When the Miami Herald asked Concetta Curtis why she is riding for us this summer, here is how she answered:
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Why are you riding from Miami to San Francisco
In October, 2003 I met Martin Kreig at a garage sale in Palo Alto, CA. He came riding up on his bicycle and purchased a couch. Unable to pick it up on two wheels, he told us that he would return later with his trailer. Being the non-cyclist that I was, I assumed that he meant a trailer perhaps attached to a car or pick-up. Not Martin Krieg! He came back on his bicycle, only now there was a trailer attached to it. Amazed, I watched him and my friend, Michael load the couch up. I wasn't able to help because a month earlier I had fallen and broken my back. The three of us began talking and Martin was quick to offer his inspiration, telling me the story of his accident and all he had accomplished since then. A couple of days later, on our way out of California, Martin returned and gave us a copy of his autobiography, "Awake Again". I read the book out loud as Michael and I travelled to Oklahoma and eventually here to Katy TX.
In Feb. 2004 I took my brace off and began to re-evaluate the state at which my body was left in. Uninsured, I was not able to see a doctor after the initial visit to the hospital, where they fused together my ninth, tenth, and eleventh vertebrae. I remember them telling me that the bone is not likely to grow back considering the intensity of the break, (crushed in 13 pieces).
I became totally obsessed with working out and hired a trainer at the 24 hour fitness in Katy. She was an avid cyclist and educated me on the great many benefits of riding a bicycle both for your mind and your body. I became interested and decided to buy my first real bicycle from her. She, on her new Trek 5200, and I, rode almost everyday. She told me that I was a natural and was very pleased at how fast I was picking things up. Slowly I began spending less time at the gym and more time on the saddle.
When I decided to start touring the first person I thought of was, hmm... what was his name? I couldn't even remember the guy's name that I had met at the garage sale and who had inspired me so much with his story. I began searching for him on the Internet using only the clues I could come up with. Somehow a google search for coma+book+bicycling+Transam led me back to Martin Krieg. I spoke to him about the ride I was planning on doing from Oakridge TN to NYC for the Mayors for Peace and Stop the Bombs. Inspired, Martin told me about a Coast to Coast ride, scheduled to leave days after I arrived in NYC. I can only remember the hair standing up on my arms and my intuition telling me not to pass up this synchronicity. In that one conversation my mind was made up to ride from NYC to DC and then across to San Fran.
Two days in to the Stop the Bombs ride, our small team of cyclist responsible for spreading the word about the walkers behind us, expired and I headed south to Savanna GA to meet my friend Michael for a nice little road trip. With time to spare we decided to travel the coast line of Florida. and somewhere along A1A I fell in love with the smell of the ocean and the warm air. By the time we arrived in Daytona my mind was made up to start the ride in Miami and take that route to DC for the start of my coast to coast. The depth and personality of the Florida landscape was too beautiful to pass up. These are the logistics as to why I am riding from Miami to San Francisco.
With deeper meaning I am doing this ride to learn about the integration of mind, body and spirit. Through personal encounters with people and land, I will arrive at my destination a much more humbled person. Somewhere along the way I hope to overcome the attachment I have to the pain in my spine and inspire others to never give up. If everyone would just ride a bicycle or walk everywhere they go, the world would be full of trees and healthy people.
Well here we are just after the Easter weekend and for me it still feels like Christmas. Every time I open open my email box there is always new wonder to be found. Using these newsletters as a guide, I do my best to try to keep up with all the neat little surprises I find waiting for me almost on a daily basis. And even those advisories that begin with what could be bad news always end up becoming power strokes that will take us to another whole new exciting level. Soon you will see, for example how Concetta is turning her lemon in to lemonade. You will also go back in time with us as we show how our riders will be celebrating the rich biking tradition found on both coasts. As well you will see how the state of Florida is flinging its doors wide open for us for when we soon land in Miami come April 15!! Rock and Roll NBG, here we come !!
