Clif’s 2 Mile Challenge is really important to me and my cycling style. I appreciate a good recreational ride as much as the next cyclist, but for me, it’s not about excessive mileage or speed. I don’t race (often), I don’t torture myself with hill repeats or sprints. And I firmly believe that the best way to use a bike is as a form of transportation. Using bikes as transportation has serious implications for the state of our environment and our health. My feelings on this are why I really support Clif’s 2 Mile Challenge, and why I’m the leader of Team Gold, which represents the non-profit The Alliance for Biking and Walking.

Clif Bar gave three nonprofit organizations each a grant of $25,000. But Clif has committed to giving away $100,000. You can see how that math doesn’t quite add up…So Clif is using the 2 Mile Challenge to decide which nonprofit gets the extra $25,000. Want to help the Alliance for Biking and Walking win that extra grant? All you have to do is ride your bike…

Here’s how you can help the Alliance For Biking and Walking win $25,000 from Clif Bar:

Go to www.2MileChallenge.com.

Sign up (be sure it’s for Team Gold).

Ride your bike as a form of transit.

Log your miles.

That’s it! You can log up to four trips per day, and each trip is worth 2 points (we’re counting trips, not miles, here people!).  You can also challenge other members (or your friends, invite them to join!) to earn extra points. And if that isn’t reason enough, I also do trivia contests, give-aways, and challenges.

Speaking of Challenges:

I have one for new and current members alike. If you’re on Team Gold, you have the chance to win an awesome 2 Mile Challenge package. I (via Clif Bar) will send you team colored socks (by Sock Guy), arm warmers (also by Sock Guy), a bandanna, stickers, a keychain, some 2MC buttons, and some 2MC postcards to put out at your local bike shop or mail to friends.  Sounds good, right? Here’s the challenge:

Ride your bike as a form of transportation three times in one week.

On each trip, be sure you ride to (or past) a sign that displays the date (ideas: banks, schools, some fast food restaurants, you get the idea).

Take a photo of yourself with the sign in the background showing the date (this might take some coordinating if the date flashes for a only a brief amount of time–I realize this, but it’s part of the challenge!).

Send the photos (all in one email, please) to kaitlin (then the at sign) bicycleboulevards.com. (the weird email format is to avoid spam emails). At the end of the challenge, I’ll pick at random 3 of the folks who completed the challenge and send them the prize package. I may also pick several runner-ups for smaller prizes.

The challenge starts NOW, and runs through the end of August (that’s midnight PST, August 31, 2010).

Get out there and RIDE!

Hey you bicycle-loving readers of mine!

It has been pointed out to me that VH1 is having an awards show called The Do Something Awards! So, why do I share this information with you, my fine readers? Naturally, because something bike-related is happening!

In the “City” category, Austin, TX has been named a nominee, in large part because of the improvements made to cycling infrastructure in the city. I would encourage you to vote for Austin, to support cities who are making it happen for cyclists! Now, Portland, OR is also in the running, and we all know they have some FABULOUS bike boxes at intersections, bike paths, and traffic control systems in place to keep cyclists happy. So I suppose you can feel free to vote for them too. But I personally think it’s nice to vote for a city who is striving to take those first steps in making change! Anyway, Portland was nominated for their sustainable foodie culture. Even if you don’t vote for Austin or Portland, it’s great to encourage cities (and people–there are other categories!) to really “do something”. I am encouraging you to GO VOTE!

Here’s some more info, courtesy of VH1’s website:

DoSomething.org and VH1 have partnered to present The Do Something Awards to honor young people’s commitment to social change. The Do Something Awards will air live July 19, 2010 on VH1 and will be hosted by Jane Lynch (”Glee“).

The final five nominees and grant recipients were announced Monday, May 24, 2010 during a star-studded DoSomething.org event at the Apollo Theater in New York. Each nominee was honored for his or her commitment to social action with a community grant of $10,000. Of these five nominees, Do Something, Inc. with the help of your votes will select a grand prize winner which will receive a $100,000 grant for his or her cause during the live VH1 broadcast of the ceremony at the Hollywood Palladium.

Since 1996, DoSomething.org has honored the nation’s best world-changers, ages 25 and under. The Do Something Award is the premiere national award for social action. Nominees and winners represent the pivotal “do-ers” in their field, cause, or issue.

Additionally, users can vote on celebrity categories, which spotlight areas of and individuals in the entertainment industry that continue to dedicate time and resources to activism and charity projects.

