Just another day in Bellingham, WA 6

Today was the first Summer Ride organized by Everybody Bike.  About 100 of us met at Woods Coffee downtown and rode through the trails and Taylor Dock to Fairhaven.  It was great fun and the weather cooperated for once.  Only problem was no one knew what to do when we got to Fiarhaven.  Ride back?  Meet somewhere?  

To make things more complicated, this was Dirty Dan Days in Fairhaven, celebrating the founder of the small town which is now the southwest corner of Bellingham.  (Dan made his money transporting goods between Fairhaven and Victoria, BC - by rowboat.  If that doesn't amaze you, pull out a map.)

It was fun to hear the Gallus Brothers on the Village Green, but I can't bear the idea of standing in a line of 20 people for a free sample so we skipped the Chowder Festival, much as I love it (there were lines like that in front of every booth.)  Instead we visited two new stores in the neighbordook: Papa's Sweets and Drizzle Oils and Vinegars.  My wife's comment: the lemon vinegar was a perfect salad dressing all by itself.  

Then we rode away.  Lovely day.

I have seen the future and it's Danish

Bike Lane
Originally uploaded by Mikael Colville-Andersen

Okay, maybe I am indulging in wishful thinking, but boy, I would like it to be true. Just spent a week in Copenhagen and this is, as advertised, a world-class cycling city. What you are looking at is a bike lane, physically separated from the car lanes and the sidewalk. Some of them have their own traffic lights (which give the biker a head start over right-turning cars). Some of the lanes have green bicycle imprints which mean they are part of the Green Wave - at rush hour bikers traveling at 20 km per hour don't ever hit a red light.

Denmark created a policy to encourage biking and the result is that almost 40% of Copenhageners commute that way. Incredible.

An interesting side effect: don't expect to see a lot of jocks in the bike lanes. Instead you see the typical commuters: cigarette in their lips, cell phone in one hand, no helmet.

I saw one guy with a popcicle in one hand and a map in the other, no hands on the handlebars. One day in the rain I saw a man in a suit bicycling, full speed ahead, with an open umbrella in front of him. I doubt if he could see anything, but he didn't seem to mind.

And worse, I saw a man riding with a baby (one year old?) on his hip. No helmets. Scary. As I understand it, children are required to wear helmets, and most of them did.

We rented bikes for about $80 for the week. Brought our own helmets. Our apartment was about four miles from downtown (south of Amager Faelled) Great ride to town. Highly recommended.

Oh, it probably doesn't hurt that the highest point in Denmark is only 600 feet high.

Photo by Mikael Colville-Andersen

Just Another Day In Bellingham, WA 3

Bike to School and Work Day 2010
Originally uploaded by teecer

May 21st was the 13th annual Bike To Work Day. We have had rainier Bike To Work Days, and windier, and even sunnier. But we have never had a colder one, and I hope we never do.

I was part of the crew running the downtown Celebration Station in front of Starbucks. I had to go in twice to buy a tea, not because I was thirsty but because I needed the warmth. Yipes.

Nonetheless a couple of hundred brave bikers and walkers stopped at our station, and an equal number biked past without stopping. (We also had skateboarders, a unicyclist and a wheelchair user.)

All got treats and chances at prizes provided by wonderful sponsors like Haggens, Mallards, Sweet Art, the Bagelry, Starbucks, and VIllage Books, to name a few.

In the attached picture by Teecer i"m the chilly guy on the right in the hoody. Next year, let's hold this thing in May instead of February.

30,000 guilt free miles

When I started working at the university I bought a parking pass. This was a hunting license allowing me to look for a space in a gravel lot that was a twelve minute walk from my office.

A year later, when it came time to renew the permit, I said the heck with that, and bought a bike. It turns out that for what it would cost to park a car I can buy a nice bike every few years and throw in the university-subsidized bus pass for those days when the weather or my health make a bike look two wheels too few.

Recently I calculated that I have commuted to work a whopping 30,000 miles since I switched to the bike. According to the EPA’s Household Emission Calculator that's about 408,420 pounds of CO2 I didn't produce.

Besides being good for the planet my bike commute is great for my health and easy on the wallet - it has extended the life of my car by, most likely, two years.

This is worth celebrating, and it happens that Friday, May 21, is Bike To Work And School Day. Oddly enough I will not bike to work that day. Instead I will help to staff one of the many Celebration Stations around town. If you bike or bus or walk to your job that day, drop by one of the stations for all kinds of treats - coffee, fruit, donuts, candy, and chances for prizes.

Don't worry about the calories. You can pedal them off.

photo by negscratch

Just another day in Bellingham, Washington

WWU students at Bellingham Farmer's Market
Originally uploaded by wwu.admissions

Went to the Farmers Market downtown. Since it was the first Saturday in April I made sure to get there for the opening.