Southeast Flank
A) Concetta to start in Miami with William Gum
B) Concetta to recruit in Florida
C) Concetta meets Power On Cycling, our Tampa sponsor
D) Miami Herald interviews me and Backsafer for feature about our ride
E) Tallahassee Mayor's office home of "Rolling in Greatness" author
F) Tallahassee Mayor John Marks to greet us at 10 AM
Northeast Flank
A) Larry Burns to ride his beloved fixed, Philly to Baltimore again
B) Larry Black to HiWheel Baltimore to DC again
C) Larry Black gets me in touch with Northeast
D) Belmont Wheel Works to put out for Northeast riders
E) Mass Bike Dorie to add to Boston fire
F) Boston Bicycle Club: First bike club in America 1878
G) How Robert Moses destroyed NY - How Jane Jacobs saved it
East to West
A) Ray Irvin, Mr Greenway also to write a book about Greenways
B) Oakland Bike Coordinator Wants to ride with us
C) Velo Sport comes on as Berkeley sponsor
D) About Lake Merritt from my novel "The NBG Manifesto, How America Can Bike And Grow Rich"
E) Nick Hein rejoins DC to Pittsburgh, Arranging Group ride from Morgantown NBG Day
Southwest Flank
A) LA Bike Coalition has our send off on their radar
B) Christopher Warnock to HiWheel SJ- PA- SF
C) Stanford: Top Bike Campus in the nation?
D) Stanford Community Day
Northwest Flank
A) Center for Appropriate Transport needs welder, w/trade for rider!
NBG General:
A) Vanage unlimited phone calls from my computer
B) Andrew Morton to create NBG bike spokes light show
C) Proclamation language
D) Bicycle Commuter Act
E) Repost: Use the OGO to stay in touch
F) Repost: NationalBicycleGreenway.com Blog Moderator wanted
D) Repost: 2005 riders order your FREE sunglasses from SlipNot Eyewear
H) Repost: Individual 2005 NBG Rider Business Cards now Available !!
I) Repost: 2005 riders order your FREE Copy of "How to Bike America"
J) Repost: Find a Ride Partner - Place an ad at our classifieds
Southeast Flank
A) Heard from Concetta Curtis from what I thought was the scouting expedition she was doing for the peace march. Not so! Seems Concetta and her biking friends were making the event happy as they alerted people in the towns along the way to the fact that the marchers were coming. No longer the funeral procession some of the organizers thought their walk to New York should be, the cyclists were all asked to leave.
Concetta was crushed by this unexpected turn of events. She had spent the better part of the last year preparing for this effort. Not only had she trained for it and sold a lot of personal posessions so she could make it a reality, she had quit her job and put her whole life on hold to make it happen. The ride she is doing for us was only going to be an extension of her exploratory tour for the Stop the Bombs people.
Ever the optimist, she was up upbeat when she called to tell me that we were now the #1 focus of her powerful energy. She wanted to know how soon she could start riding for us. And with her infectious spirit, she was able to get her friend Michael to come up from Texas to pick her and her bike up so they could then do a vacation in Florida. Come April 15, in Miami she will join William Gum as they both ride up to Tampa!
B) Articulate and excited, Concetta has already been busy as she trains on her bike in Florida. So much so, that as she has been telling people about our ride and the NBG, she ran out of NBG business cards and needed me to send her the template so she could print more.
C) Concetta, who is touring Florida in, dare I admit, the car that Michael Mongold rescued her with, popped in to see Tampa sponsor, Mark Power, of Power On Cycling. She sent this assessment to me:
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well everything that happens is meant to be. I met Mark Power yesterday. He was a super cool guy with honey colored curls that mopped out over his shoulders. His store was filled with recumbent bicycles, not a one upright, not one! A shirt hung on the wall that he joked about sending to me. There was an image of an upright rider's backside, bulky bike shorts and all. It read, 'that just ain't natural'.. Looking around at all those recumbent with their nice cozy seats drew my attention to my own back and I questioned my reasoning as to why I didn't take a recumbent when the Backsafer offer was extended. I guess I have something to prove to myself that has a lot to do with making it as hard as possible. One of my biggest personal reasons for doing this ride is to cure myself of the continuous sensations I feel up and down my spine. It is literally alive and trying to tell me something.
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The Power On Web: http://www.poweroncycling.com/
D) Last week, when Desonta Holder, a marathon runner and reporter for the Miami Herald showed up at Paul Lester's law office to interview him about our ride, he decided to call me and make me part of a three way phone call. For those of you new to this thread, Paul is one of the partners for the Backsafer recumbent bicycle. They are our Miami sponsor and it was Paul's connections with the Miami Mayor that insures us that not only will Mayor Manny Diaz be there to kick this year's ride off but that the biggest paper in Florida will alert people to the fact that this is so.