I pretty much agreed with Ben at the GJEL blog that the laws here in California were too lax, and that drivers should be  prosecuted. But I was operating under the assumption that cyclists would always be in danger of being taken out by a giant SUV. What if it didn’t have to be that way? What if we never had to worry about prosecuting drivers because there could never be an accident?

I hadn’t really thought about this option until I read an article on Slate today about the possibility of giving cyclists their own “highways.” The author, Tom Vanderbilt, explains that it’s a fairly American concept that cyclists must share the road with cars. This so-called “vehicular cycling” is apparently not so common in the rest of the world. In fact, Vanderbilt informs us that in the Netherlands, all new roads must have a bicycle path that is at least 2.5 meters wide, and 1.5 meters from the road. Meanwhile, here in the States, there’s no requirement that bike lanes be included at all, and when they are, they’re usually a measly one meter or so wide.

As Vanderbilt notes in his article, most major cities are trying to increase the number of residents who are using bikes as transportation. What better way to do this than to give them their own “bicycle highways?” The story reminds me of something I saw on Public Television here in California. There’s a show, called California’s Gold, and in one episode, the host explored the history of cycling in California. As it turns out, there was  a plan for a great elevated highway from Pasadena to Los Angeles (see the photo to the right!). It had overwhelming support from cyclists, all of whom were willing to pay a toll to ride on this raised path. It was shut down, however, when a railroad company refused to grant the project the right to cross railroad-owned land. It’s all about the money, right? Anyway, this was an amazingly long time ago–1897. Over a century ago!

Maybe they had it right way back when–give cyclists their own place to ride, and they’ll be safe, happy, and there will most definitely be more of them. Now the challenge is fitting these separate cycling paths into our current infrastructure–and, in my opinion, finding a way to keep pedestrians with roller blades and strollers off them.

Thoughts?

I’ve thought a lot about safety, as a cyclist. In fact, one of the first things I did when I started this blog was to build up some basic safety information pages so that even if I wasn’t posting frequently, or if the information I posted was just for fun, at least the site could always have something of a resource on the issue of safety. Of course, I mostly wrote those pages from the perspective of a cyclist trying to abide by the rules of the road that are set out in statutes. My thought has always been along the lines of “if you stay within the law, you will likely be safe–and if something does happen, at least you won’t be at fault.”

The logic of my theory is sound, in a system where the only way to handle a car-on-bike accident is in civil court. But what happens if a driver doesn’t obey the law? Sure, they’re at fault, so you can probably sue them in a civil court. Great, you might get some money to take care of your medical bills, maybe also to cover some pain and suffering. The driver might have a received a ticket for a couple hundred dollars. But you also may have permanent brain damage. Or several broken bones. Or stitches. Or all those things put together. Your life may be totally altered, or it might be ended entirely. And though the driver is out some cash, he or she will be able to get back in that huge hunk of fast-moving steel and hit the roads again the very next day.

Drivers are scary. Not all of them–there are certainly some very careful and aware drivers on the roads. But, as Ben over at GJEL shares in a quote from Oregon lawyer Ray Thomas, “the time has come to recognize that driving is a dangerous privilege and serious consequences should follow anytime a needless death occurs because a driver failed to drive carefully.” I couldn’t agree more.

But I wondered what could be done? If it was an “accident,” we surely couldn’t press criminal charges, could we? We let the civil court system take care of negligence issues, right? Well, I didn’t know, until I read it in Ben’s post, but it used to be that a driver could be hit with criminal charges in a car-on-bike accident. And even today, in many car-on-car accidents, criminal charges are brought. So what happened?

Apparently, the car-on-bike accidents “clogged the courts” so in the name of judicial economy, we gave up on prosecuting drivers who injured cyclists–unless it was a case like the one in LA, where the driver intentionally hit two cyclists. Now, I was always for a good policy argument in law school, and I generally support the idea of judicial economy–let’s make the court system run smoothly and efficiently, and get rid of cases that are frivolous or meritless. But this is not a case for that. I think the policy argument here is that we need more people to ride bikes. We need to conserve fossil fuels and limit carbon emissions. We need to fight the obesity epidemic. These things can be done by getting people to commute by bike. But they won’t do it if they’re scared. And they’ll be scared, as long as drivers continue to drive recklessly, knowing that there are few serious consequences to their behavior.

I encourage California to bring back the practice of prosecuting reckless drivers who injure cyclists. At least make it an option. Police and prosecutors will always use their discretion and can certainly choose not to press charges if the situation doesn’t call for them. But drivers should be aware of the potential for serious consequences, and it should at least be an available option for police and prosecutors.

