In rec.bicycles.misc Nobody wrote:
On Wed, 16 May 2007 19:08:13 GMT, "George Conklin"
wrote:
"donquijote1954" wrote in message
groups.com...
Will we ever see the day when American cities have thousands of
cyclists going up and down the street without unnecessary risks?
Go to India to fulfill your dream. They do that now. You can even lock
your bicycle up at the train station and let it sit in the rain all day for
a few cents.
And for the obverse: come visit cities of the like of Vancouver BC,
Seattle WA, and Portland OR in the fall, winter, and spring.
Oh, you mean like where I commute by bike year round? And where I see
people also commuting year round by bike? If you live in Seattle, you
don't let little things like rain stop you from doing things.
Why the Bloody Hell would anyone ride a bicycle, and risk getting
drowned in any month from October to April?
-- copied from a previous post of mine --
My reasons look more like this:
1. Enjoyment
2. Exercise as part of everyday life [1]
3. Money saving - I save a shedload of money by not having a second car.
4. Ease of parking [3]
5. I enjoy working on my bikes - I'm mechanically inclined
6. The social aspect - I see and talk to people on my bike I would never
get a chance to see in a car.[4]
7. It is often faster. In many cases [5] I get home faster from work
than the people driving.[6]
8. Pastry - I eat pastry instead of filling my car with gasoline.
9. Engineering reasons [7]
10. I don't like driving. [8]
11. Greeny-weeny reasons.
12. By riding my bike I build up self-righteousness points that i can
spend on making my friends feel bad about themselves for driving.
[9]
The Bicycle Lobby lives in a Dream World.
I would say in a better world, but you're allowed your opinion.
And god, can't you people stop replying to DQ's trolls? Killfile the
idiot already.
[1] I used to weigh 280 lbs, I weigh about 200 now. My father and
brother are both type II diabetics. [2]
[2] Additionally I'm a computer programmer, so my everyday job is very
sedentary.
[3] No joke this. You try and fight for parking at my favorite Asian
grocer with the little old Chinese ladies. F$#% that noise. I roll up
and park right at the front of the store. Parking at Pike Place market
is a dream on the bicycle.
[4] Footnote elided
[5] Baseball games, snow, heavy rains, wind storms. This last winter
many of my coworkers were trapped for many hours on roads completely
jammed with traffic caused by downed trees and powerlines. One poor guy
spent most of the night in his car. I rolled up to the downed sections
picked up my bike, walked around, and was home about 15 minutes later
than usual.
[6] The best case - where the highway was completely empty - it used to
take me 25 minutes to get to work. It takes 40 minutes by bike. 30
minutes extra a day. In return I get 80 minuts of quality exercise I
enjoy. And of course on the many days where traffic was not so good it
could take much much longer in the car.
[7] Using a 3000 lb car to move a single 200 lb person from point to
point is just an inefficient solution. It's always grated at my
engineering sensibilities. Not to mention the huge amount of
infrastructure needed.
[8] I'm far too concious of just how much damage you can do with a car
to yourself of other people. Driving is fine at 2am when I'm the only
idiot on the road, but how often does that happen?
[9] That's a joke people. God, don't you people have any sense of humour
at all?
--
Dane Buson -
Everybody is somebody else's weirdo.
-- Dykstra