This is from today’s entry by Bike Snob NYC:

The New York Times also points out that in particular the number of cyclists crossing the Williamsburg Bridge has quadrupled from 2000 to 2008. This particular statistic is an excellent example of how important semantics are when it comes to interpreting data. While at first glance you’d take this to mean that more people are cycling, it’s also possible that the same number of people are cycling but that they’ve only been able to successfully cross the bridge since the city finished renovating the bike path in 2002. Before that, crossing the Williamsburg Bridge was like crossing a rope bridge in the Himalayas. So it wouldn’t suprise me if just as many people set out on their bikes to cross it before 2000, only to either give up and choose another bridge or plummet into the East River below.

How can you top that? Answer: You can’t.

Now head over there and read the rest.

Hiroko Masuike for The New York Times

Moving Targets
By JAN HOFFMAN
Published: August 8, 2008

IT seemed like a good idea at the time.

Save gas money, be environmentally correct, lose weight — just by biking to work. And so after two decades, Dan Cooley, 41, saddled up a silver 21-speed Raleigh in April to make the daily two-mile commute to his nursing job at a senior citizen center in Louisville, Ky. In four months, he lost 15 pounds. Way to go, Dan!

Friday morning, July 25, around 6:50 a.m., he was pedaling on a residential street, wearing his green hospital scrubs, when a Volkswagen roared out of a driveway in front of him. Swerving to avoid the car, Mr. Cooley cursed loudly and rode on.

The driver and his passenger cursed back. As Mr. Cooley pulled over to the sidewalk, the car turned onto a driveway, knocking him off his bike. In Mr. Cooley’s narrative, the passenger, swearing, jumped out and pummeled him. Then he got back into the car, which zoomed away. Mr. Cooley lay prostrate on the sidewalk, bloodied, with a concussion and a torn ligament.

The rest of the article, which bravely quotes Bike Snob NYC, is at the New York Times site.

Quite possible the greatest part of this story is that the Times is forced by its editing conventions to refer to him as “Mr. BSNYC” throughout the article.

Jason Crane interviews the man known only as Bike Snob NYC. Since launching his blog in June 2007, BSNYC has become hugely popular for his biting wit, fearless parody and willingness to look at thousands of ugly bikes to find the best few to eviscerate. In this interview, he tackles the tough questions, including:

• What’s up with top tube pads?
• Where have all the Aerospokes gone?
• Is Fixed Gear Gallery evil?
• How do you find a bike that looks like Molly Ringwald?
• Does appearing in Bicycling mean BSNYC has sold out? (Hint: No.)

(The theme song for The RocBike Review is “The Luckiest Guy On The Lower East Side” by The Magnetic Fields. Visit them at The House Of Tomorrow.)