This issue is somewhat contentious…I’d love to hear arguments either way from people–drivers and cyclists alike.

image courtesy of Roadsidepictures

So what’s been keeping me so busy?

1) I’m the Gold Team leader for Clif’s 2 Mile Challenge!! This is super exciting, because it gives me a chance to promote some bicycle advocacy and give a big “boo-hiss” to emitting carbon dioxide with all the support of a really great company. I promise to write LOTS more in detail about this. But in the meantime, you should go to the website and sign up to be on the Gold Team. We’re riding to fight climate change, and logging our miles. Every trip you log earns you (and our team) points. The team with the most points at the end wins $25,000 for the non-profit associated with that team. Ours is the Alliance for Biking and Walking. More on the Alliance in a future post, too!

2) Sailing! So, Orion and I (well, mostly Orion) bought a sailboat! This happened in mid-May, about the time I dropped off the face of this site. It’s something of a fixer-upper, though honestly it’s in pretty good shape for being made in 1972. Anyway, we’ve been working on the boat or sailing on the boat pretty often, which has, needless to say, kept me away from blogging.

3) Random summer activities, including a weekend whitewater rafting trip, helping a friend move, hitting up the Temescal Street Fair in Oakland, and flying to Wisconsin for 5 days to be in a wedding/visit some folks. Insanity rules my schedule!

But I promise there will be more frequent postings from here on out…because I know you’re bored at work and need something to read!  And sometimes I’m bored at work (like today) and need to write! Stay tuned!

These two words are used a lot, usually by groups like the East Bay Bicycle Coalition, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, Bicycle Friendly Berkeley, and the like. And I fully support this thing called “bicycle advocacy.” I would even call myself a bicycle advocate. And as it’s Bike to Work Month, and there’s lots of talk of advocacy, I feel it’s a good time to discuss what it means to be a bike advocate.

I confess I don’t have a lot of time to donate to volunteering at events put on by advocacy groups. Occasionally I donate my time, and sometimes I donate some money. There are people out there who do a lot more with organizations than I do, yet I still consider myself to be a bike advocate. In fact, I have a great sense of pride about the particular type of bicycle advocacy I engage in. I think it’s the kind of bicycle advocacy that Gandhi would have been into.

My bicycle advocacy is simple. It is non-confrontational. It is peaceful, quiet, and not ostentatious. I simply ride my bike. I ride it as a means of transportation. I take it to the grocery store, to cafes, to the homes of friends and family. I ride my bike to the BART station, to doctor’s appointments, and to farmer’s markets. But my advocacy is only partly about the fact that I actually ride my bike. The other major part of my advocacy is how I ride my bike.

I always stop (or at least seriously slow down) for stop signs. I always stop for red lights. I ride on the right side of the road, and in the bike lane if there is one. I never yell at motorists, I never spit on their cars or bang on their windows (I’ve seen it happen, and it’s not very nice).

In general, I believe that a calm, rational approach to cycling is called for. I know there are angry, militant cyclists out there who passionately hate motorists. I know they break the rules, and I understand that the rebellion feels right because as cyclists we believe we are doing the right thing for our bodies and our planet. But I think progress is made when cyclists respect motorists, and in turn, motorists respect cyclists. We have come a long way–let’s not undo the progress we have made.

Besides, the most important thing about being a cyclist in a world full of cars is remembering to stay safe. Until we live in some kind of utopia that is car free, where everyone moves at slow, non-lethal speeds, we need to look out for ourselves. Following the rules of the road and respecting motorists is one way to make sure you don’t end up smeared on the pavement.

Take care out there, and if you’re commuting, don’t forget to log miles at Clif’s 2 Mile Challenge site. Go Team Gold!

As part of my commitment to my Earth Day resolutions, I decided to try biking part of my epic commute. I drive 50 miles each way on any given workday, and I feel pretty bad about my carbon footprint, and my general lack of exercise that are the result of so much drive time. We’ve had a fair number of storms recently in the Bay Area, so I haven’t had a chance to try my new plan yet. I figure Bike to Work Day gives me the perfect opportunity!

