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#11
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Today Show: Bike Use Soars With Gas Prices
And I figure the best way of delivering the message that Practical Bicycling can indeed be viable is by, well, simply doing it -- by simply being an example to others. Well, I know I spend a lot of time explaining my Bike Friday to people every time I ride it. I recently went on the Amtrak and when people saw me unfolding it in the parking lot and then the reverse when I returned, I had a crowd around me. Sheesh! I don't mind telling people about it, but I have noticed a lot more interest recently. Pat in TX |
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#12
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Today Show: Bike Use Soars With Gas Prices
Anybody here remember the seventies? This is neither new nor suprising,
nor will it last any onger than it takes for people to realise that it actually requires work. At which time they'll all go back to using their cars anyways, complaining about how expensive it is, getting more obese and dying from the very diseases that putting out a little physical exertion would have solved in the first place.\ JMHO. - - Compliments of: "Your Friendly Neighborhood Wheelman" If you want to E-mail me use: ChrisZCorner "at" webtv "dot" net My website: http://geocities.com/czcorner |
#13
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Today Show: Bike Use Soars With Gas Prices
On May 31, 2:42 am, (Tom Keats) wrote:
Hear, hear! And I figure the best way of delivering the message that Practical Bicycling can indeed be viable is by, well, simply doing it -- by simply being an example to others. I think it helps to dress in normal workaday clothes which look nice but are also cycling-friendly. It also helps to maintain a happy-go-lucky demeanour. All of that demonstrates that riding needn't be a burdenous extra chore in one's life, and that riding can in fact mitigate what would otherwise be drudgery. Heh :-) My Leggero Max[tm] cargo trailer absolutely astonishes SUV pilots at my local laundromat. It folds down to a bike trailer, and folds up into a shopping cart or laundry hamper. Or I can fold it flat and use it like a luggage carrier, or scootch it up flat against the laundromat's wall so it's out of the way. The trick is to entice people into it. You surely know how proselytive phrases that begin with: "Y'know what you should do?" go over like lead balloons. But if you display your 'product' actually working at its best, without any extraneous razmatazz hype, it sells itself. Then, word-of-mouth takes hold among the populace, followed by the Keeping-Up-With-The-Jones's effect, and trendiness ensues. Make it seem like an "underground" thing, and everybody will want in on it. (I should've been an advertising exec, but I only use my powers for good.) Anyways, if we're gonna promote Practical Bicycling, we have to do Practical Bicycling ourselves, in such a manner that puts a bee in people's bonnets, and gets them to thinking about it for themselves. Couldn't agree more with this. People are so enamoured w/ motors. Hiram Maxim said that when the bike came on the scene, it sparked a demand that it couldn't satisfy. Robert |
#14
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Today Show: Bike Use Soars With Gas Prices
In article ,
"Pat" writes: And I figure the best way of delivering the message that Practical Bicycling can indeed be viable is by, well, simply doing it -- by simply being an example to others. Well, I know I spend a lot of time explaining my Bike Friday to people every time I ride it. I recently went on the Amtrak and when people saw me unfolding it in the parking lot and then the reverse when I returned, I had a crowd around me. Sheesh! I don't mind telling people about it, but I have noticed a lot more interest recently. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Same here. I do my errand runs in workaday clothing, and it shows people that riding needn't involve having to wear funny clothes, nor it being a complicatedly technical affair. Folding bikes such as your Bike Friday + multimodal commuting are a great way to show that life without a POV is possible. I'm hearing: "nice bike" from passers-by a lot lately. I can almost hear their thinkin' gears turning, as they pensively work their ways toward that eureka: "Maybe I should give it a try." My only beef is that with our local MHL, I fear helmets portray cycling as dangerous, and scares incipient riders off. I regret bringing the helmet issue up yet again, but I deem it of greatly importance to get the message across that practical bicycling[*] is not only viable, but quite safe when approached competently. I deeply resent being coerced by my provincial government to publicly demonstrate otherwise. cheers, Tom [*] Heh -- Practical Bicycling almost sounds like the title of a book, doesn't it? -- Nothing is safe from me. I'm really at: tkeats curlicue vcn dot bc dot ca |
