It’s child’s play.

Look, it’s a bike inside a car. Just in case you wanted to get some exercise of a pedaled nature on your way to work.

As Grist says, “It’s like biking to work except as stupid as hell.”

The car also has a TV, a mobile office and all kinds of other ridiculously lavish stuff.

And while we’re on crazy aspects of car culture, here’s one you also may have missed. Texts from people who are stuck in traffic on their way to the gym.

This was inspired by what is (apparently) a famous quote in the USA, although I had never heard it before: “Let’s have a moment of silence for all those Americans who are stuck in traffic on their way to the gym to ride the stationary bicycle.” — Earl Blumenauer, Oregon*

Seeing these stories reminded me that America is probably one of the only places in the world which is still more car dependent than NZ.

I know people who drive to the gym to do pump classes and lift weights – that makes sense to me, those are things you can’t do elsewhere.

And while I do sometimes think that they could just walk/run to the gym and this would be a much more efficient use of their time, I understand that’s often not an appealing option on many of Auckland’s urban wasteland, 4 lanes packed with traffic streets.

But I don’t know many people who would drive to the gym just to ride a bike. What do you think? Do you know many people who drive to the gym to ride stationary bikes? Does it annoy you when people complain about being stuck in traffic** on the way to do exercise ?

*Sorry if we already posted this image, it’s late and I’m tired and I can’t remember.

**I have a friend who cannot let anybody make this statement without saying “You’re not stuck in traffic, you are the traffic.”

I’ve been a bit absent from the blog lately and I’m afraid that state of affairs will continue until mid July because I’m working towards a major deadline.

There’s been a lot of cycle related stories in the media lately I’d like to comment on (this article about the compact city, a proposal to put the CBD rail link overhead, a crazy, crazy proposal to raise the speed limit) but I’ll keep it short and sweet.

An alert reader has sent me some photos of the cycle way on Maioro Street.

This photo shows you nicely where the cycle way is meant to be.

And this photo shows you the problem.

Theoretically, children are meant to use this cycle way to ride to their school – New Windsor Primary. As you may (or may not) be able to see, the road next to this cycle path (the aforementioned Maioro) is a 4 lane regional arterial and pretty scary.

Not the kind of thing you want your nine year old riding down.

As you can also see, on rubbish collection day (and often for several days afterwards) it is cluttered with bins which makes using it fairly impossible.

This is particularly true during the morning peak when there are pedestrians about as well, occupying the space that isn’t taken up by bins.

I’m not sure what the solution to this is (maybe put the cycle way on the inside of the footpath, or just widen the footpath out to allow more space for cyclists and bins?).

But it’s a great example of the kind of rubbishy, on-footpath, sub-standard cycle way that Aucklanders get asked to put up with a lot. Is it any wonder our children don’t cycle to school if this is the kind of infrastructure we provide them with?

Particularly when you consider that these kids are the lucky ones, most schools don’t have any cycle paths around them.

What do you think? Are there any good, on-footpath cycle ways in your area? Is the only good, on-footpath cycle way a dead one? Do you know what other countries do about the bin problem?

PS: If you have pictures of some inadequate piece of cycling infrastructure that you’d like to share, then do feel free to send them through to me. I will post about it when I have time.

It is essential in life to maintain a degree of delusion. It’s an essential survival mechanism. Too deluded and you’re likely to be carted off to the funny farm. Too little and you would never get out of bed in the morning.

Sometimes you get to hear the good stories, like the installation of a new cycle facility. But that is matched by the knowledge that it will remain largely unused for some time to come. Not because the state of the facility is poor, but because there are not enough people cycling at present, to use it. Do Auckland Transport have any strategy in place to get bikes on it? Does the organisation have a strategy to deal with the backlash from irate motorists who will see it empty and will want it replaced with car parking?

When you look honestly at what is being done to grow cycling, it is difficult to remain optimistic without needing to be fairly deluded at the same time.

There are a range of strategies that need to be implemented in order to increase the number of people using a bike for transport. Among other things, you could…

- Train people how to ride a bike and how to keep their bike in a roadworthy condition.
- Ensure cyclists wear correctly fitted helmets and wear clothing that makes them visible.
- Educate motorists on how to be considerate and aware of cyclists.
- Provide safe and convenient cycle routes.
- Reduce traffic speed limits in city streets.
- Design city streets that are people and cycle friendly.
- Promote it like this or this. But beware of half-assed attempts like this.

I’m sure you can see where this is going. The first two items on the list are the most commonly used. They are also the easiest and least expensive to initiate. But they have minimal positive impact. And of course, they simply put the onus on the cyclist to ‘stay safe’.

Currently, we are only really seeing this kind of tinkering around the edges. When we see those tougher but more productive strategies at the bottom end of the list being implemented will we know that cycling is being taken seriously as a transport option. It’s time to move on from simply relying on the cheap and easy options of helmet checks and lecturing kids about the dangers of cycling.

Cycling. It’s as easy as walking, but faster….

You can follow the #wheeledpedestrian on Twitter- @wheeledped

This came into my inbox today so I thought I’d share, in case you haven’t seen it …

Auckland Transport (AT) is trialling new ways to keep cyclists safe on our roads.

