Bike registration, cyclist licensing

Updated 3/28 - added a few more in-text links to articles about licensing

A little while back the Bicycle Retailer and Industry News blog (BRAIN) had a piece on an effort in Oregon to get a bike licensing bill passed. The article was written primarily on the impact the bill would/not have on retailers and the general feeling was that it didn't have a huge chance of getting passed. From the post:

“The word I have is that the chair of House Transportation does not intend to schedule it for a hearing, so it is dead,” [Karl Rohde, government relations and public affairs director of the Bicycle Transportation Alliance (BTA)] said. “But we'll continue to monitor it though, in case it comes back from the dead.”

The piece does include the concerns that BTA has with the bill, specifically:

(f)or its part, the BTA opposes the bill stating that net revenue would not contribute significantly to the construction and maintenance of roads and ancillary facilities, and the cost of registration would discourage bicycling.

All of this, and some other posts I've seen floating around lately, has got me thinking about the validity of bike licenses.

My first thought is that there needs to be a good reason for licenses if you're going to require them. This is mainly my small government mindset speaking, but it's also common sense. Too often the reason given for requiring bike licenses is the "cyclists don't pay their fair share of road maintenance" argument (debunked and debated at the preceding links). Accepting this argument as valid (which I emphatically DO NOT) the appropriate response would be to just add a tax at the time of purchase of a new bike or other cycling equipment. Requiring licensing just for the fees generated makes little sense.

Drivers are licensed twice, once as an individual and once for their vehicle. In the first case, the license is supposed to ensure that the driver has gone through a state-approved course of education, or at the very least has demonstrated through testing knowledge equivalent to having completed the training. In the second case the vehicle license is to ensure that there is an accurate record of the vehicle (used when the driver violates the law) and that the vehicle passed certain safety/emissions testing. Do these same criteria hold up for cyclists?

• Individual licensing - I think there is some validity to having cyclists go through a specific course of education and be "certified", especially for cyclists in urban areas. If there were a recognized cyclist license, it could potentially ease some of the scofflaw-cyclist hatred, or at the very least provide riders with a ready response to that line of argument.

• Bike licensing - Unlike with motor vehicles, an unsafe bike is rarely (if ever) a threat to anyone other than the rider. Additionally, there are a number of existing private ways to get a bike "licensed" for theft-recovery purposes (identifying the bike). Licensing bikes for the purpose of catching lawbreakers strikes me as something that would require far more time, effort, and money than it would ever recoup in terms of tickets or deterrence.

So what does this all lead to? In my opinion there is some justification for licensing cyclists, if the goal is to integrate cyclists into the larger pool of road users. Licensing bikes makes no sense to me, although that seems to be the favored model of politicians. I will say that I'd rather see programs like those offered by the League of American Bicyclists expanded as a de facto standard rather than something coming down from either state or Federal government, but I don't know if that will carry the same weight with non-cyclists as something that is government sanctioned.

"Riding" vs "training"

A recent post on the Bike Noob blog asked "When does your riding become training?" The thrust of the piece was that there is "riding" - getting on the bike and having fun, and "training" - getting on the bike and doing a certain number of miles/hours because you have to get in shape for something specific. In the post, the author (Ray) discusses his upcoming MS 150 ride, the need to "train" for it, and his dislike of "training" compared to "riding".

As this stuff tends to, his post got me thinking. This time it got me thinking about my own riding vs training questions. I now have to admit that not only do I dislike "training", I just don't do it. Like Ray, I ride because I enjoy it. I do not enjoy riding on my trainer, just like I enjoy jogging and can't stand treadmills.

Previously, when I was pulling down a couple of hundred miles a week, I did my training by having a long commute home and riding it three to five days a week. That's my goal again. In this case, my commute is only 12 miles or so if I take it straight. I have a couple of options though, which include going up into the Oakland hills or just stretching the trip out past my house and looping back up. For now, the 12 miles is enough to whoop me but good by the end, but hopefully that won't last too long.

I can hear those hills calling.

Training update - 23 March

Last week I only got one ride in. It was another commute ride, so slightly over 12 miles in just over an hour. After only three of these rides my legs are getting much stronger. The first day I did it I wasn't sure I'd get home, the second day I made it home and was twitchy for a little while after. The third day I got home and felt good - tired, but good.

This week I'm working from home  (well, my mom's house) so I won't have the commute to motivate me. I've accepted that training is something I just don't like to do (by "training" I mean going to a ride just to train, as opposed to commuting or riding with friends - see Wednesday's post for a more extensive discussion) but I'm going to have to force myself to do it this week.

Commuting mojo

In the months that I haven't ridden my commute I've lost my commuting mojo. Specifically, I have lost my red light mojo.

There was a time where I could drift through town without missing a light. Sure, I'd have to hustle through some yellows, but I didn't have to stop. These last few days I've had streaks where I've had to stop at every light, five or more in a row. And since I'm rolling through a town like Alameda, if those lights are turning it means there's cars coming.

