Maybe some of you parents can relate. One day your kid is on training wheels or a balance bike, the next they decide they can ride no hands.
It starts out simple enough–one hand up for a split second (see “the beginner in the video). Then two (for a split, split second). They start stretching it out. Longer and longer. The wobbles get bigger, and more dangerous because they aren’t going too fast to start out with and usually stop pedaling as soon as the hands come off. But still they wait even longer before returning to the safety of hands on. Eventually, they’ll realize speed is a good thing. It stabilizes the bike. But until they do … yikes.
The boy right now is in the early stretching-out stage. And it scares the crap out of me. Continue reading →
Val (in the hat) at the start of 2008 Labor Day ride at 20/20 Cycle
As many of you know, Val Kleitz was a driving force for the Seattle holiday cargo bike rides. For us, he was the spirit of cargo bikes in general. So it’s quite fitting that this year’s Labor Day cargo ride is honoring Val as a memorial ride.
The Labor Day ride traditionally runs (very roughly) from 20/20 Cycle on Union St. to Cowen Park in Ravenna. Plan on a slow, cargo-and-kid-friendly pace. Make sure you carry enough in the way of food, beverages, and picnic supplies. Just in case!
We’re hoping to see a lot local riders and family cyclists showing support for Val’s memory, as well as enjoying some transportation cycling on a lovely day. As always, a cargo bike is Not Required (If you are hauling yourself, you’re hauling a load!). So come on out and join the pallet.
Details: Meet at 20/20 cycles (2020 East Union) noon Monday. The Pallet leaves at 1:00 and should take about 90 minutes to arrive at the Cowen/Ravenna park picnic shelter. Later Monday night is a wake for Val at Pike Brewery.
We got the sad news tonight that Val Kleitz (ie, Bike Pilot, the Instigator, Rolling Jackass, Dreadnought, former owner of Bike Smith, and all around amazing spirit), died Wednesday at age 51.
Val had been fighting cancer for about two years.
If you knew Val, even a little, then you know what kind of loss this is. And if you don’t know Val, here’s a little story.
My earliest memories of Val are tied to fast road bikes and hot pink Lycra spandex, circa 1990.
Yesterday, while heading to REI, I heard my name and friendly shouts coming from a biker in the distance. It was something like”Hey Anne, you’re not normal” (referring to the post I wrote the other day) Continue reading →
What’s the deal with your blog? We used to get all kinds of information about riding as a family from Carfreedays, but you haven’t updated your blog since May. What gives? Are you all done? Did you run out of things to say? Left the country?
Clif Bar is once again sponsoring the 2 mile challenge.
To highlight a commitment to bike advocacy and the fight against climate change, CLIF BAR will award $100,000 in grants to support nonprofit organizations helping to lead the way. We’ve assigned each organization to a 2 Mile Challenge team: Red, Gold and Blue. All you have to do is register, pick your team and start pedaling your bike to earn points and help decide where the grants go.
Join a team today and start logging miles! I’m cfdanne and I joined the Red Team benefiting Safe Routes to Schools. Do you have a challenge for me?
We woke this morning to the sound of raindrops pounding the roof and splashing the windows. So hard to accept after the lovely sunny and warm weekend. Yesterday we were at the beach and there were kids in their skivvys playing in the sand and dipping their tiny toes in the Sound. We slathered on sunscreen and sat in the sand eating pizza and drinking beer out of plastic cups (and talked about how summer had arrived).
And today we woke to rain. Really? On day one of Bike to School Month? Can’t we catch a break?
I was ready to ditch the bike-to-school-plan and walk instead. (We only live 5 blocks from school, it’s easier to walk). But we _are_ the organizers and during Bike to School month, we ride. Continue reading →
Here at Car Free Days HQ, we’re busy with preparations for the fourth-annual Bike to School Month kickoff (this Friday on the school playground).
look how little...and cute
Four years already? Seems like just yesterday, we were planning our first event.
Tim and I love planning Bike to School month: it’s become a much-anticipated spring tradition at our kids’ elementary school. We share the planning and execution with our friends and fellow family riders, Clint and Leslie. Each of us brings the perfect mix of enthusiasm, mellowness, last-minute surprises and creativity that makes the event a super fun spring tradition at our school. And this year we’ve recruited some new bike riding parents who will hopefully carry on the Bike to School month tradition long after our kids “graduate” from elementary school. Continue reading →
As Anne mentioned recently, we’ve been loving the Bromptons and the role they’ve helped play in letting us live car-light. Beyond the expanded Zipcar range, or the fact that a gorilla-sized dad and his 9-year-old daughter can ride the same bike, we’re in love with how easy they mix with transit. This is especially clear when bussing across the bike-hating 520 bridge (which normally requires us to ride a special—non Xtracycle—bike, and then hope that the bus bike racks are clear).
Altogether the Broms allow for some nifty, who-the-hell-needs-a-car-at least-when-it-isn’t-raining-three-inches-a-day options.
But if we lived in a real city, with real density and real transit solutions, well, the mind boggles at the imagined practicality of our little yellow folders.
Well, thanks to this fine video from the 2010 edition of theToward Carfree Cities Conference, in which the Little Green Brompton OWNS a freakishly hilly, dense-city commute in Genova (Genoa), Italy— I’m boggled no more.
(hat-tip to video creator Massimiliano Amirfeiz from the Brompton Talk list)
After watching this commute (for the 3rd time or so) I’m also struck by how little* Seattle has done to flatten our fair city for the non-driving folks. How about a Trampe up Queen Anne and Capitol hills, for example?
These motorized bike-lifts can flatten out the steepest sections of a city. Check out the video, but save yourself by muting the sound. If I was slapping them down around town, I’d also like another placed to ferry riders over Phinney Ridge.
I’m sure you’ve got some locations to nominate—0bviously West Seattle, downtown, and Beacon Hill seem like naturals—so let’s hear ’em.
Of course I know this idea is fantasy. A mere mention of the option in San Francisco brought out the haters, who failed to see that this was an option to get non cyclists out of their cars and onto bikes, not a way to pamper already-riding hipsters who don’t want to “walk up the damn hill.”
I can’t imagine the spew and outcry such a plan would generate around here.
Sigh… at least the Brompton video was cool 😉
–Tim
* Don’t get me started on the SDOT propensity to route bike lanes up and down hills when they don’t have to. Instead of forcing riders to sweat their way up the Dexter hill for a Fremont-to-Downtown bike route, why don’t we just bite the bullet and build better infrastructure a mostly flat and under-traveled Westlake Ave?
Hills like Dexter may be fine for the neon-clad Cascade fitness riders, but casual commuters— you know, the people who don’t call themselves cyclists, but still need to start riding if we want cycling to move out of the transportation fringe—are never going to do it.
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