News: September 2010

When you first visit Copenhagen, the first thing you'll notice after being mesmerized by the sheer number of cyclists on the roads is the eclectic kinds of bikes, especially ones that carry groceries, baggage, furniture or other people & children.  As Copenhagenize's Mikael Colville-Andersen happily points out: for many in his city, the cargo bike is equivalent to the SUV. Thus, for this final chapter in Streetfilms' 2010 Copenhagen Triology (check here: for previous vids on bicycling & pedestrian space) we present this quirky look at some of the types of wonderful bikes that are used by the public.  We randomly spoke to folks gallavanting about town on their vehicles, attended the 2010 Danish Cargo Bike Championships, and got to speak with Hans Fogh, owner of Larry vs.Harry, a cargo bike-making specialty shop.  The result here is really just a melody of vignettes, which...

Those on the sharp end of cycling injuries want to keep the laws, writes Steve Dow. A COUPLE of times a month, the neurosurgeon Jeffrey Rosenfeld operates on a cyclist who has suffered a serious head injury. They've almost always been wearing a helmet, removed by paramedics who bring it into the hospital. The helmet is often "crushed and messed up". In half of severe brain injury cases there is a poor outcome. Haemorrhaging is bad enough, requiring urgent surgery to relieve the blood clot, but brain swelling is worse, and 70 per cent of patients with swollen brains do poorly. Occasionally, there is death, but much more often there is life-long illness and family distress, including relationship break-ups. "The ones with brain swelling, that's diffuse axonal injury, and that's bad news," says Rosenfeld, who steers the National Trauma Research Institute's...

FROCKS on Bikes member Isabella Cawthorn is one of 10 (out of 12) submitters in favour of lowering speed limits along the Golden Mile. She believes it will make the city safer and more cycle-friendly.“This is the kind of trend that Wellington would be wise to encourage,” she says. “[Cycling] saves money, and that disposable income can be spent in the local economy or saved. A policy that provides for increased urban cycling will be celebrated for generations to come.”The proposal, which will be discussed by the Wellington City Council on Thursday, is part of the “Restoring Wellington’s Golden Mile” project, which included allowing buses to travel through Manners Mall.The proposal recommends lowering the speed limit to 30km/h along the Golden Mile and parts of Willis, Boulcott, Victoria, Taranaki, Dixon and Tory Streets. It also recommends lowering the speed limit on lower Cuba...

Commuter on Victoria St CAN's Annual General Meeting will be held on the Saturday afternoon (30 October 2010) of the CAN Do. The venue will be the Petone Central School, 16 Britannia St, Petone, Lower Hutt. For more details, see the CAN Do page. For your information, here are the minutes from the 2009 CAN AGM. Also, here is a copy of CAN's Rules (aka Constitution). #Agenda Item1Welcome/Apologies/Proxies.2Review of Previous Minutes.3Matters arising.4Office holders' reports:4a  Chairperson's report4b    Treasurer's report5Election of officers:  Chairperson  Treasurer   Secretary  CAN Committee6Notices of motion   Motion #1: Membership fees    Motion #2: Lifetime membership fees    Motion #3: Cycling Conference Funds7Any other business?7a Photo shoot for Liz.8End of meeting. ...

Google the phrase "war on cars" and you will find that across North America, people are using the phrase to defend the happy motorized way of life. As one blog put it:Hiding behind the veil of environmentalism and "sustainability," a small number of activists are having a big influence on tax policy, urban planning, and government regulation with the hope of shifting our society away from the individualism and freedom afforded by the automobile. Yup, that's us, and a whole lot of urban types in a fight with suburban types who we slow down with our streetcars and bike lanes. In Toronto, Rob Ford, the leading candidate for Mayor wants to tear out bike lanes on arterial streets and move them into ravines and hydro rights of way, (few of which take people where they want to go) and he wants to get rid of Toronto's iconic streetcars and replace them with buses.He says that he...

I've had a soft spot for Puerto Rico since taking a work trip there four or five years ago. I'd heard some negative things about the island, which many people seemed to think of as a third-rate part of the Caribbean, but I found much to enjoy -- the natural beauty of its coastlines and rainforests, the charming and lively capital of San Juan, not to mention the mofongo and the rum. Fending with the traffic, however, was hardly a highlight. "People complain about traffic jams, but they see congestion as a sign of progress," an environmentally minded priest told me at the time. Now it seems that attitude may be changing for the better. San Juan, the oldest planned city in the Americas, is banning cars from large parts of its most historical area, known as the Isleta, and hopes to make the entire area walkable by 2030. It won't be a simple task. Half the island's...

When the New York Police blamed cyclists for causing 75% of accidents -- without offering supporting data, the organization Right of Way struck back with a report showing only 25% of bikers at fault, and that only on the assumption that the drivers responsible for bicycle fatalities testified fairly, in the absence of the victim's point of view. In a Toronto study, a convalescing bicyclist demonstrated that cyclists cause less than 10% of bike/car accidents. The Berlin study delivers another big surprise -- that blows in the face of common perceptions. So how did a recently released special study of Berlin bicycle safety conclude that almost half of all bike-vehicle accidents and over half of bicyclist fatalities are caused by the bicyclist? Is there any truth to it? And what is the big surprise? The Results of the Bike Safety Study The special study on...

Cycle Aware Wellington is here.

8 Sep 2010 Scotland’s first public bike hire scheme that is backed by the Government was launched in Dumfries yesterday in a bid to mimic the success of similar initiatives across Europe. Under the Bike2Go scheme, 30 bikes have been made available at nine automated docking stations around the town, which users can access on a 24-hour basis by entering a PIN and riding them away. After a faltering start in the 1960s, bicycle-sharing schemes have enjoyed a comeback over the last five years as cities in Europe and North America have developed security systems to prevent bikes being stolen. Around 20,000 bikes are available for hire in Paris following the launch of the Vélib scheme three years ago, while 3000 cyclists had signed up to the London bike hire scheme before its launch on July 30. The Dumfries initiative has been developed as part of the Scottish...