AT has installed new cycle safety measures at two locations in Auckland’s west. The innovative safety measures are a first for New Zealand.

On Clark Street, New Lynn the measures consist of raised lane markings and flexible bollards which clearly mark the edges of the cycle lane. The aim is to keep vehicles out of the cycle lane and protect cyclists along this busy arterial route.

The raised cycle lane delineators have a curved cross-section and stand about 25mm above the road surface. The curve is safe for cyclists but causes a judder-type effect for motorists. They have been laid for a length of 60 metres along Clark Street, finishing at the cycle stop box at the Clark St/Rankin Ave intersection, where a row of six flexible bollards provide a physical safety barrier for stationery bikes.

And in more good news for cyclists, the cycle lanes in Triangle Road, Massey have been upgraded to stop motorists blocking them. The cycle lane is now divided off by solid rubber kerbs and flexible bollards. Auckland Transport also did some road widening and relocated some car parks.

Road safety engineers from Auckland Transport say the safety measures work well and they are keen to introduce them at other locations in Auckland. This is subject to final approval from NZTA.

There has been a bit of chat about Triangle Road on this website in recent times so … what do we think of the improvements … good? bad?

The pics came with the email from AT: top one is Clarke Street sporting some flexible bollards and some natty yellow bumps, and the bottom one is Triangle Road sporting some raised lane markings. Preferences anyone?

Click here to view the embedded video.

http://player.vimeo.com/video/39401575

Of course it’s unlikely that this much care and attantion is bestowed on the making of today’s bicycles, but this would definately have been how my 1950 Triumph was born.

I should warn you that if you work for OSH, or you’re the least bit sensitive in the health and safety department, look away now!

Time spent riding your bicycle is never wasted.

This graph shows what percentage of trips were made by bike in Auckland from 2003 to 2011. It is done on a rolling 2 year average of survey results. I have included Wellington and Christchurch to give a comparison.

However, as you can see, this graph is not very exciting right now. There does not appear to be massive, double digit growth in cycling rates (as a percentage of all trips) going on in any of these cities right now.

These graphs are based on the Household Travel information Survey which is probably the best source of info we have on cycling rates but WARNING WARNING is still probably not that reliable.

This is largely because the number of cyclists in the survey in any given city is so small (ranging from 20 to 60) that it may be difficult for them to accurately extrapolate to work out the total number of trips made by bike.

I guess you could potentially interpret this graph as showing a small increase in Auckland cycling rates, from 0.26% of all trips to 0.83%. But I doubt it would be a significant trend, although I don’t have time to analyse it myself.

But that’s ok! Because in future our brilliant advocacy (and rising petrol prices) will make the graph look like this.

Right guys? What do you think? Am I being too optimistic or too conservative in thinking we might achieve 5% mode share by 2017? Perhaps the goal should be for 2022 instead. What do you reckon?

This photo is from Keenan Roberts at Buzzfeed via Grist. Read on to find out more.

A few links that caught my eye during the last week.

Good post by Green MP: Obviously I’m hugely biased because I like her and I once worked for her and I’m a member of the same political party she represents. But having said that, I liked this great blog post, “There’s no better time to invest in cycling,” by the Green’s transport spokesperson, Julie Anne Genter, a lot.

Here’s a sample paragraph:

 ”Hastings has had dedicated investment in cycling and walking infrastructure from NZTA as one of its ‘model communities’, and cycling figures there have shown the results – a rise of 23% just a year after the iWay program began.

Portland’s entire cycling network has an estimated replacement cost of one mile of urban motorway, and that city has seen a 400% rise in cycling numbers in the past 20 years (check out the PDF here). It now has the highest bicycle mode share in the US.”

Now we just need more action from the Greens (and other political parties) to make these great ideas a reality.

Transmission Gully approved: And, on the dark side, some distressing news is that Transmission Gully has been given resource consent by the Board of Inquiry, which means it’s almost bound to go ahead.

So there’s another $1 billion from the transport budget wasted on a huge motorway project with questionable economic benefits, and unquestionably significant negative environmental impacts.

Puhoi to Wellsford moves on: Another massive motorway project, Puhoi to Wellsford has also taken a step forward, with NZTA confirming their route for the $750 million section from Puhoi to Warkworth. They are hoping to start construction in 2014.

This is depressing for those us of who were beginning to hope that the project might be delayed until, eventually, a more fiscally prudent government was elected and cancelled the whole thing.

However, the good news is that NZTA may be backing away from ever completing the second section from Warkworth to Wellsford, which would save the country around $1 billion (possibly more since that initial costing could be a considerable under-estimate – this seems the most likely reason why NZTA has delayed announcing the alignment of the second section).

They may have done press releases but I must say I’ve seen little public opposition by either Labour or the Greens to these two major announcements which is a bit disappointing, given what a huge extravagance these motorways are.

Dogs on bikes! Finally, just to cheer you up, Grist has a post about some very important photos of dogs on bikes which it is imperative you look at right now. Here are some of my favourites below.