A Man's Bike Is His...

Getting elected to public office or being given a badge is a downward spiral.  I've seen the change in everyday lifestyle and need to fit-in with their peers lead otherwise fine and goodhearted individuals to make stupid and self-interested decisions and public policy that is unabashedly determental to the lives of the citizens they once upon a time truly wished to serve.

According to the link, theres no real data, just comments by people "I've heard that", "A friend said" etc

Who parks a bike outside for the winter? That would kill a bike

Quote:

If you have attached it to a metal ring put out by the city on public streets and leave it all winter then your an idiot.

Your what is an idiot?

The woman is the story above was actively using her bike.

if you only have enough room to sleep I suppose you can always keep the bike on top of you...doesn't make it practicle...nor your life a lot easier.  People really do ride a bike because it a more affordable form of transport and many are not willing to sacrifice what little living space they have to store it inside in winter.  Not to mention the difficulty in carrying bikes up and down stairs or dealing with snow/ice melt for those who ride in the winter.

I'm not saying bikes should never be removed, I'm saying the way we go about this could be much better and serve to lower the cost of cycling...and probably the public expense that must go in disposing of the bikes.  It doesn't really matter if you think it's a good idea or not, the bikes are there and the way we are dealing with it is not acceptable.

Sorry but unless your homeless, you can put a bike in your bedroom. Might be unsightly but far far better for your bike, If you have attached it to a metal ring put out by the city on public streets and leave it all winter then you're an idiot. If it belongs to the city, then they get to make the terms on what happens and leaving it for months means its abandoned to them.

Nor could they reasonably be able to determine when a given bike is really abandoned or just 'stored ' there for the winter

ebodyknows wrote:

The woman is the story above was actively using her bike.

if you only have enough room to sleep I suppose you can always keep the bike on top of you...doesn't make it practicle...nor your life a lot easier.  People really do ride a bike because it a more affordable form of transport and many are not willing to sacrifice what little living space they have to store it inside in winter.  Not to mention the difficulty in carrying bikes up and down stairs or dealing with snow/ice melt for those who ride in the winter.

I'm not saying bikes should never be removed, I'm saying the way we go about this could be much better and serve to lower the cost of cycling...and probably the public expense that must go in disposing of the bikes.  It doesn't really matter if you think it's a good idea or not, the bikes are there and the way we are dealing with it is not acceptable.

Read Snert above. If you are actively using it, you will not get tagged.  If you are not, its abandoned, gets tagged and then eventually removed. And one poster on your link stated he has seen a bike left for over a year without removal.

And dont create strawmen, if you don't about 8 inches by 3 feet beside your bed for a bike, then you have way bigger problems than bike storage. And that cannot be common so dont bother going there. We cannot account for everyones personal issues like that anymore than we will plan for the rare billionaire with no where to store his expensive bike on the streets without city supplied guards.

Snert wrote:

Actually they tag bikes before removing them. 

 

Quote:

Did you actually read my messages or are you just offering knee-jerk reaction to 1-2 lines that fired up some emotions whilst skimming?

I don't really have a big problem with the City removing abandoned bikes. If the concern is that it's a waste of a (potentially) useful bike, I suppose I'd suggest that someone who wants to spearhead a project should talk to the City. I'm sure the City would be happy to have someone take them, assuming they can demonstrate to the City that they have the necessary resources to fix and distribute them. I don't think it should be the City's job to do so, any more than it's their job to repair and resell cars at impound.

um...let me quote myself again " that post is written by a volunteer at a pay-by-donation DIY bike shop(click her name for the link).  She says they have tried to get these bikes to put back in the community."

I go to this shop often.  It's where I fixed the thrown away bike that I subsequently rode 600km+ round trip to algonquin park through rural ontario where if anything went wrong with the bike i'd be walking a long ways. I still ride this same bike 2yrs later. The shop is typically overflowing with customers.  Apart from possessing a solid understanding of low-income bike riders these volunteers are some of the most sincere, helpful and dedicated to helping others I've ever met.  There is no sensible reason why they shouldn't be given the bikes.  It is criminal not to do so.

A occasional mistake is not an issue that requires wholesale change. Another strawman.  Somehow I don't think anyones reading comprehension is dubious here except your own. And thats not an insult. I just think you want to see a bigger issue than is really there

Ohh a driveby bash post. Nice

Bacchus wrote:

And dont create strawmen, if you don't about 8 inches by 3 feet beside your bed for a bike, then you have way bigger problems than bike storage. And that cannot be common so dont bother going there. We cannot account for everyones personal issues like that anymore than we will plan for the rare billionaire with no where to store his expensive bike on the streets without city supplied guards.

I stand by my argument.  Yes we do have a way bigger problem than bike storage.  Throwing away useful things doesn't help the matter.

Snert wrote:

Actually they tag bikes before removing them. 

I'm not sure if I've posted this before: bikes the police will take(would 'steal' be too strong a word?). You didn't think I knew they tagged bikes? 

• BTW the original intention behind posting that link is to support the idea that it takes money/time to keep a bike shiny and new.  Those with a lesser capacity to do so have more problems created for them when city officials and officers exercise bad judgment.
• Cleaning up old bikes is a problem the city has. 

Experience and intelligence should be combined to elevate problems all around.

There are groups(bike chain, bike sauce, Charlie's Freewheels and bike pirates) with demonstrated experience, desire and capacity who could put more bikes on the street by using the bikes the city legitimately determines to be abandoned. 

