Portland is undergoing a process to create something called the Portland Plan, a guiding document aimed towards achieving an ambitious list of environmental, educational, and economic goals by 2035. I wrote the letter below the jump as testimony to the importance of bicycle transportation in achieving the plan’s economic goals. It’s not exactly smooth reading […]
Why bicycle transportation will save Portland’s economy
Twitter and the grammar of the Occupatio...
Posted on“Bike check!” is how you know the mic check is for the bike swarm. One of the reporters for our local daily has recently started using Twitter, mostly in live reporting Occupy events. Two things were immediately clear: First, that he didn’t really get Twitter (he learned fast) and second that he really didn’t get […]
Occupy the Ports -- Portland photos
Posted onNot without well-founded political trepidation, we got up at 4am to ride with the Bike Swarm up to today’s 12/12/11 port shutdown. Joe was after footage and I was after photos and maybe a story. Most of the bike action happened before dawn, including some seriously unwelcome flashbacks to the bad old days of motorcycle […]
Cycling's gender gap, explained
Posted onI’ve written about why there is a gender gap in cycling in the U.S., and have struggled to explain that it isn’t because women are so damn womanly but rather because we’re an economic underclass and our transportation choices are more constrained than those of our male peers. So it was great to read a […]
Sharing the road with Bitch
Posted onThe first issue of Taking the Lane zine is out of print. If you want to read it but didn’t get one of those 500 copies I underprinted, you’re in luck – you can now read a big old excerpt in the current issue of Bitch Magazine. My copy just got here and they made […]
Tea parties, chicken suits, and falling ...
Posted onFor the past year and a half I’ve been shuffling around a half-written essay about the ways in which the tea party is hopeful and exciting and, in some ways, just what this beleaguered country needs. But I never quite knew what to make of my mixed feelings, especially the part of that mix that […]
Bikenomics zine -- new edition
Posted onThings got a little hectic in the lead-up to tour this September. I forget exactly how it happened, but I ended up sitting on a comfy couch in Provo, Utah, while our friendly hosts and their 3 year old daughter helped me hand-number and mail out an impromptu, photocopied edition of 160 of the Bikenomics […]
Let's talk about labia
Posted onA sample page from the zine. Click to read! I’m particularly excited about one of the essays in my forthcoming zine, Our Bodies, Our Bikes. It’s a friendly, approachable, no-nonsense guide to crotch comfort and health for women who ride bikes, co-written with my friend Caroline, a nurse, seamstress, and hardcore mountain biker. (Word to […]
Our bodies, our bikes -- what's inside
Posted onOur Bodies, Our Bikes is at the printer. Copies should be available at the beginning of December. You can pre-order the zine via Kickstarter or directly from me and I might have a few copies available at BikeCraft on December 2nd and 3rd. This will be the fifth volume of Taking the Lane’s printed counterpart […]
Why I type funny
Posted onBefore someone uses my computer to look up a bus schedule or check their email, I try to remember to switch it back to normal. But often I don’t catch them until they’ve begun to type and are staring at the gibberish on the screen in baffled frustration. “Your keyboard is broken,” they sometimes say. […]
Bikes on the base
Posted onPhoto courtesy of Minnesota Air National Guard Earlier this month, I wrote a short column about the historical use of bicycling in the military. While I was researching it, I chatted with Justin Haugens, who is the only person he knows who commutes by bike to the military base in Charlotte, North Carolina where he […]
Kickstarting the zine engine again
Posted onWant the upcoming Our Bodies, Our Bikes issue of Taking the Lane? Or thinking about picking up a bunch of back issues for yourself or as a gift? Want to renew your subscription? Or nab one of the last copies of the elusive and out of print Volume 1? My current Kickstarter campaign is a […]
Randonnerdery
Posted onDavid, Elly, and April. Photo by Theo Elliott Yesterday, this happened after spending six and a half hours riding a hundred kilometers through beautiful back roads. This photo was taken just before we found out we’d made it in three minutes before the cut-off. I was just happy that the cold, wet day of riding […]
Parking and the percents
Posted onFree parking and one of its not-so-hidden costs – induced demand. From an Atlantic Cities interview with a city planner who’s trying to help cities wean themselves from free parking, as good as an explanation as I’ve ever seen of the class divide underlying the economics of transportation – and what we can do about […]