September 19, 2003
Bright in the night.
This morning I rode the Crystal Springs route to work -- for the first time in a month! -- and felt glorious. Later in the day I spoke with aram and he pointed out the Kogswell fixed-gear frame. Not only does it have tidy rear fork-ends (or drop-outs, whatever), but it's fully lugged! I decided then and there to get a rainy-day frame; ever since I cracked the frame of the Blue Dutchess, I've needed a spare frame. A nice relaxed road-geometry fixie setup with fenders. And the Kogswell has eyelets!
Later in the evening, sitting on the stoop with jimg, who was explaining half-step gearing and his desire to build up an audax bike, we saw a bright set of lights pedal past. I called out "Nice Bike!" and the rider wheeled around and pulled up to the stoop. jimg recognised the bike, a custom Sycip, as the idiosyncratic three-speed that recently rode PBP. Turns out that the rider, Joel Metz, recently organized a race from SF to Portland.
Portland being my current fave-rave bike city! Legend has it that some kinds spirt places donuts and coffee (or bagels and cream cheese, depending on whose version of the lenged one hears) out on the Broadway Bridge. And drivers and cyclists appear to coëxist much more happily, with motorists giving cyclists ample room, and cyclists riding more courteously and confidently. The grass is always greener? and Portland has wide, clean bicycle lanes marked on the roadway and on signs posted along the side of the road. San Francisco recently started a campaign to educate drivers and cyclists about courteous and safe behaviour, but the campaign consists of clever ads on the side of MUNI buses, not better-maintained signs along bike paths or the clear and accurate "Bicycles on Roadway -- Merge carefully" sort of sign one sees in Portland.
The SF campaign is certainly useful, but the wordy ads are only a part of the solution. We need more and better signs, wider and safe spaces for cycling, and better traffic calming than those ridiculous ersatz roundabouts.
