Doesn’t It Make You Feel Small?

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I’m taking it very slowly, this getting back into the saddle after seven-odd years. We’ve taken two rides on the Greenway, and I’ve been using the bicycle to get back and forth between home and work.

I use a rear-view mirror that attaches to a pair of sunglasses, with backup mirrors at home. It is my preference not to be on the street without a mirror, because drivers cannot be trusted.

Come cooler and darker weather, the plan is to take the lenses out of an old pair of cheap sunglasses.

As for the title question of this article, the answer seems clear enough.

We’re flipping idiots. 

Why Do Americans Hate Bikes So Much? by Eben Weiss (Outside)

How low will some of us go to keep our neighborhoods bike-free? And won’t somebody please think of the children?

 … But regardless of whether this is indeed an organized attempt to shut a bunch of schoolkids out of a bike rack, or merely one self-appointed spokesperson claiming to represent an otherwise loosely affiliated smattering of disgruntled motorists, what’s perhaps most absurd about all of this is how long it took the city to install the bike corral in the first place. From application to installation, the process took one year, not including “a few months of work” during which “we had to take photos of bikes locked to sign posts and trees to demonstrate demand for a bike corral.”

Parents driving kids to school creates a traffic nightmare; the city should be doing everything it can to create safe bike routes to schools and to give kids places to leave their bikes and scooters once they get there, and they should be doing it proactively. This would make life easier for everyone, even the cranky people in the neighborhood whose primary concern is how difficult it is to find parking.

Instead of dumping bikes on the corral, they should be leaving it thank you notes.

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