Cycling in Brisbane Australia
Ride to Work Day
I always look forward to Ride to Work Day. I'm not sure why because I ride to work every day, but to me, Ride to Work Day is special.
Maybe it's the lead up and as cycling co-ordinator at work encouraging my colleagues to have a go, maybe it is just seeing how many of the 80 or so cyclists we have at work will sign up, perhaps seeing more cyclists around, or is the feeling of having a special day to celebrate my mode of commute?
I must confess though, I do love getting the freebies, Free Coffee, Free Gatorade, Free Smoothy, Free Bun, Free Banana, Free Drink Bottle, Free Puncture Repair Kit, Free Reflector, Free Maps, Free Foldable Frisbee, Free Email Listing on the Two Day Cancer Council Bike Ride and some Free Gold Card from Bike Exchange. I'm still not sure what the Gold Card is about or if it's just plastic. All that I remember about it was a couple of gorgeous chicks handing them out.
But today I had a dilemma. I needed to be in the office ready to go for a conference at 8 AM, at the opposite end of the CBD to the free stuff. Given the logistics of transit, park bike, shower, freshen up and prepare, coupled with the necessity of fixing up some Power Point slides ahead of the conference, it looked like I would miss out on the freebies.
I was also concerned about parking my hand made Italian Carbon Fibre Nano Tech Campagnolo equipped Bianchi unattended in with the great unwashed mass of bikes that would undoubtedly appear and the fear that some other bogan there for free stuff would pinch it.
Then I hit on a solution. I could ride to work early, lock the Bianchi in its cage at the office car park, head up to my office, fix the Power Point Slides, then jump on a City Cycle cruiser from across the road, glide down Adelaide St and stow the cruiser at the King George square racks. Finish the breakfast; jump back on a cruiser, up Adelaide St, into work, shower, change, PowerPoint done, bike safe, conference. An elegant solution all around.
And that was how it was. I had breakfast. loaded the backpack with freebies and suddenly found myself on a City Cycle cruiser, still clad head toe in lyvcra, heading up Adelaide St amongst the growing crowds. Funny how I didn’t feel self conscious on the ride down to King George Sq earlier when there was no one around.
It was not so funny how many buses there were in Adelaide St at peak hour and how few bicycle lanes there are. It was not so funny trying to peddle a three speed seemingly 200 Kg cruiser as fast as I could while being monstered by a BCC bus loaded with about 200 non-cycling commuters. It's even less funny when the bicycle lanes double as bus stops.
Just after Anzac Square Adelaide St kicks up into a bit of an incline. Just after Anzac Sq Adelaide St also has several bus stops all in a row.
Despite yellow mud guards, flashing bicycle lights and a liberal covering of bright lycra I survived another near miss with a BCC bus that had lost patience with my break neck speed, had overtaken me, then swerved across from the right lane to park in the bus stop on the left, presenting me with the proverbial back end of a bus.
Undaunted I checked behind and swerved out to overtake, but there was not one, or two buses at the stop, there were four! Uphill, 200 Kg velocopede that was seemingly putting on weight by the second and on the wrong side of four buses on the road. Three of them flashed by on my left as I overtook. The last one saw fit to start pulling out as I passed its back wheels. Now it was do or die. There were cars parked up ahead, so the bus kept coming out across the lanes. 200 Kg bike or not, it was easy to predict who would loose this engagement.
To escape I had to peddle faster, faster and faster and managed to actually pass it, flashing lights, wire basket, yellow mudguards, chain guards and overloaded backpack. Finally I hit the front. Now he had to give way! Bicycle or not, you just can't run people over from behind.
Near the top of the rise Wharf St loomed and the traffic lights turned red. And that's how my ride work day exercise ended. Stopped at the lights at Wharf St on a City Cycle cruiser, clad in lycra, lungs bursting, sucking air big time, lactic acid coursing through my legs, and hoping, just hoping, I wouldn't be recognised as I docked the bike.
Maybe I just like the exercise.
Comment
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Comment by Paul Martin on October 28, 2010 at 9:36am -
From People for Bikes:
"But if you can’t bike to work, don’t get discouraged—it’s not the only trip that counts."
This focus on 'commuting' is too narrow, particularly in Australia where many people live far too far away from their workplaces. All the other varied trips - the short one's which they'd take a car for - are much more important.
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Comment by Paul Martin on October 27, 2010 at 5:49pm
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On that theme: http://bikingtoronto.com/cycling50plus/rideandprejudice/
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Comment by Paul Martin on October 27, 2010 at 4:00pm
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Gary,
You raised the h-word, not me! :)
It is an important issue, but only one of many that need urgent attention.
There are some organisations (Cycling Promotion Fund) around that are independent of Government but how much power they have is questionable. Then there are all the QANGOs (BV, BNSW, BQ) who appear independent but don't really lobby as you'd expect them to and they receive a lot of indirect Government funding.
It is a chicken or the egg problem. We need more folks on bicycles and using them for all sorts of trips (not just for sport or commuting - that's great but it will always be a minority if this is where efforts are focussed) so that there are more voices calling for better infrastructure and legislation changes. Unfortunately, these very people are put off by the poor infrastructure and the perception that cycling is dangerous, as highlighted by the 'safety gear' and 'confidence courses'. These may well be well meaning but they send the wrong message to the non-cyclist (and these are the people that need convincing, not those already riding bicycles).
