Free Republic

Why don’t more people of color ride bikes? There is no singular reason; however, safety is often cited as a primary concern. In communities of color with a high concentration of low to middle-income residents, the lack of cycling infrastructure elements, such as bike trails, bike lanes, or even shoulders, make cycling unsafe and impractical. “The lower a metro area’s median household income, the more dangerous it’s streets are likely to be for people walking,” according to a Smart Growth America Dangerous by Design 2021 report. “This is unsurprising, given low-income communities are less likely to have sidewalks, marked crosswalks,...

Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry objected to Rep. Cory Mills' (R-Fla) contention that "his 48 trips lasting more than 60 hours and emitting an estimated 325 metric tons of carbon since President Biden was sworn into office seemed to contradict his mission to impose regulations requiring the reduction of carbon emissions by everyone else." In his response to Mills, Kerry insisted "I don't own a private jet. I personally have never owned a private jet. Considering the importance of my mission, it's stupid to complain about how I get to the meetings that are essential to saving the...

Four people died in a fire at an e-bike repair shop in lower Manhattan on Tuesday, with another two people reportedly in critical condition under hospital care. Lithium-ion battery storage has been blamed for the tragedy. The fire broke out overnight in a maintenance shop for electric bicycles and scooters, on the ground floor of a building in Chinatown. “It’s very clear that this was caused by lithium-ion batteries e-bikes,” Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanaugh told a press conference Tuesday, UPI reports.

Cheap bikes are nice, but free is even cheaper than cheap. Residents of the asylum seekers’ center in Dronten will soon be able to purchase a cheap bicycle. A workshop for bicycle maintenance will also be available. The Central Agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers (COA) hopes that this will reduce the number of bicycle thefts in the area… The police will deliver part of the 150 bicycles. These are specimens that were once seized and for which no one has reported. The COA is still looking for the remainder. “We fix up the bicycles and make them available...

As the automotive sector braces for job losses in the wake of increased competition and the end of the combustion engine, bicycle manufacturers are encouraging redundant workers to enter the growing cycling industry. Europe’s auto industry faces an uncertain future as competition from Chinese carmakers intensifies, and factories jettison decades of internal combustion engine knowledge to focus on zero-emission vehicles. Some 3.4 million people are employed across the EU by the car industry, both directly and indirectly. Internal combustion engines require hundreds of components, involving a broad supply chain of companies. But according to CLEPA, a Brussels-based body representing automotive...

Bright orange scooters now share — and sometimes command — Pittsburgh’s sidewalks. They’re an integral part of the Move PGH pilot project, the city’s plan to bundle transit options to help residents get around without owning a car, whether by bus, bike, scooter, zip car or more. Statistics reported by Move PGH, a year into its two-year pilot, are encouraging: People have taken more than 576,000 scooter trips for a total of hundreds of thousands of miles. They have biked tens of thousands of miles, and ridden Scoobi mopeds for more than 14,000 miles. Experience has dispelled Initial fears about...

Cities in Europe topped the list of bike-friendly places thanks to high-quality bicycling infrastructure like bike lanes and weather conditions that include a high number of "cycleable" days.

Wind turbines. Solar panels. Electric cars, nuclear reactors, geothermal energy. The $369 billion climate package unveiled by Democrats last week is chock-full of subsidies for technologies meant to rein in planet-warming pollution. But there’s one popular, emissions-free machine conspicuously absent from what could be the nation’s most significant piece of climate legislation yet: the bicycle. Provisions designed to supercharge the sale and use of traditional bikes and the battery-powered variety were dropped from the climate deal reached by Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Joe Manchin III (W.Va.), the Senate’s most conservative Democrat. The absence is grinding the...

he Eugene Water and Electric Board celebrated Earth Day April 22 with a plan to give people green to buy an e-bike: a $300 e-bike rebate program. The rebate can be used by EWEB customers for any e-bike purchase. The city of Eugene and a local community development financial institution are working together with EWEB to get residents on e-bikes through informational events, such as the city’s May 20 e-bike expo, and low interest rate loans. Pedal-operated bicycles are great for trips shorter than three miles, says Cas Casados, a senior transportation options coordinator at the city of Eugene. E-bikes...

How far will the government go to infringe on your rights? In San Francisco, residents aren’t even allowed to store their own belongings in their home. Residents of the liberal city are banned from using their garage to store any personal property other than a vehicle. Chapter Six of the San Francisco Housing Code states, “Private and public storage garages in apartment houses and hotels shall be used only for storage of automobiles.” Those who violate the law can be slapped with a $500 fine.

Welcome to The Bicycle Thread. A monthly PING List for bicycle enthusiasts to share experiences, information and ideas.

Paris-Roubaix is set to be run in a downpour for the first time since 2002. Supporters are thrilled. Riders are terrified. But for the past few weeks, Doulcier has been rooting for chaos, along with nearly every other cycling fan. That’s because Paris-Roubaix is set to be run in the rain this weekend for the first time since 2002. And while it might seem strange for supporters of an outdoor sport to pray for abject weather—unless you live in Green Bay during the playoffs—cycling fans see something epic in the added peril of riding bicycles on cobbles in the mud....

Doug Ross runs a Top 20 Tweets from BadBlue Tonight feature: last night this came in at #16. Not something you often see. Route of the Tour de France temporarily blocked by llamas in fog. Photo from TdF Race Radio. pic.twitter.com/RSC5abj6I0 — John O'Connell (@jdpoc) July 15, 2021It turns out the photo is actually from the Tour de France a few years ago but since it got retweeted it qualifies and I think it deserves a much higher ranking than 16, based solely on the responses it engendered. While many observed that “Llamas in the Fog” would make an exceptionally...

Welcome to The Bicycle Thread. A monthly PING List for bicycle enthusiasts to share experiences, information and ideas.

A truck driver plowed into a group of bicyclists during a race event in eastern Arizona, and police said Saturday that an officer shot the suspected driver, who had fled the scene in their vehicle. The Show Low Police Department said that at approximately 7:25 a.m., a black Super Duty Ford F150 struck multiple bicyclists during a "Bike the Bluff" race event. Six victims were taken to the hospital with with injuries — four of whom were in critical condition, while two were "critical but stable," police said. Police said at least two other "walk-in" victims at Summit Healthcare were...

Welcome to The Bicycle Thread. A monthly PING List for bicycle enthusiasts to share experiences, information and ideas.

Welcome to The Bicycle Thread. A monthly PING List for bicycle enthusiasts to share experiences, information and ideas.

Welcome to The Bicycle Thread. A monthly PING List for bicycle enthusiasts to share experiences, information and ideas.

Welcome to The Bicycle Thread. A monthly PING List for bicycle enthusiasts to share experiences, information and ideas.

The BMW driver whose ride was surrounded and trashed by a gang of bicyclists on Fifth Avenue was attacked in broad daylight while driving with his elderly mom — who screamed during their escape, “We’re going to die, they’re going to kill us!” Max Torgovnick, 36, recounted the harrowing run-in to The Post one day after it unfolded around 4 p.m. Tuesday at 21st Street and Fifth Avenue. “It’s something that I never expected to happen in New York City,” said Torgovnick, a lifelong city resident. “That’s something like you would see on the streets of a war zone. I...