BIKEPGH MESSAGE BOARD ARCHIVE

Whoooooo hoo! That's great!

I would love to see monster turnout at this, show those Ptlndrs what up. Start telling everyone you know. Plus sounds like a fun night.

I think I'll wear Stillers gear, "hey, p'land, how's your football team, yo?"

Uh, I guess I'm répondez, s'il vous plaît-ing.

Sounds interesting, where would you like people to RSVP? I would definitely attend.

If someone hasn't already, I would say contact REI and ask them to put it on their events calendar, and obviously Trek, Performance, V.O., Wpw (though I don't know if wpw actually gives a rat's about transportation, snark), et al.

Good ideas, I'll get in touch with them.

Any chance we could get a little something like this by the 29th? Dwillen?

holy shit. thats awesome. if it had the steeler/bike logo like the one in the sticker pack it would be even better.

You could easily do that with iron-ons.

Given that I still have about half an order of flock shirts, I'm a little hesitant to dump more cash into screen printing

whoa that shirt rules.

i can add it to the collection

Bring the excess flock shirts to this 29th thing, I wager they'll go. It's a burgh original.

One of the presenters is Elly Blue who wrote an article that spawned a big discussion on the message board when I first moved here:

Sexism in the Bike Scene

Another from me..

I know a lot of people aren't on Facebook, but if you want to respond on that invite, here it is.

Come to Bikestravaganza! Lots of fun and great people watching maybe...

this sounds cool! i just read elly blue's "sharing the road with boys."

This is coming up next Wednesday. Mark your calendars, phones, fists, or wherever you write your plans. The capacity of the room is 50 so get there early / on time. Found out we can't hold RSVP's in the library.

Also, if you want to share this with other people or put up a flyer for this at your job / house, there's a flyer here. Just write on the bottom that it's September 29 at the Oakland Library, 6pm.

Looks like the weather forecast has turned much better for this! I hope it holds.

Hello! This is tomorrow night! The weather looks magnificent! I just picked up Elly and Joe from the train station and they are sleeping upstairs in my house. They took the train from Portland to Baltimore to here and then are taking it back to Portland after this so they have traveled a lonnngggg time (four days) to get here to talk with us. Come out!

You should check out an article Elly just wrote for Grist about bicyclists paying for infrastructure. There are some good numbers in it for countering arguments that cyclists are freeloaders and need to pay for roads.

why train? Is that part of their message? Just curious cause it seems like an unusual choice.

I'm not 100% sure but I think Elly just prefers a long slow train to an airplane. This was at least her second cross country train trip. If I had the time, I'd definitely do that too.

really liked that article. Thanks for sharing, Im saving it and handing out copies next time some jaggoff says "YOU DONT PAY FOR THE ROADS".

Hope to make it!

Hi everyone,

If you're not already a member of Bike Pittsburgh, we're giving out our new water bottles to the first five people who become Bike Pittsburgh members tonight (or renew). Also we're having a special tonight so you can join for just $25 (or $15 if you're a student / low income).

How was this? I completely forgot about it. bummed.

Though I'm not objective since I organized it, I thought it was awesome.

It would have been (much) better if we had more time for brainstorming and discussion but extenuating circumstances caused the event to start late and then we had to leave when the library closed.

We should have this discussion separately anyway. I was pretty inspired and giggly about some of the parts.

Thanks to the 61 people who came out last night!

It was good!

2 favorite parts:

At almost every item that the Portlanders pointed out as components of their bike friendliness, I could think of an exact equivalent that we have here, bikefest = bikefest, bikefun = flock of cycles. About the only thing we don't have is a Sunday Streets (need, need).

Also, they said that the rest of the cycling community needs to make Bike Pgh! seem like the reasonable, conservative ones, so the city will be happy to deal with Bike Pgh! That seems like an excellent strategy.

I missed this because I was working at the office until 9pm

I missed it too, was sick.

Edmonds- explain more about this idea of making BikePGH seem conservative? Should we form a band of timitos to play in contrast to Bikepgh?

Just suppose, sometime in 2011, some un-named group performed a guerrilla road closure, say, Fifth Ave from Negley to S. Craig, on a Sunday morning - late Friday afternoon, like 4:30 (PennDot closing time) distribute an official looking notice to all businesses and homes on the street, then first thing Saturday morning do some massive distribution of flyers that the road would be closed Sunday morning for walking, running, cycling. 5:00 am Sunday morning borrow some orange barrels, detour signs, barricades, the whole 9 yards, those should be easy to find.

