Author Archives: Tim K

Election Night Special Edition: Seattle Mayor DOES Want to Show Off His Rack

Posted on November 7, 2007 | 1 comment

…at least the new one at University Zoka, spotted this morning by an eagle-eyed, pre-caffeine, carfree-Anne.

If you recall, I posted a while ago about the Seattle Bike rack program. One of my nominated locations was UZ. Low and behold, today we see a single, shiny new rack. Either someone SDOT reads this blog (unlikely), or I just got lucky.

Like any red-blooded, American urban cyclist, I ultimately lust after a nice pair (at least). The demand is there — at 11am. this rack was full, a Zoka-installed rack was full, and bikes were chained to the street trees. Still, I’m a sucker for almost any rack and can’t help but give a frat-boy-sized W00t! to this lopsided offering,

Dare I hope this is a sign of life to come in a post-Bicycle Master Plan world? Nah, I’m not that optimistic. Still, I won’t mind a bit if SDOT proves me wrong.

-Tim

1 Comment

Posted in alternative transportation, bikes, Human Powered Politics, neighborhoods, Rack that Bike, shopping, traffic

Tagged bikes, BMP, coffee, government, racks, SDOT, seattle, zoka

NY Times ♥’s Portland Bikes

Posted on November 5, 2007 | 3 comments

I opened my Gray Lady this morning to find I wasn’t the only one smitten by the bike. This time, it’s the Times with an early November Valentine for our neighbors to the South. It is a good read and don’t have a lot to add, other than:

I’m Jealous: Why can’t my city do better? Why can’t we live in Portland?
My friends know how to get to me — four of them sent me this article.
The article is pretty shallow. The article emphasizes high-end frame builders and how Nike and Columbia sell cycling products, but lacks info about the large number of cool shops, amazing resources like BikePortland.org, and the other businesses who cater to regular cycling folk.
It’s the Times’ most-emailed article. Hey, you crazy politicians take that. The nation is indeed interested in bikes as modern transportation alternatives.
The PDX buzz is nearing an unsustainable level and I’m concerned about a hype fallout. I remember when all the college kids were moving to Seattle in the early 90s because of the music (and later, the dot.com scene). I got so sick and tired of meeting people from Virginia whom had moved to Seattle because they heard it was cool. And then they decided it wasn’t, but hadn’t got around to moving to the new IT town.

At least we had jobs here, back in the day. I think the reality of BYOE (Bring Your Own Employment) in Portland might not be so kind to this generation of hype gypsies.

If you think I’m dead wrong on #5, keep in mind #1. Envy isn’t always fair or rational or …

-Tim

3 Comments

Posted in alternative transportation, Human Powered Politics, PDX, sustainability

Tagged bikes, economy, envy, jealousy, love, lust, news, PDX, politics, portland, sustainability, transportation

I ♥ my Wald Front Basket

Posted on November 4, 2007 | 10 comments

After date night, I attended an amazing lecture by Lawrence Lessig at Kane Hall. On the way home, when I should have been thinking about things like hybrid companies, government regulation, and our broken intellectual property system, I found myself moved to conduct an impromptu bike-basket photoshoot. As much as I wanted concentrate on Supercapitalism, etc, I was smitten by the beauty and function embodied in my Wald #585! Continue reading →

10 Comments

Posted in alternative transportation, bikes, buildin' the xtracycle, consumerism, shopping, wrenchin', xtracycle

Tagged basket, bikes, cargo, cargobikes, crush, gear, love, shopping, utility, wald, xtracycle

Xtracycle Date Night #8

Posted on November 4, 2007 | 1 comment

It was a lovely Friday night for some Xtracycle errands followed by drinks and dinner at Flowers on the Ave. The combination of my captive subject, our bikelights, and the camera’s second-curtain flash settings were hard to resist.

-Tim

1 Comment

Posted in dates, extravehicular activities, seattle, xtracycle

Tagged car-free, carfreedates, date night, dates, seattle, U-district, xtracycle

Xtra-spooky? Halloween, Xtracycle Style

Posted on October 31, 2007 | 2 comments

Little Red Riding Hood (the six-year old) needed a ride to her Halloween party after school today. Xtracycles to the rescue. Here she is joined in the ~~car~~bikepool by a ferocious dinosaur (our four-year old), and a friendly cowgirl from the bikepool.

