Posts by Alice Ronald
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Hard News: Dressing for the Road, in reply to Hebe,
I'm loving it - really easy to use. Mine doesn't look very good as I keep it outside & we have a lime chip driveway, so the chrome has rusted & the spiders have taken up residence. The build quality's a little light compared to a Pashley or similar, but it's serving me well as a city commuter with a comfy ride position & plenty of carrying capacity. I've ridden it from Beckenham to Riccarton Mall, I probably wouldn't go much further than that on it (because I'm lazy).
I got one of the first ones off the boat (I know the guys who are importing them), but I think they're giving away some extras with them now - bells & locks, that sort of thing.
My Mum's got a Bauer from Bicycle Business with a step-through frame & internal hub gears which she loves. There are occasions on the Archi where I wish for gears, but that's not often.
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Hard News: Dressing for the Road, in reply to Stephen Judd,
Tennyson St in Beckenham has this setup - it'll be interesting to see how it works around the university. My experience is that car passengers aren't accustomed to looking before they open their doors & I've seen quite a few cyclists have to swerve onto the grass verge or far left of the lane to avoid getting doored. And families going for walks quite often use the bike lane as an extra footpath.
Then there's the one guy who likes to literally go against the flow & ride the opposite direction in the cycle lane (so he's facing the oncoming cars & bikes). But he's a special case.
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For going to work or biking to shops etc, I wear my normal clothes. It's only 3.5km to the office, completely flat, and I ride a step-through, single speed cruiser (in candyfloss pink) from Archi bikes. If it's raining or dark, I add a raincoat & high vis vest. The only thing I'm really conscious of when dressing for cycling to work is my shoes - I've got some with really slippery soles, so if I want to wear them at work I'll pop them in my basket & wear sneakers or something & change shoes in the office.
I've got induction-powered Reellights on the Archi bike, but I also add some Lezyne detachable ones on the handlebars & seat support.
If I'm cycling for exercise, it's my Ground Effect Witches Britches or some other form of cycle shorts, with either a GE top in lime green or a running tshirt (usually Active Intent brand from the Warehouse) and sneakers.
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Traffic's going to get worse? What the? I'm in Beckenham, so I don't see it 90% of the time, then I try to get to Parklands about once a week & find the easiest way is to go via Ilam & Papanui. Twice the distance, same amount of time, half the stress & potholes.
Woo, happy 30th birthday to me! Maybe I'll shout myself a rooftop beer at C1 for lunch. Or I'll copy what I did last year & spend the day in bed.
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Hard News: When "common sense" isn't, in reply to Sharon McIver,
Yep, a researcher in the UK a couple of years ago found that car drivers gave him more room if he wore a long wig & skirt.
I have the same opinion as you - cycling's an everyday activity for me, to get to work & shops etc. I do it in my work clothes, with a raincoat & maybe a change of shoes (some of my heels have pretty slippery soles that don't work well with my plastic pedals). I'll probably put on a hi vis vest in the winter, along with lights, but at the moment I'm happy commuting in civvy clothes. Funnily enough, when I was biking to uni about 10 years ago, I was one of very few people with a reflective jacket most days. Now, of the 2 dozen commuting cyclists on my route in the mornings, there's only 2-3 of us not wearing orange/yellow/silver.
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Hard News: A long way yet, in reply to Hebe,
Is there any indication that it would be a single-purpose facility? The previous stadium was used for several sports, plus concerts & other events. I'd be more likely to go to rugby games in a covered stadium that was closer to pubs etc for the aftermatch - I hated the idea of having to rug up & sit in the wind, then finding my way into the central city with an armful of scarf/hat/gloves/extra jerseys that had to be stowed somewhere.
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Hard News: A long way yet, in reply to Lilith __,
You're right - so many Monday mornings are filled with finding out what colleagues did on the weekend so that you have an idea of something to do during the week or next weekend. What's open, exactly where such-and-such is going on, how far in advance do you need to book for restaurant X.
Rob, I think there is an argument for places like the convention centre & stadium. Those sorts of large facilities are expected in a major city. They're not needed right this very minute, but 5-10 years down the track, when everything's coming together, it will be a boon to have them. Yes, it absolutely sucks that we're going to lose some facilities to make way for them - my workplace was supposed to relocate to an office space, which we've since discovered is right where the new pool/leisure centre is going. So no point in moving, if we're going to be kicked out in a couple of months. Would have been nice to get into a building with working toilets (OK, officially our toilets still work, it's just that the wall may fall on us).
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Hard News: Disrupting the Television, in reply to Bart Janssen,
And my thing is music, mostly because I have friends who are musicians. My flatmate, who's worked in television, won't pirate TV shows, but is happy to download music. We've chosen to support the industries that we feel some kind of connection with.
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Legal Beagle: MMP Review #1: The Party…, in reply to Brent Jackson,
That's sounding like STV - proportional, yes, but often confusing.
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Hard News: Staying Alive, in reply to Chris Bowden,
It is a case of "if you build it they will come" in terms of safer cycling infrastructure
This. I've just moved to a new part of town with oodles of cycle lanes & the place is just teeming with people riding. I don't have any problems with car drivers getting annoyed with me, as there are so many cyclists around, the car drivers "get it".
Phased lights are great - there's a set at the intersection of Colombo & Moorhouse here & often I'll take a route through there, even though it means using the overbridge rather than staying on the flat, simply because of the ease of getting through a major intersection.