Another excellent Dutch Resource is the Fietsberaad ('Bicycle Discussion') site.
They have a nice infrastructure knowledge-bank among other things.
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Comment by Gary MacDonald on October 27, 2010 at 2:27pm -
It is quite sad how discussions on cycle commuting always end up with a helmet debate and a focus on how dangerous it is to cycle in Australia e.g. how dangerous our road conditions are and how manic our car drivers are. Can people please try to keep things in perspective? Cycling is a safe mode of transport and statistically the more people who cycle; the safer it becomes (see http://www.cyclehelmets.org/). Therefore as cyclists it is in our own interests to encourage others to cycle and focus on the benefits provided by cycling. Smoking, obesity and lack of physical activity are the real threats to life in Australia and yet our politicians haven’t made it a criminal act to smoke or be overweight in an effort to “save” these people from themselves the way that mandatory helmet laws were supposed to save us all.
On the helmet debate I personally found it interesting that the British Medical Association were set to recommend mandatory helmet laws in the U.K; however, when they actually looked into it their findings where that “regular exercise such as cycling is beneficial to health, and non-helmeted commuter cyclists have lower mortality than non-cyclists. Helmet laws would be counterproductive if they discouraged cycling and increased car use. Wearing helmets may also encourage cyclists to take more risks, or motorists to take less care when they encounter cyclists” (see http://www.bmj.com/content/332/7543/722.1.full.pdf+html). Therefore, why can’t we all agree that the wearing of helmets should be a personal choice?
While I am talking about agreement, wouldn't it be great if we could stop bickering amongst ourselves and stop separating into helmets vs. helmetless and fast/ sports cyclists vs. slow/ utility cyclists. Perhaps what we need is some form of cycling body to represent us all and to lobby for better infrastructure for all cyclists just like the Dutch Cyclists union (Fietsersbond) have done in the Netherlands. What do people think? Is there such a body already?
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Comment by Paul Martin on October 26, 2010 at 4:35pm
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Hi Gary,
Almost certainly.
I think Darwin (and the NT generally) is an interesting control group for the rest of the country - and yet it is largely off the radar elsewhere.
From discussions with Mike Rubbo it appears that there are two main types of cyclists - slower, utility cyclists who largely stick to bikeways and footpaths (sans helmet) which make up more than 50% of bicycle riders and the sport cyclists who prefer speed on the asphalt and are really doing it for the exercise. There is much overlap with many people belonging to both 'groups' but the data suggest that the NT is the safest place to cycle, yet the most dangerous place to drive. Many people use their bikes for all sorts of trips up there.
There was a discussion on Sydney Cyclist started by Mike Rubbo on this topic.
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Comment by Gary MacDonald on October 26, 2010 at 1:18pm
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Paul, interesting that you mention that Darwin has the highest mode share in the country at 5%. Could this be something to do with the scrapping of Mandatory Helmet Laws when cycling on bikepaths? Mike Rubbo has produced an interesting You Tube video on this topic http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGEewrHr2q0 and I think our elected officials could learn much from this.
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Comment by Paul Martin on October 22, 2010 at 4:07pm
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I should add that they conveniently mix walking in with cycling to get that 7.5% number - still generous I think.
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Comment by Paul Martin on October 22, 2010 at 4:05pm
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Rape alarms... good grief!
So much good work can be undone in a second by this sort of 'initiative'. We need more people on bicycles for all trips, not just 'commuting' and this sort of nonsense is discouraging, particularly for women & girls.
School bike racks are practically empty and the fearful parents blame the 'dangerous roads' (and other practically absent risks - abductors, etc) - a problem to which they are actively contributing to by driving their offspring to school, in SUVs, thereby endangering anyone wanting to walk or ride.
When authorities scream 'safety, safety, safety' the non-cyclist out there - the very people that need encouraging - when hearing those words, hears nothing but 'danger, danger, danger'. The authorities really have a lot to learn about relative risk.
This country has a long, long way to go. I see that in the Draft Transport Plan for SEQ they claim the 'active transport' component is 7.5%! I don't think so. The (commuting) mode share for cycling in Australia (and SEQ is not special) is 1.3% - less if you consider all trips. The highest in the country is Darwin with almost 5% and they also have proportionally more women riding bicycles.
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Comment by DamianM on October 19, 2010 at 11:27am -
I've not heard of many magpie rape attacks, is this a new danger we need to concern ourselves with ?
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Comment by Gordon on October 18, 2010 at 11:33pm -
Hi Peter,
We got the same. It all kind of arrived out of the blue. Had been posted direct from Hong Kong too.
The reflectors and water bottles were popular; the panic alarms were not so enthusiastically consumed at my workplace.
Personally I'm not in favour of those personal alarms as I sometimes wonder if they give the owner a false sense of security, encouraging them to wander into areas where instinct may suggest it is not prudent.
As a deterrent it is dependent on the intervention of others who are alerted by it, but the lowlifes that inflict this sort of terror usually do so in remote or isolated areas, where there is little chance of being observed or apprehended. Even when activated, passersby’s can tend to ignore them, or batteries go flat over time before it can be used, or they are buried in the bottom of a handbag and can't be reached in time.
I suspect it more likely the decision to supply them was 'just one of those things that seemed like a good idea at the time'.
One of our cyclists suggested they may have been for repelling magpies. Just activate it and peddle through the magpie danger zones, though I didn't receive any reports on how they function in that role.
© 2012 Created by DamianM.
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