On another note - when I wrote about the TwoWheel Gear bag I mentioned that there wasn't a blinkie loop. I was wrong. I found the loop when I was packing the bag up for another trip to work. The little bag on top has a blinkie loop on the back, which puts the light right up on top. The downside is that at least with the light I'm using (Cateye TL-LD1000) unless the pocket is full the light flops over on its back. For now I'm going to keep playing with the way I load the bag to see what I can do to keep that pouch full, but in the ling run I'll probably try and figure out a good way to attach the light to the rack directly. 

The future of cycling?

A recent post over at Web Urbanist (a great blog of the odd and artistic sides of life) was on interesting concept bikes. Much like the concept cars unveiled at every auto show, the bikes on display in the post are radically designed. In some cases the bikes look like they're more artistic than functional, and some are designs I've seen in other places (like Bicycle Design). In either case, it got me thinking:

Why are so many people looking for "the future of cycling" in some kind of radical or odd design?

I freely admit to retro-grouchy inclinations when it comes to bikes. I ride nothing but steel and 2/3 of my stable is older than I am. All that aside I have to wonder what it is that causes so many people, including avid cyclists, to dream of the future? I don't see the future of cycling in an odd, artistic, or radical design. Far from it. I see the future of cycling in a throwback, specifically the old-school city bike. 

We don't need bikes to be different, we need to look at bikes differently. Most people, including many cyclists, see bikes and riding as:

• something kids do
• something athletes like Lance do
• something you have to wear spandex to do

As long as bikes are viewed as either athletic equipment or toys people won't think about cycling as a part of daily life. As long as people don't see cycling as a part of daily life we won't see wide-scale changes to the way cities are laid out, meaning that while we may see more bike lanes we won't see any serious integration of cycling.

And personally, the future of cycling I want to see is one where people riding a bike to work aren't given strange looks.

Training update

Last week there was a big jump in my training. As before (years before, the last time I lived in the Bay Area) it's easier for me to fit lots of miles in by commuting. Last week I did about 25 miles over two days, about an hour each day.

On the good side - the weather should make it easier for me to keep commuting by bike, and it shouldn't be too long until I can hit four or five days a week. My hope is that once I get up to that many miles in a week I'll be in better shape for weekend rides, and then I'll really be able to see what I can do.

On the bad side - in a couple of weeks my mom is coming home from the hospital and I'll be staying with her in case she needs any help. This means much less riding. Coming right at the start of my training this could be a problem.

Next week, or some time in the near future, I'm going to start adding weight info to my weekly training update. Honestly, I want to make sure that it's regularly going the right way first.

Product review (Initial Impressions) - TwoWheel Gear suit/pannier

A while back I mentioned that I had purchased one of the nifty suit bags/panniers from TwoWheel Gear. Until I started bike commuting again this week I hadn't used it. Now that I have, I can give my initial impressions.

I likes it.

The main compartment has a little velcro closure that goes over the hooks from hangers, which makes it easy to put the clothes in, a clipping strap that runs across the middle of the bag where it fold to go over the rack, and another strap near the bottom. All of which make sure your clothes  (in my case slacks and a long-sleeved dress shirt) stay in place.

On the outside are two pouches, one faces up when the bag is on the bike and the other faces up when the bag is hanging up. I don't know if it was what the designers intended, but the way I will be using this is to put things like my lunch in the "upright on bike" pouch, and things like shoes and toiletries in the "upright when hanging" one. Lastly, there is a small pocket that sits in the middle of those, which ends up on top of the rack with the opening facing the rear of the bike when the whole thing is mounted.

The bag held everything I needed to put in it, but I did have a few problems. First, the bag was tough to zip/unzip. I think it was probable because the material is stiff from being new. The other big issue is the lack of a loop for a blinkie. I used the clip for the shoulder strap, but it was sideways and the light came off on a bump. Maybe there's a loop that I missed, but I don't think so.

I'll write another review when I've used it a little more, but at this point I'm ready to say that if you commute more than a few miles and have to wear nice clothes at work this may be the bag for you.

Ow

Alright - I slacked last week and didn't train. That's why there was no training update. I sort of made up for it yesterday by finally bike commuting again. 

The trip to work was not very thrilling - I rode the mile or so to the BART station, took the train most of the way to work, and then rode the last 10 min or so to the office. On the way home though...

The total trip ended up to be a little over 12 miles, and I did it in just over an hour (better than I thought I could do). The trip took me past Jack London Square and the Oakland Airport. In the next few weeks I'll start taking my camera with me so I can shoot the ride and put some pictures up.

I was pretty glad that the only thing (clothing-wise) I forgot was my belt. I'd gotten so used to be able to commute in my work clothes (Baltimore commute was 1.6 miles, one way) that remembering all of the stuff I needed to bring was a little rough. 

Going on how I feel (a little sore, a lot twitchy, and REALLY eager to do it again) I'm hoping to do three days a week until I get the base miles in, and then up it to 4 or 5.

LiveStrong training update 1 March

Okay, this won't be much of an update, but I'm trying to establish a rhythm here. I have put in a whopping one day of training and learned something important -

the butt is more out of shape than the legs.

Specifically, I was okay to ride longer than the 30 min I got in, except that I just couldn't sit in the saddle any longer.

By my heart rate monitor I did 30 min with an average heart rate of 143, resulting in ~ 411 kcal burned. None of that is very impressive, but the important thing for me is that I was able to finally get started. Hopefully next week's update will be a wee bit more impressive.