So on May 13th, I will be taking BART from MacArthur station to Fremont, the end of the line. From there, I’ll be following the route mapped out below, using Google Maps’ relatively new bicycle directions. For some reason, Google doesn’t let you embed maps that show only the green bike routes that you normally see when using the “by bicycle” option. But this should give you a general idea of where I’m headed–it’s about 20 miles each way:

View Larger Map

Anyway, I encourage you to join in the Bike to Work festivities. Click here for the list of East Bay Bicycle Coalition “energizer stations” and here for the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition list of “energizer stations”. If you check out the energizer stations, you can grab some coffee, snacks, and other goodies–definitely good motivation! I know I’ll be stopping at the energizer station at the Fremont BART station before I get on my bike to make the trek to San Jose. If you have a great story about biking to work, please leave a comment…the more we talk about loving being on bikes, the more people will give it a try, and find out they love it too!

Well, I don’t do very well with guilt (I think it’s the Catholic school girl upbringing). So, I’m going to try to set some things right. Besides, everyone makes New Year’s resolutions to improve themselves, so why not make Earth Day resolutions to improve the world? And why not make them bicycling related?

Here are my promises:

1. The 2 mile challenge: This is a program put on by Clif Bar, with the idea being that if your destination is in a 2 mile radius, you should probably ride your bike to it. From the website: “40% of US urban travel is 2 miles or less. 90% of those trips are by car.” Maybe I can help fix this.

2. Attempt sustainable transit to work: This could be a serious pain. It means getting up at 5 AM, getting to BART, taking the train to Fremont, then riding the 20 miles from Fremont to San Jose. Then I have to change from my spandex to my professional clothing and hope I’m not sweaty. Then, after 9 hours at the office, I have to ride back to Fremont, and take BART home. It makes for a long day, so I’m going to attempt it once, and see how it goes. Perks include 40 miles worth of work out, not putting miles on my car, saving a little gas and parking money, and having a greener footprint. Problems include getting up early and being super tired, possibly getting sweaty and having to shower at work, carrying a bunch of extra clothes and shoes with me, and probably getting lost the first few times I try the ride. *Sigh* This will be the most time-consuming and challenging goal on my list.  But Bike to Work Week is happening this month, so now’s the time to try my best.

3. Volunteer: I’m going to an East Bay Bicycle Coalition training tonight. I encourage all of you to come! 7:30-9:00 PM, at the Rockridge Library, 5366 College Avenue. I’m going to learn how I can help get other people on bikes more often, even if I can’t commit to living car-free.

I’m certainly open to suggestions, too. So if you can think of some way that I can commit to riding my bike rather than driving my car, post a comment!

Normally when I think of urban assault riding, I think of the kind of riding Orion used to do in Madison all the time. He’d ride up or down flights of stairs, jump off various benches, curbs, and public art on the UW campus, and ride around inside campus buildings. He was quite literally assaulting his urban environment.

I’ve never been much for the urban assault riding, myself. For one thing, I don’t like getting tickets, and I generally obey traffic laws while riding my bike. If you’re not supposed to ride on the sidewalks, I’m fairly sure they don’t want you riding in or on the buildings or public art. And I also have a nice scar on my ankle that reminds me of the time I had a little liquid courage and tried to ride Orion’s bike up some outdoor stairs in Madison. I bled a little bit when I fell, and when I dropped the bike, I bent Orion’s derailleur hanger. So anyway, I wasn’t super excited about the Urban Assault Berkeley event that I found out about yesterday, that is, until I actually followed the link.  (Do it! Follow the link!)

If you didn’t follow the link, I’ll give you the lowdown:

Basically, this event has nothing to do with doing stupid things on your bike. It has to do with being smart and speedy and getting from one checkpoint to another before the other teams. There’s two people per team, and as a team, you check in at pre-determined points (one of them is Clif Bar in Berkeley, for example). At these points, you have to do something wacky–the website mentions a slip-n-slide– and then you move on to the next checkpoint.

And if fun weren’t enough of a reason to partake in such a glorious event, how about schwag? According to the site (I told you to follow the link. It’s not to late! Here: link!) there’s going to be plenty of freebies from sponsors like New Belgium and Specialized. And some of the entry fee is a charity donation. You can’t really beat that. I think Orion and I may check this event out…I’ll keep you all posted!

Last Thursday, Orion and I headed out for a little mountain biking just south of San Jose. We went to Santa Teresa County Park, which has some nice rolling hills, and not too much in the way of super difficult terrain. This was perfect, because it was the first official trail that I’d be riding my new Titus on.

The ride was way better than I had anticipated. This is because we dealt with most of the complaints that I’d had from my first test ride: we hacked 5 inches off the handle bar, and we flipped the stem over, so I wasn’t sitting so upright. I’m ordering my new saddle today, and I think everything is going to be fine.

Now, if only it would stop raining….