Desonta asked great questions and I know that the feature that will result will indeed be a worthy one. A distance athlete herself, she runs marathons, Desonta knows what Concetta and William and all of our riders have ahead of themselves. Too exciting!
E) When I made initial phone contact with the city of Tallahassee, I asked the woman who greeted me how she was doing. Expecting a brief exchange of formalities, I was stopped in my tracks when I heard, "I'm rolling in greatness". I began to probe and soon discovered that I was talking to one of the Tallahassee commissioner's chief aides who also happened to be the author of the book, "Rolling in Greatness". I offered to trade books to which she agreed. I'm still waiting for hers but already she is taking mine with her on a tour she is doing. She wants to hold it out as an example of overcoming adversity to do great things. I can't wait to get her book at which point I can tell you more about it!
F) We have Tallahassee Mayor John Marks confirmed for April 25. He will greet us at 10 AM. Indeed, Floridians love their bicyclists. Of the three cities we will be passing through in their state, two are already confirmed to greet our cyclists. Hopefully Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio can find time for us as well!! I will keep you posted!!
Northeast Flank
A) Larry Burns was excited to hear that we want him to ride from Philadelphia to Baltimore for us again this year. A welder for Bilenky Cycle Works, our Philadelphia sponsor, he tells me that last year's ride was a lot of fun for him and that he wants to do the 120 mile ride on the same bike he used last year. A bike with only one gear!
The Bilenky web: http://www.bilenky.com
B) Larry Black, of College Park and Mt Airy Bicycles tells us that he wants to ride for us again this year. And like Larry Burns, he also wants to do so again with one gear. Only the singe gear Larry Black will be riding from Baltimore to Washington DC is the wheel itself. Black's fixed gear is a Messicek HiWheel. If you want to see what his machine looks like, go to the Kool Stop website. They are the only US importer: http://koolstop.com/mesicek
The Mt Airy web: http://bike123.com
C) And talk about connected, when I told Larry Black that we still need a rider to move our proclamation down from Boston to New York City, he rattled off a slew of names for me to contact. Hopefully the calls I made will soon bear fruit!!
D) One of the calls went out to Quint of Belmont Wheel Works. I put him on our mailings and sent him our latest newsletter and he tells me he will put out for riders.
E) Had a couple of purposeful phone exchanges with Dorie Clark, the executive director of Mass Bike. She had just completed the Washington DC Bike Summit and I talked to her on both coasts. The first call she returned was from Logan Airport in Boston while the next time I heard from her she
was here in San Francisco. We had hoped to meet when she got out here but as fate would have it, her calendar for what was supposed to be a vacation, got filled up.
Even though she wasn't near any of her resources both times we talked, like Larry Black she was still able to get me contacts and also like Larry, she even knew some of the email addresses from memory. She also told me that when she gets back to her office next Wednesday that she will announce Boston NBG Day and our need for riders on their huge mailing list!
And indeed Dorie is Big Power. Boston cyclists can expect her to carry on the the rich cycling tradition that made Boston the home of America's first bike club. In fact, at one point in time there were more cyclists on Boston roads than anywhere in the US. In carrying the two wheel torch forward, Dorie, armed with a Masters in Theology from Harvard knows how to get attention for a cause. She was the New Hampshire media coordinator for the Howard Dean presidential campaign! Even tho Dean didn't win, it was the excitement that was created in the Northeast that turned a virtual unknown into a serious contender and the force in American politics that he is today!!
The Mass Bike Website: http://www.massbike.org
F) Boston Bicycle Club, the first bike club in America, was formed in 1878 by Albert Pope, the man who also brought us the League of American Wheelman and a lions share of the HiWheel bicycles that filled America's roads and paths back in the 1880's.
G) Found a 7 part DVD series called, "New York, a Documentary Film", the last two DVDs of which I feel every bike activist and traffic planner should watch. In it one sees how it was the example that one man, Robert Moses, set that turned what was once a force for good into the very agency of destruction it became for cities across America. One sees how putting cars before people that even more traffic is created as in New York, their roads and bridge and tunnels destroyed a working rail system, countless historical landmarks, whole neighborhoods (Moses displaced a quarter million New Yorkers) and played a part in almost pushing New York itself to bankruptcy.