I bet that would get some press.

Imagine such a thing.

ooooooh! I like imagining this!

Using that approach, the very idea of a Pittsburgh Naked Bike Ride becomes much more imaginable.

"Should we form a band of timitos to play in contrast to Bikepgh?"

Now I'm being refered to in threads I haven't even posted in? There's no cliques here, totally unlike high school. Just someones idea of fun, just for laughs.

I have some fun unconserveative ideas to step things up a notch, if anyones serious about a little bicycle radicalism. I break the law.

timito

Nothing to do with cliques. You do present some of the more radical "us vs. them/fuck cars!" type ideas on here, the side of which you've come to represent cause you're the most consistently vocal about them.

Unrelated: the tank in your profile pic - I've seen that somewhere. An art show in Cleveland; the artist made the tank out of soap and photographed it in various places... is that your work?

That tank was made by of friend of mine, Jason Byers, this one is suet, and he is from Cleveland, good eye sir.

@timito +1 I thought the comment was unnecessary too. Although I don't think it was meant to be mean spirited either.

@timito - I actually thought it was kind of complimentary, I mean you have been made an archetype: timito (n): strong-willed individual, passionate about cycling first, last and always, willing to do or say what it takes to get his point across, often misunderstood.

At the Portland presentation in the library the other night, the adult gender breakdown (I may have missed a few who slipped in and out when I was focused up front) was 26 women and 31 men by my count.

whoops, sorry timito didn't mean it negatively at all. ALMKLM's definition was what I was thinking. still, sorry I said it and offended you.

When I was sixteen I rode a bike. I felt pressure

from others, to buy a car, my parents even. I didn't want one. I was

probably gay.

When I was twenty six I rode a bike, some ten dollar thrift store

find, sometimes my friends rode with me, mostly they drove from the

suburbs to get drunk and break stuff.

People yelled at me from cars, they always yelled from cars, probably

because I was most likely gay. Different anyways. Sometimes cops would

yell, "Get up on the sidewalk."

I'd yell back, " Get up on these nutz?"

When I was thirty six I rode a bike. My friends would say "Still

riding a bike?" which to me was plainly obvious since I was in fact,

riding a bike. I'd chide back "And you sir are still a fat ass"

Now I'm forty six and I still ride a bike. I will never own a car, in

fact, I will not ride in them. I no longer ride my bike alone. I

sometimes strap my daughter Sarah to the back. She's two and cannot

drive or ride a bike, well she can almost reach the pedals on her

trike, maybe next month.

I'm not going to put up with some punk threatening her life with his

bogus ass excuse for Manhhod, his ridiculous fckn car. You wanna be a

hard ass, step out from your little contraption son and I'll show you

what's up,. If you prefer to menace me and my girl from inside your

cage, that's your preference. We can do it that way, I'll get in.

I have a reason to give a fuck now, believe me I do. I'm sick of

people dieing in the streets. I'm not going to sit idly by and expect

others to advocate for me, I'm gonna take care of it myself, right here on Butler st.

That's whats up.

Hear, hear!

The man may have an attitude, but he has a point, and it's a worthy one. The car is not necessary in order to live.

I live 10, 12 miles out into the 'burbs, and with the exception of the retired couple across the street, have the only driveway for at least 10 houses in every direction with just one car in it. Everyone around me thinks me an extremist. What, walk? What, take a bus? You take HOW LONG or HOW MANY BUSES to get to work? You BICYCLE 17 miles? in the dark? in the snow?

So, yes, I do have one car and do drive maybe once or twice a week, but I can fully understand and support timito's point of view. It does take some guts to be the one out in front, the extremist, the absolutist, the futurist.

Everyone's out of step but Johnny, but dammit, Johnny is right.

+1 timito

"...I'm sick of people dieing in the streets. I'm not going to sit idly by and expect others to advocate for me,..."

So to respond to Tabby's question, yes.

Extremist is a funny word. It's really just a fancy replacement for "weirdo", isn't it? I think it reflects badly on those who use it. Many of my heroes were extremists.

