’s out of town, so I thought it would be appropriate to use it to go on a photo tag mission. (It rides great,Jason! And don’t worry, I’ll clean it up)
After grabbing that shot, we cruised on to a nearby undisclosed location, where Karl got these shots of us at a mysterious purple tunnel:

another shot with more locational details

This should be a pretty easy find for anyone who tries, give it a shot!

We were a bare-bones group this week, but doesn’t mean it was any less fun. Some caliente music was keeping us warm as we made our way through our routines as rolling creatures of habit. Here’s the Breakdown: Dogtown, Monty’s Krown, Rolling Around Town, Snow Falling Down, Looking Like Clowns. Standard Wednesday Night Cruise. We even hit up our favorite Footbridge over 490. It was almost impassible, as we expected. We did however stop and do a bike lift for the evening 490 traffic. We did a little exploring for hidden routes through the Park Ave neighborhood. Then skipped LUX for a change and got a 6-pack of a beer with a dog biting a bicycle tire on the label. These frosty libations were enjoyed in my humble abode while we watched cartoons and played 2-player Tetris with the friendly neighbors.

As always, an open invitation to join us any Wednesday. We’re a fun group who likes riding bikes and listening to music, while visiting some of our favorite watering holes. No agenda, just cruising!

Pics by Adam, video by Joey

[Show as slideshow]

December 3rd Snowy Bike Ride from Adam Durand on Vimeo.

Above, you’ll find 2 minutes of video I took during my ride last night. Yesterday was my first commute on snow-covered streets, and it was a learning experience!

I currently have wide road tires on my bike. I tried putting knobby mountain bike tires on over the weekend, only to find that they don’t fit below my fenders. So I may be stuck riding with the road tires for now - they did OK yesterday, and I believe they worked even better today after I followed Keith’s advice in the comments to take some air out of the tires.

Sticking to the sidewalks

I’m changing up my riding style now that the roads are all slush. I stick mostly to the road when traffic is low, but when motorist presence picks up I jump up onto the sidewalk and do the best I can in the deeper, irregular snow. I’m also finding that even though the surfaces of the side streets are less predictable, the reduction in auto traffic is well worth it.

The milk-crate-on-the-back-rack strategy works well enough for me in fair weather. But based on my run to the grocery store last night I’m realizing that riding a bike with a high center of gravity is dependent largely on my ability to work up speed fast enough to stay balanced. After loading thirty pounds of groceries and gym clothes into the crate, there were very few stretches in my two-mile trip back home that I could actually ride my bike instead of walking it. It felt like a long walk through the snow, but I enjoyed every bit of it.

Next time I’ll bring a backpack. Or I’ll buy an Xtracycle.

I’ve been having a grand old time with the snowy roadways and trails the last few days. Notice I said “snowy.” The slush is another matter; and the infamous, slip-and-slide “car snot” or brownish gunky pancake that coats the back streets, is another matter still. Notice I said “matter” twice. Both times I meant “crap.”

But back to the snow. Ah, what a pleasure to glide silently through a couple inches of powder on a trail glowing with reflected ambient light. The purity of it all. Well, of all but the embedded particulates and various toxics that come with every form of precipitation.

On Sunday afternoon I mounted my older set of Innova steel-studded 1.5” tires on the Kona. Just in time. Because on Monday I needed to commute out to the RIT campus for the first day of classes. Everything worked great – though for while I’ll have to use East River Road instead of the Lehigh Valley Trail (north section) and thus will exchange a great nature experience for a couple miles of looking over my shoulder. I keep dreaming that trail sponsors will start plowing the most popular lengths of trail to encourage year-round bike commuting. But that’s a long way off.

This morning I rode out Monroe Avenue to Pittsford and the Nazareth campus. Some people are amazed I take this route. Frankly, I do so only because it’s the quickest way from my house, and I have trouble mobilizing my body in time to do the longer, slower, but much more pleasant Canalway Trail. But Monroe isn’t too terrible for the “reverse commuter.” Very little motor traffic heads east from the city line early in the morning.

With some snow and slush at the fringes, Monroe Avenue doesn’t put its best face forward, no matter what time it is or which way the traffic is flowing. But don’t rule it out. Just be careful, especially at the I-590 juncture.

You can also go intermodal. The Monroe bus line (number 7) has frequent service from very early to pretty late, so you can toss your bike – I mean lovingly cradle it – on the carrying rack and climb aboard to comfort. Quite often I bike the whole way out to Nazareth from the Highland Park neighborhood then take the bus back to the city from the Pittsford four corners. Satisfying and cheap.

This afternoon, though, I saw some of the downside. It happened a minute after I’d got off the bus across from Monroe Square, near Union Street. As I was re-mounting my panniers, a young woman carrying a two- or three-year-old in her arms came up and asked me if the number 7 bus had just gone by. When I said it had, she seemed more distressed than impatient. She’d been struggling to navigate that Rochester early-winter special, the unshoveled commercial strip sidewalk. And carrying a little kid obviously added to the burden. I told her another bus had to be coming sometime soon, but she took up her precious cargo again and headed west on foot. She really could have waited – but there was no shelter at the bus stop, or anywhere close by, so walking into the wind made some kind of sense.

That’s the reality that those who warm up to things like Renaissance Square – a maxi-station project gone berserk - would rather not think about. They scheme to get their developers’ windfall built with (mostly) transportation money, while those who (literally or figuratively) miss the bus and pound the pavement get the cold shoulder.

Maybe we need a true intermodal task force, a real political coalition of mass-transit and human-powered-vehicle folks, to address the full range of problems. I’m going to think more about that after my next bike commute, i.e. early tomorrow morning. And there’s bound to some additional time for contemplation on Thursday or Friday, when I mount the new Nokian carbide-studded tires that I ordered through Freewheelers, my favorite “LBS.” The well-worn Innovas on my bike are approaching the end of their service life. The Nokians, with long-wearing studs and (reportedly) superior grip, will help ensure my personal service life as a winter cyclist won’t be unnaturally short.

Jason’s not the only one with Bicycle Insanity.
5am, 21°F, several inches of snow and rising, during the first snowstorm of the season. For some reason I am compelled to ride a cruiser down the street to the gas station to get some ice cream. Makes perfect sense to me! And I got to leave that sweet trail in the virgin snow with the fat balloon tires. Winter is fun!

Jason sez: Eric Larsson has contributed links to the daily list before. Here’s his first essay. Welcome, Eric!

Rochester needs a youth bike program.

I like the earn-a-bike model. Kids come to the shop, learn a hands-on repair curriculum working on donated bikes, and ride away on a bike of their own (with a helmet on their head). Two great examples are Bikes not Bombs and Recycle a Bicycle. We could go well beyond that. Maybe incorporate a local chapter of Trips for Kids. It could offer adult classes and a community workshop like the Broadway Bicycle School. If a few engineers, welders and machinists stepped up to the challenge it could be a human powered business incubator something like the Center for Appropriate Transport.

Rochester has all the elements to build and support something great: a well-developed bike culture, a large population of college students, a vibrant network of non-profit organizations, and plenty of kids to serve.

If I wasn’t so old and lazy I wouldn’t be writing this — I’d have already launched a youth bike program in Rochester. But, I co-founded one in Worcester, Massachusetts ten years ago, and now it’s time to step aside while the new talent steps forward. I’m happy to offer up free advice tempered by experience. I’ll share some good contacts. I might make a few phone calls or go to a meeting. I will make one concrete promise: I’ll secure at least one startup grant for anyone serious enough to take this on. Why wait? Let’s roll!