Bike Commuting Tips

After wrapping up a shop-lead ride, a badly needed commuter bike tire change and tube patch while watching the Tour de France, I realized that a floor pump serves nicely as an alternative hassock.  Just place the pump a couple of feet from your beer-stinking couch and rest your achilles tendon on the handle.  With beer in hand and legs raised, your leg metabolites will work their way to your organs and allow you to relax and watch others suffer while you recover.

A friend of mine who used to ride BMX in his younger years enlightened me about this trick. I ride a mountain bike about town most of the time. In the course of normal use, the ends of the handle bars eventually work their way through the end of the grips. Now this doesn’t bother me much — I’m more about function than style — but if you are style conscious this may lead you to run out and buy a new pair of grips every few months. No need. I recently bought a new pair of Oury grips as my last pair was about 10 years old and had turned into something like those rubber animals that stick to the wall they used to put in your cereal box. Needless to say they were nasty. Anyway, prior to installing your new grips jam a nickel in the end of the grip. Once the grip is installed this nickel will spread the load from any impact to the end of your grip and lessen the likelihood of your bar ends ruining an otherwise lovely grip.

Also, quick tip on installing your grips. Use a compressor to shoot air under the grip when sliding it on. This makes it soooooo much easier.

If you bike commute, you’re likely a familiar friend of fear. Undesirable vehicle (UDV) drivers feel fear too. They fear the drunken driver. They fear following the close call they experience once every couple of years. They fear looking bad. They drive the nicest UDV they can’t afford so they feel respected. They fear non-conformance. I don’t like fearing those things. I don’t like fear.

That is one thing I really like about western religion. For the most part, the only thing they teach you to fear is god. The rest is “Ye, though I walk through the valley of death, I shall fear no evil.”

I think about the people who fear the most in this world. I feel like they’re the ones who own the most, have the most power, are the coolest, the richest, the most beautiful. They have so much they always fear that they’re going to lose something. Kim Jong Il and the Iranian government are perfect examples. They fear and thus create fear to control their own fear. Voodoo priest are similar. They control by fear — creating more fear, combated by fear, combated by rituals originating from fear, etc.

The best quote I’ve heard regarding fear is extremely cheesy but is useful in a certain context…Yoda: “Fear leads to the Dark Side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads suffering” — suffering like the people in Darfur, Korea and Iran. I think that that quote could start with, “Possession leads to fear…” The Dark Side here is obviously evil and evil is bad.

Most of the people I know drive UDVs. As a bike commuter, there’s not much else I fear other than UDVs. Take UDVs out of traffic and I have almost complete freedom to operate. Although I fear these people in their UDVs, I do not fear for myself. I fear that my children and future generations will not enjoy, even modestly, the privileges that I’ve enjoyed in this life — opportunities to eat, be reasonably comfortable, and to travel modestly and learn new cultures.

Does UDV use lead me to fear? Yes. Does UDV use lead me to anger? Yes. Does it lead me to hate? I don’t think so. There is where I break from Yoda. I do not possess the future of my children and future generations. While I fear for their future, it is a fear born of caring and love. My fear leads me to conserve, to return the privilege, to sacrifice, to return the love I’ve been shown. I am determined to continue to fear…to continue to conserve…and more importantly, love. I love for my son, daughter, others.

I hope you will find the joy I’ve experienced from sacrificing my convenience for the future of others.

I hope you continue to fear. May your fear lead to love.

A lot of people, when becoming aware that I bike commute, say, “How do you bike commute in Memphis!? Drivers here are terrible and the roads are busy.” Until recently, I couldn’t understand why they would say that, other than they haven’t been on a bike in the past 10-20 years. Then I realized, “They only know the roads that they travel by undesirable vehicle to get from point A to B.” Now I know why they think I’m crazy. They think I ride my bike on the busiest roads in Memphis.

The fact is, I rarely get passed by cars with less than ten feet of distance between me and them. Okay, the distances are closer towards intersections but the passing cars are traveling slowly. I take a wide range of streets to get to and from work. Some are always lightly traveled, some are heavily traveled and some are walks (or rides) in the park. I know what the busy streets are. My friends who drive to work take them. I take the back streets. In town, that’s easy. There’s a thousand different ways to get to work, many of the ways on back streets. I also ride through a local and very historical park. On the one busy road I have to take, I utilize the sidewalk. First, it’s my understanding that in Memphis you can legally do that and second, since no one else is using it (they’re sitting inside watching tv or driving their undesirable vehicle), I might as well.

It’s taken me a while to find the best route to work. Just two weeks ago, after commuting for almost two years, I found a small but very meaningful shortcut through an abandoned airport parking lot, over a small wooden walking bridge and through the parking lot of a career college. I couldn’t believe I had just found such an obvious short cut after more than two years. But finding the right route has been a progression. When I first tried out the commute on a Sunday morning to determine it’s ‘doability,’ I took all of the major roads. That’s fine for Sunday morning but spine-tingling on a Monday morning or Friday night. As I’ve learned the streets of Memphis more and more, I’ve change my route. My route evolved twice within the last two months, each time becoming more safe.

So what do I recommend? Well since even people living in the areas you intend ride through probably don’t know all of the streets and won’t know how to connect them for a safe and comfortable commute, I recommend this: Take several weekend scouting trips, each time selecting different routes. Don’t select roads you know will be heavily traveled during the week. Stick to the parks and small neighborhood roads. If your only option for one section of the commute is the sidewalk, I recommend taking it — at least someone will be using it then. Select your final route based on low traffic or smaller hills or just by areas you enjoy seeing. And, your route to and from work may be different based on traffic flow.

Starting a bike commute, if you haven’t done it before, needs to feel safe and comfortable. To achieve this feeling, good preparation and a little weekend scouting will not only be enjoyable but ensure your commute will get you to work in one piece.

Note for web developers: If it hasn’t been done already, a Mapquest-like search tool that not only eliminates the highways from the search but also allows the searcher to identify very lightly traveled streets would be an excellent tool for bike commuters. (Remember, it’s taken me two years to develop my current route, and I can’t be sure it won’t change again.)

If you’re like me, you like speed, especially on a bike.  If you’re like me, you also have a lot to look forward to in life.

I’ve ridden both a 14 gear road bike and a single speed, knobby-clad mountain bike on my daily commutes.  For safety, the mountain bike wins hands down.  While having better handling, fewer flats and better breaking, the lack of speed is probably the most critical to safety.  After all, hitting something at 25 mph as compared to 15 mph can make quite a bit of difference.  I’ve also found that drivers don’t typically expect to see a bicycle traveling at 25-30 mph.  I know this because I’ve almost hit several as they turned in front of me.

If you’re worried about carrying too much speed on your commutes (because, like me, you can’t control yourself) , try a single speed.  And no, it doesn’t have to be a fixie.