• Throwing these bikes away effectively creates a need for more money to be spent on new bikes and consequently limits, or at the very least, increases the difficulty level for low-income individuals to own a bike as disposal reduces the available supply and creates greater scarcity(incidentally supply reduction does not usually occur when a bike is stolen). 
• If you feel passionately about bike theft I believe you should feel strongly about how we are handling abandoned bikes as both result in people needing to spend more money on purchasing bikes.

This is my last post.  I don't think I can be any more clear about what I've learned from actual experience and don't really see anything coming back at me but ivory tower rationalization and a dubious capacity for reading comprehension.

ebodyknows wrote:

I'm assuming that crack heads don't need to be blamed as much as our politicial/policing institutions in terms of how each contributes to depriving the 'poor' of bikes.

??  I live downtown, and see abandoned bikes chained all over the place, all the time, for months, wheels bent out of shape, getting rustier by the day.

If the police were diligent about removing these bikes, thus "depriving the poor of bikes," you might have a point.  

I encourage folks to do what I have: if you have an old bike you don't want to use any more, leave it by the curb, unchained.  It'll be gone in less than 24 h, and is far better than chaining it to a post to be destroyed by the weather.

Back to the graphic novel. I read the piece in Now last week. In no way were the writers attempting to paint Kenk a hero. in fact, the vast majority of the novel is culled from years of Kenk's own words, and those of the people he associated with. The writers were trying to be balanced. They were not and did not make him a hero. 

I'll be purchasing it for two reasons: 1) it is a large part of Toronto history now and 2) to support local artists.

and to be fair to the artists they did start the project before the arrest and have waited before pushing out the product.  Dandyhorse printed a few pages of the book and it does look like the artists have put in a good effort and if I had the whole book I'd probably go through, but what makes it a large part of toronto's history?  Yes, he is notorous and affected a large # of people but I see him mostly as a insignificant wobbling old squeeky wheel that took too long to be dealt with. 

As an artist I appreciate that you want to support local artists. I can appreciate now magazine supporting artists by putting their story on the front page but the cyclist in me who only flipped through that issue quickly is wondering how much attention the ongoing news in the bike lanes on university or the bixi project is getting.

The who would park there bike outside in the winter comment got me thinking.   Some people take a great deal of pride and have serious emotions invested into their bicycle as a number of posts in this thread confirm. So what's going on with the owners of these abandoned bikes? I don't have an answer but it inspired me to post some memories on cyclists and where they parked/lived here.

I'm in my 50s and have some arthritis, especially in one shoulder. It would be practically impossible to bring my beater bike (a very good one, old Raleigh mixte, but definitely not new and shiny) up a couple of flights of stairs to my flat on the upper storey of a triplex. Not all cyclists are young and exempt from minor disabilities.

Fortunately we do have (outdoor) cycling parking at my co-op. And no, I don't leave it out all winter in months when there is too much snow and ice for me to cycle.

Here is a solution to your parking issues sineed:

as a PERSON's bike is their car, and I am getting my friend to build me one like it. It is my new favorite thing.

Oh that is wonderbar....bamboo like last forever, almost and is light light light.  Imagine a 2 seater or 4 seater made of bamboo!

Bamboo bicycles are good for places where bamboo grows naturally. Think globally, act locally, etc.

We had some bamboo furnishings in our Ottawa home in the 1960s, I recall they eventually got frayed and fell apart - and thrown out less than ten years later. I can't imagine a bike made of bamboo would be any better. Meanwhile, my steel/aluminum CCM bike rides almost like new, 14 years later, all I've had to do to it in that time is tape the handlebars and change the tires - once!

ETA: and I have a new lightweight GIANT bike with fiberglass fenders and knobby tires for the gravel roads here - I expect it's the last bike I'll ever have to buy.

ETA: photo and specs here 

ebodyknows wrote:

even in areas where it grows the bamboo needs to be treated right to get decent durability.  I spent a couple of days walking around the asian country side searching out non-crazked pieces of bamboo...I'd keep finding these big piles and get super excited and then disapointed.

In Ghana, they are trying to make a local sustainable industry atround bamboo bike frames:

http://www.bamboobike.org/Home.html

  I'm not saying you can't make a bike out of bamboo, that there isn't crazy amounts of blood in the metal industry that makes alternatives nice, I'm just saying bamboo doesn't last forever on it's own, and when given simple treatments I'm not certain it's going to beat out steel for durability.

In addition to the other posts in this thread about durability potential of metal frames I can tell you my frame was made in the early 80's and is still perfectly fine..Al posten in the "Questions about sharing the road, bike lanes, etc." thread about a guy who's been riding the same bike for 50 years.  In an ideal world with only our current level of reasources I can't think of a good reason why everyone couldn't have a bike that will last them for life. 

Does that website say anything about the expected durability of a bamboo frame?  Even if it lasted me only a couple years I'd probably still like to make one if I had bamboo growing on my compound.

I have a 1970 Raleigh Grand Prix 10-speed I bought last year. It runs pretty much like a dream. I'm going to get some new alloy rims this fall (the steel ones that came with don't stop all that well in Vancouver rain) and maybe a nice comfy new seat this summer. But other than that, t's hard to beat. A sweet looker too.

A friend moving into an apartment was putting his bike in the communal garage, where he saw some weird old bikes.  My friend is a bikes guy, so he asked the landlord about these bikes, who explained that he brought them when he immigrated here from China; and yes, my friend was allowed to try one out if he liked.

My friend showed me one of these on my porch.  It had no gears, and the frame looked unusual.  So my friend said, try lifting it; but I hardly could - the frame was made of cast iron!!!  This was the most indestructible bike I've ever seen.