The strategy proposed -- making someone else out to be the "fringe", the "wackos", is a technique for ingratiating yourself with the establishment. Sometimes this is done by carving out the idealists in an organization and throwing them under the bus. It's a cynical way to gain power and status for one's self. But it's also dangerous. It's easy for an organization to lose sight of its real goals and focus on securing its position. They'll call this "logrolling" or "going along to get along". "You catch more flies with honey than vinegar." "Politics is the art of the possible." Eventually they turn things around, and their focus becomes convincing their members of the rightness of establishment policies. I think that democratic organizational structures, membership organizations, are more resistant to this than others, but in can happen to them too.

Yesterday I was sitting idle, and I was thinking. I do expect others to advocate for bicycle rights while I sit idle, that's why I gave them some of my money,

These people here.

Lou, Erok, Lolly,

thank you Bike-pgh

Lyle, I noticed before that you were wearing a LAB shirt, you weren't by any chance thinking of any specific instances (above), were you? There seems to be some wacky stuff going on over at the LAB.

Maybe. I still can't figure out why PeopleForBikes got started.

Maybe. I still can't figure out why PeopleForBikes got started.

I think we need extremists and moderates in a healthy community. Extremists are the ones blazing new roads and paths. Moderates are the ones laying the pavement and putting up the street signs.

Extremism without moderation is mostly sound and fury. Moderation without extremism is just status quo for the sake of status quo.

Gross generalization? Oh, yeah.

"A thing moderately good is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper is always a virtue; but moderation in principle is always a vice." Thomas Paine

That's all.

Bikes for People is a bike industry funded initiative, hey, if they want to come at the problem from their angle, good for them.

timito, you're makin' me tear up in my coffee.

Maybe. I still can't figure out why PeopleForBikes got started.

diversity of tactics. eventually something will stick. yeah, it's also industry funded, and part of our only capitol hill full-time bicycle lobby group. that's probably why it looks so slick too.

They should call it "the bike industry for bikes" then.

True. My guess is that it is a re-branding attempt to appeal to non-hard core folks who don't immediately identify as "cyclists". Oddly, Americans seem to trust huge, slick, faceless corporations more than they do their fellow citizens, whom we hold in great suspicion. I suppose we don't trust anyone whose prime motivation isn't profit.

Aside: (Um, according to the Supreme Court, corporations are citizens.)

honestly, it's about time the industry stepped up.

@erok: It sucks, but that is how the game is played at that level (slick, corporate-backed industry lobbyists). It's probably stinky, but it's a voice at the table.

(Any chance they take their u-locks into meetings? Any chance we could we get Jens registered as a lobbyist?)

yeah, i know. i'm all for the industry doing what they can. imagine what chicago would've looked like if schwinn pushed to make sure every chicago resident could safely and happily ride their bikes around as transportation instead of just marketing them as toys. it woulda been like detroit, made for bikes not cars.

I am also in favor of the bicycle industry getting involved. Look how much car manufacturers were able to apply pressure to asphalt America and wipe out streetcars, forcing people into cars.

Similarly, we need the bike industry to do their part to make the streets safe for people to use their products. It can't be just the users of bikes working alone to change the face of streets and cities.

Buy, Planet Bike accessories, oh and Clank Works

Look how much car manufacturers were able to apply pressure to asphalt America and wipe out streetcars, forcing people into cars.

I'm not sure this example advances your argument. Allegedly, GM acted in its own corporate interests and against those of the American citizenry. Which is precisely my point.

What assurances can you give me that the bike industry will act in my interests, and not their own? I think you imagine that our interests are aligned. I am not so naive.

I can't really conceive of how bike industry interests (making more money) could conflict with my interests (riding my bike more). I'm not saying it can't. I just can't think of an obvious way at the moment, though evil corporations continually amaze me in their shifty plots to make a buck.

It seems like the logical way to do this is to popularize cycling, which will call for improved infrastructure and better laws, which in turn gets more people riding (and buying) bikes. Maybe I'm naive. Perhaps this bike-industry spurred infrastructure is crap, and targeted for recreational riders, which would sort of conflict with my interests.

I suppose the other way is to ship even more manufacturing overseas (as if the bulk of that hasn't yet happened) or make crappy bikes that fall apart and require the owner to frequently replace it, which would definitely conflict with my interests. Maybe they lobby for tax breaks for bike manufacturers, under the umbrella of "green", but I, personally, wouldn't really have a big problem with that.