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Today Show: Bike Use Soars With Gas Prices
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#17
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Today Show: Bike Use Soars With Gas Prices
From: (Tom*Keats)
Actually, the 70s gave a lot of folks in Vancouver the kickstart they needed to take up practical cycling. Yes, some fell by the wayside. In fact that's how I accumulated my fleet of Apollos -- people bought 'em, decided they didn't like riding, and gave/traded/sold 'em cheaply to me. But many of my fellow citizens carried on, and continue to this day to ride both recreationally and practically. I daresay we have a thriving bicycling culture here which is due in large part to the Energy Crisis. Even more so in Victoria, B.C. The seventies' so-called Energy Crisis was just a temporary glitch. I sense we're now on the brink of something much more serious. Biofuel to the rescue! * * (... maybe.) Maybe biofuel could be made edible, or at least potable. It could be advertised as "Good For Man or Machine or Beast." I could make good use of a decent fractionating column, myself. Not for vehicle operation, though. I've noticed lately how publicly-available bike racks are getting a lot more use. We need more of 'em. Sheltered bike parking areas would be nice. At any rate, I figure a lot of people are gonna learn the hard way, the difference between "/can't/ adapt" and "don't wanna adapt." cheers, ********Tom - - - - - - - - - - - - You're from Canada? you don't count then. My statement was in referance to us slothful Americans :-3D - - Compliments of: "Your Friendly Neighborhood Wheelman" If you want to E-mail me use: ChrisZCorner "at" webtv "dot" net My website: http://geocities.com/czcorner |
#18
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Today Show: Bike Use Soars With Gas Prices
It's Chris wrote:
Maybe biofuel could be made edible, or at least potable. I have a friend with a converted diesel Mercedes that can run on bio-fuel, but that also runs on pure vegetable oil (you must start and stop the engine while it's getting fuel from the bio-fuel tank, but once the engine is running it can be switched to the plain vegetable oil tank). |
#19
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Today Show: Bike Use Soars With Gas Prices
"Tom Keats" wrote in message ... Hear, hear! And I figure the best way of delivering the message that Practical Bicycling can indeed be viable is by, well, simply doing it -- by simply being an example to others. I think it helps to dress in normal workaday clothes which look nice but are also cycling-friendly. Tom's right. I hop on my town bike with the fenders and the chain guard and the step through frame in my white skirt and sandals and pedal off to join friends downtown for lunch. And sure enough, I glide right up to the restaurant and snap down the kick stand, pull the key out of the ring lock and take my purse out of the basket and am ready to go, while they tell me how much trouble they had finding parking. Heck, turns out that we left at the same time to go the same distance, but I saved all that time parking. We don't even have to get into the cost of gas discussion before they want a bike just like mine, down to the bell. |
#20
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Today Show: Bike Use Soars With Gas Prices
Tom Keats wrote:
My only beef is that with our local MHL, I fear helmets portray cycling as dangerous, and scares incipient riders off. Helmet laws can have the opposite effect as well. In my area, which is heavily Asian, there is an unexpectedly large number of school-age kids riding to school. The schools thought, apparently, that the parents would be too overprotective to allow their kids to ride to school, but the helmet requirement helps to give the parents a false sense of security, for better or for worse. The kids ride horribly, on the wrong side of the road, on the sidewalk, darting out from between parked cars, running stop signs and red lights, but the parents are seemingly unconcerned because the kids wear helmets. I think you're falling for the fallacies promoted by the AHZs, by stating that widespread helmet usage makes others thinks that cycling is more dangerous than it actually is. Seat belt laws don't portray driving as more dangerous than it actually is. No one believes that seat belts will save your life in a really bad accident, yet everyone accepts that wearing them can reduce injuries in some situations, even if they don't like wearing them. |
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