Later I ran into G., a friend who moved to town last year. "Were you here for the cabbage toss?" I asked.

"What cabbage toss?"

I explained that, to officially open the new market season, the mayor of Bellingham ceremonially throws out the first cabbage at 10 AM on the first day.

G. gave me a look that said "SURE he does."

Well, it's true. That's life in Bellingham.

Later I went over to Kulshan Cycles to pick up my bike which was in for a tune-up. The wheel wonders at Kulshan have set my vehicle up for another year on the trails and commuting routes.

I pedaled over to the Upfront Theatre. When Ryan Stiles (of The Drew Carey Show and Whose Line Is It Anyway?) moved to Whatcom County he founded the Upfront to indulge his love for improv comedy. This was the day of the annual Improvathon where a group of young actors do 27 hours of comedy, just for the hell of it. For ten bucks I watched two hours of it. The highlight, for me, was a lengthy story of a quest, which involved a knight having to defeat several monsters at Yahtzee.

After that I wheeled over to the Public Library where I ran into my friend E, who was looking for some new female novelists to try out. I recommended THE BAY AT MIDNIGHT, my favorite novel by Diane Chamberlain, who happens to be my sister. Keep it in the family.

After a hurried dinner I went over to the Mount Baker Theatre, our city's big house, built in the 1920s, and caught the national touring company production of Cabaret. I lost track of people saying "The plot of the movie was completely different." Yup, and much better. But the music is great.

Then it was home to bed. Just another day in the City of Subdued Excitement.


Photo by Layna Bennehoff, taken on a much warmer and sunnier Saturday than yesterday.

Pedaling to a special interest

crowd with bicycles
Originally uploaded by bellyanz1

I just read a fascinating article in the New York Times. Apparently I am a special interest. Who knew?

After the bailout package failed last week Congress started sticking every molecule of pork they could find in it in the hopes of sweeting it enought to get the dozen or so votes they were missing. And they succeeded.

Turned out one of those sweeteners was the Bicycle Commuter Act which gives biking parity with car parking and transit. In other words, employers can give biking employees a reasonable monthly reimbursement and take it off their corporate takes.

Interesting part is the bill's sponsor, Congressman Earl Blumenauer, couldn't bring himself to vote for the bailout that contained it. Talk about bittersweet, huh? Blumenauer represents Portland, OR, the most bike-commuting city per capita in the US.

I don't know if this will effect my family. The university doesn't pay corporate taxes and they already subsidize my transit pass (if the weather turns stinky I can put the bike on a bus rack), and my wife's employer already pays their staff a reward for not driving to work (and thereby saving parking spaces for the customers).

But it's interesting to be part of a successful pressure group. Guess I'll sit around and look powerful

Park and ride

Bicycle Parking
Originally uploaded by vormplus

I usually bicycle to work but last week I had a medical appointment and had to drive my car. While I cruised around the campus, sharklike, searching for a space for the jalopy, I remembered something that happened about ten years before.

We received a note from my daughter's school inviting us to some parent-teacher event. It was inoffensive until the very end. Then there came a sentence that had me muttering to myself for days. It read: PARKING IS LIMITED, SO...

We'll pause here. How do you think they finished that line?

PARKING IS LIMITED, SO PLEASE CARPOOL.
PARKING IS LIMITED, SO CONSIDER TAKING ONE OF THE FOLLOWING BUS ROUTES.
PARKING IS LIMITED, SO WHY NOT BIKE IT?
PARKING IS LIMITED, SO, PLEASE CONSIDER SAVING THE SPACES FOR THOSE WHO NEED THEM MOST.

No. Here's what my kid's school chose to advise:

PARKING IS LIMITED, SO PLEASE COME EARLY.

Think that one over, okay? Please come early.

I sent them a letter asking them what, exactly, they thought they were teaching my daughter with that letter. Because what I saw them teaching was this:

This world has limited resources. Please don't think about sharing. Don't be considerate. And for heaven's sake, don't try to think outside the box and look for alternative solutions. Just jump in and get your share before someone else takes it.
Maybe that's even good advice, but it isn't what I want the school teaching my kid. I never got a reply to my letter, which I suppose was immediately dropped in the Crank File.

And speaking of cranks, and gears, and handlebars, this Friday is Bike to Work and School Day in Bellingham. Get the ol' Mountain Bike or Racer or Hybrid out and dust it off. On your commute you may pass one of the Celebration Stations where volunteers will provide you with cookies, coffee, juice, candy, coupons, stickers, and tons of moral support. Hope for good weather.