Continue reading →

2 Comments

Posted in alternative transportation, bikes, extravehicular activities, kids, longbikes, School, seattle, xtracycle

Tagged bikepool, bikes, carpool, costumes, dinosaurs, dragon, halloween, kids, seattle, xtracycle

Xtracycle Build Details: Stoker Bar

Posted on October 31, 2007 | 3 comments

This is part of an ongoing series of posts (ok, it’s the first–we’ll see how it goes) on the building of our Xtracycles. We get lots of questions about putting them together so I thought I better start documenting. Normal people would do it in order, starting with the actual kit, but me, I gotta start with the stoker bars. Maybe I just like saying Stoker….

Interested in the build? Read on, then see the blurb at the bottom and watch the “Buildin’…” category.

For our stoker bar setups we used some cheap ebay tandem stems and beer-can shims to mount bars for our passengers. I’ll get to the stems in another post but for now, here’s the scoop on these sylish Nitto “Swept-Back” bars.

Continue reading →

3 Comments

Posted in bikes, buildin' the xtracycle, wrenchin', xtracycle

Tagged bikes, build, cork, diy, grips, howto, parts, passengers, seattle, stoker, wrenchin', xtracycle

Trader Joes: $187.93

Posted on October 29, 2007 | 9 comments

…contrary to our cashier’s expectations, we got the whole mammoth cart on the bikes with room to spare. The first time we did this we spent as much time packing the bikes as we did shopping. But as the weeks go by, we’re getting faster and finding we have room for more. Once the sideloaders reach a certain “fullness” I can’t resist stuffing them to make it all worthwhile (twice I’ve sent Anne back for more beer). We’re learning some tricks on that front. (A bakfiets would would be the ultimate in easy packing, but talking to Todd at Clever Cycles it’s probably too darn hilly here.)

And who would have thought the Wald basket, while cool in an old-fashioned-paperboy way, would represent a packing revelation? This little 14x9x9 beauty holds cameras, beer, wine, coffee cups, sweaters, gloves, hats, lunch, stuffed pink piggies, American Girl dolls, and the occasional U-lock. Once again, those guys at Rivendell are onto something simple that works fantastically. When Anne gets the rigid fork on her Xtra, she’s getting a Wald, too.

Check the the thumbnail image for some packing details.

-Tim

9 Comments

Posted in alternative transportation, BIG Loads, bikes, extravehicular activities, seattle, xtracycle

Tagged baskets, bigloads, bikes, groceries, packing, seattle, shopping, trader joes, xtracycle

Xtracycle: An Anti-Minivan for the Anti-Soccer Mom

Posted on October 28, 2007 | 2 comments

Seats four in comfort. Check!
Cupholders? Check!
Loads of cargo Space? Check!
Room for the brother to bring his bike? Check!
Space for tailgating? Check!
Co2 Belching SUV/Minivan? Nah!!!!!!!!

We had a lovely Saturday at the six-year-old’s soccer game. It’s not exactly sport at this age, but it’s fun to watch. Dozens of these tiny three-on-three teams play at a time and the resulting parking frenzy resembles the UW Montlake lot the first week of fall classes.

No matter, we just cruise by the madness and park the SUBs on the sidelines like VIPs!

-Tim

2 Comments

Posted in bikes, extravehicular activities, neighborhoods, School, Uncategorized, wrenchin'

Tagged bikes, cupholders, kids, seattle, soccer mom, SUB, tailgating, xtracycle

Seattle Mayor Nichols Wants to Show You His Rack(s)

Posted on October 26, 2007 | 6 comments

SDOT Photo

As we ride more (and more and more) around our fair city, I’m struck by how little the city does to accommodate the parking of our two-wheeled steeds. Racks are few and far between, but cars are welcomed on nearly every curb. It used to be, back in the day, this didn’t matter much because you could count on a nearby, sturdy, parking meter…

Continue reading →

6 Comments

Posted in alternative transportation, bikes, neighborhoods, Rack that Bike, seattle, sustainability, xtracycle

Tagged bikeracks, bikes, governement, local, racks, seattle, transportation, xtracycle

Do You Want Fries with That?

Posted on October 23, 2007 | 7 comments

Nothing says cycling like a big fat burger, right? (uh, yeah…right, Tim)

So it follows that nothing says riding in the rain like a big Costco-sized bottle of ketchup-turned buddy flap (mud flap)!

I had big plans to make some fancy Rivendell-style tweed/leather mudflaps, but I went back to my reuse roots. Once I saw the flap-goodness embodied in that giant old ketchup bottle, I don’t know, I just couldn’t sit idly as it was sentenced to the big recycling tub.

Continue reading →