Do you have a particular scenario in mind Lyle? Action on the part of bicycle manufacturers that you would be displeased with? I don't have strong feelings on the subject either way, so I'd be easily swayed.

I don't think the bike industry, which probably gets less than $1000 a year from a typical high-milage customer, will ever fund at the level of the car industry that gets 10 times that amount from a typical user.

The auto industrial complex exists to get people into cars and keep them there. I agree with dwillen, it stands to reason that the bike industry exists to get and keep people on bikes. It does seem to me the interests of cyclists and the bike-manufacturing industry are aligned.

Let's get back to making BikePGH look conservative. I like where that conversation was heading.

I would very much like that as well.

Bike-pgh conservative?

We could put Scott and Lolly in suits.

They exist to sell bicycles. And if they can do that by supporting (eg) places to drive to, that are fun for bicycling, that's what they'll do. Destination cycling is entirely antithetical to my interests. The industry lobby will push for the opening of every bit of parkland to mountain biking, and with all due respect to our offroad friends, that's a set of politics that I don't share (I don't violently object, but it's completely irrelevant to utility cycling). And if the industry lobby thinks that supporting a mandatory sidepath law, like the one that Florida just passed, would help it gain traction on one of its other goals, then they would surely do that. They don't care if people actually ride those bikes, as long as they keep buying them. If they can sell bicycles as fashion accessories, they'll do that, too.

I'm not arguing that the industry is totally evil. I'm sure my interests align more closely with theirs than with the interests of the automotive lobby. But I'd rather support an organization that represents cyclists, than one that represents corporations and uses "people" as a tool.

In a prior post someone mentioned street closures, what a great idea, "if" it could happen, "if" it happened, I like Friendship,

There are two major auto arteries that run parellel, more or less, traffic could be easily diverted. There's a park. I have several traffic cones.

I believe Lyle is right. Although I like Destination cycling. I'm not interested in getting there by SUV.

I want to take my bike, and maybe a trailer, kids, a dog. When they finish that GAP trail into the city. That's gonna open things up. Imagine commuting into the city from Mckeesport, by bike.

or an overnight camping trip, by bike.

Yeah, that's a bad idea, no one's gonna ride thier bike that far.

You can buy some nice racks to put your bike on your car, thereby taking your bike with you.

Just enjoy riding a bike. Tell your friends how you rode your Full Suspension Rig all over tarnation. "See all the mud" that's what I tell my friend. All that mud.

I wonder how many "destination" cyclists become "lifestyle" cyclists?

@Eric: Me, for one.

Sometimes I put my bike on my car to drive to places where cyclists have been killed by innattentive drivers to ride to increase awareness of road safety and to try to make roads safer for everyone.

What "niche" is that?

Probably the same niche as someone who bikes 14 miles SE of his house before work in the morning to start a 7-mile ride to increase awareness of road safety and to try to make roads safer for everyone. And then bikes 17 miles home at the end of the day.

Sometimes I put my bike on my car to drive to places where cyclists have been killed by innattentive drivers to ride to increase awareness of road safety and to try to make roads safer for everyone.

What "niche" is that?

I don't know, but I sincerely hope it's not a niche that the bike industry tries to exploit for profit.

@ Stuln, that's an impressive commute, especially, considering from what I can glean here, you're not exactly a spring chicken. I might ride 14 miles over the whole day.

I finally got to riding some of the GAP trail a few weeks ago. One hundred miles, my first century ever. I will confess to stopping for a two hour nap.

Yeah, Stu man, you're in a niche of your own. You're a tough bird.

i talked to someone yesterday who was talking about starting a fringe cycling advocacy group... that would really make bike-pgh look conservative.

First rule of "fringe" cycling group: don't talk about it on the "conservative" group's message board.

no way... being fringe isn't cool unless people know you are fringe... therefore the above rule doesn't apply.

There were some interesting-looking Zines being passed around at the Bikestravaganza event, but I was sitting in back & focused on the visitor presentations. Well, I just found out that these are cataloged on LibraryThing & housed at the Main Branch.

(Thanks to librarian Jude Vachon for the info & for building the collection.)