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Paris -- where old bikes go to die?
My wife and I just spent a week in France -- my daughter is doing the study abroad thing in Strasbourg, and so we figured we _had_ to go see how she was doing. I was amazed by the large percentage of extremely old bikes there, especially in Paris. I'd say that a good third of them were at a minimum 30 years old. These are mostly stolid transportation vehicles, not the beat-up junkers turned into fixies like you see in New York all the time, nor do they just look old. It says a lot for the basic engineering of bicycles that they have stayed in one piece so long. It isn't the case that the maintenance is all that good, either. Many folks are riding around on nearly flat tires, with chains nearly rusted solid. It's also common to see bikes that are clearly unridable, with tacoed wheels, looking like a Dali sculpture. I guess when a Parisian gets hit by a car, someone locks their bike to a handy pole and it just stays there. One was particularly amusing. Clearly a vintage machine, lugged steel 3-speed, lots of rust, flat tires. The lock used to secure it to the post was certainly more valuable than the bike itself. The brand, convincingly real-appearing, was "Junque". Too bad I didn't have my camera with me. -- David L. Johnson __o | You will say Christ saith this and the apostles say this; but _`\(,_ | what canst thou say? -- George Fox. (_)/ (_) | |
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On Mon, 14 Mar 2005 23:52:37 -0500, David L. Johnson wrote:
I was amazed by the large percentage of extremely old bikes there, especially in Paris. I'd say that a good third of them were at a minimum 30 years old. You'll find the same in much of Europe. Gothenburg Sweden, in particular, has a large percentage of folks on old bikes. Even old folks on new bikes for that matter. I saw a woman who had to be over seventy climbing a snowy hill this winter on her fender equipped MTB with snow studs. Now that's cool! |
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