It as least is heartening to see that it was a bespectacled housewife named Jane Jacobs who finally was able to stop the Moses machine. Using her book "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" as a guide, she was able rally fellow New Yorkers to keep Moses from ramming yet another expressway through her beloved Greenwich Village. It was her and her group's actions that finally slowed Moses to a crawl. `
It was also good to see that planners and urbanists are beginning to awaken to the damage that the Moses legacy left behind as we try to rebuild the urban landscape. And it was Moses's love for the automobile, tho he didn't even drive but relied on chauffeurs, that also gave birth to the historical building preservation movement that we know today.
The film on line: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0220924
East to West
A) Ray Irvin, Mr Greenway, of Indianapolis and the cutting edge Indy Greenways organization, shot me an email to let me know that, following my lead, he is also writing a book about Greenways. His book will be the result of the entire process he documented as he turned his city into the recognized world leader in Greenway recreation and transportation systems. And he tells me his book will be out well before my 2007 Mayors' Ride/Author Tour. Write On Ray!!
Indy Greenways at http://www.indygreenways.org
B) Kathryn Hughes, Oakland's Alternative Transportation Director who is also wearing the city's Bike Coordinator cap tells us that she wants to ride Berkeley to Oakland with us. She wants to be able to join Oakland and Berkeley council people, Nancy Nadel and Kriss Worthington respectively as well as our HiWheelers and hopefully the Berkeley Friendly Bike Coaltion people, as we make the short but fun ride. But that is if she can get her boss, the Public Works director, to allow her to spend time on our project.
C) In some of the research I am doing about Oakland bicycling for my novel, I spoke with the legendary Peter Rich who still owns Velo Sport in Berkeley. And while I had him on the phone, I was able sell him on the idea of coming on as this year's sponsor for Berkeley. What an honor! Back in the early 60's Velo Sport was the only shop in the entire San Francisco East Bay selling high quality bicycles. One of the first importers of European lightweights, his shop led the bike boom that swept America in the early 70's.
The Velo Sport web: http://velosportbicycles.com
D) Here is an excerpt from the novel, "The NBG Manifesto, How America Can Bike And Grow Rich", I am writing, It will be author touring with me across the US in 2007:
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"Yeah and how we're gonna make it cool is we're going to have a bike museum there with these huge glass windows that will look into the dance floor. It will have antique bikes on display. And also it will be a place where you guys can show off your own creations. We can turn on the lights during the breaks or we'll close the curtains and have an attendant there who can show visitors the bikes you guys pick to best represent your work. You can have bikes like modern day low riders and double decker bikes there that you guys can show your friends. They'll be alongside modern day touring bikes and fully faired racing bikes and stuff like that!"
"Wow!" Jose said. "Every city's gonna have this? Where you gonna get all the bikes?"
"Well not every city but every region. Like for here in the San Francisco Bay Area, we would have a Hub in each of our Mayors' Ride cities. Or maybe since they are all so close we'd have just one San Francisco Bay Hub to start out. And we'd locate all of them close to mass transit so people can come in from for just the auditorium stuff from far away."
We could hear screaming as a car full of teenage girls passing in the lane next to us slowed down next to me. "We like your bike mister."
Before I could reply they took off.
"Damn, I want one of those," one of the kids riding near the front with me and Jose exclaimed. "You're getting all the looks with that bike." By now pretty much all of the younger riders were privy to the visualization I was filling their minds with.
"That's what I mean you guys, you don't need a car to be cool. All of us can return to the Gay 90's when it was cool to ride a bike. Back when these bikes ruled the roads, bikes set the trends. They determined the fashion of the day and people made dates just to go biking. And there's no reason we can't return to that happier more simple time. Part of our NBG Hub strategy is to get everyone talking about bikes again."
Up ahead we could see Lake Merritt. A sparkling jewel set in the middle of Oakland it is, in what is a little known fact today, America's first National wildlife refuge protecting more than 90 species of migrating waterfowl. In 1869 when a tidal slough that drained into the Bay was dammed up to create this 145-acre body of salt water, such a designation was required to protect all the migratory birds from the hunters who saw them as easy prey. Now home to innumerable herons, egrets, geese and ducks, this true urban miracle is surrounded by parks, homes, businesses, even a Children's Fairyland.
Soon we were pedaling on the path. three and a half miles in length that surrounded it.
"I remember when I was a kid in the 60's sitting over there and watching drag boat races with my parents," I said as I pointed to a grassy area where the lake spread out below stately apartment buildings that were fed my long staircases. "The used to come once a year but by 1970 or so, too many people were getting killed so they stopped em. I can't believe that's what it took. Man I can't believe they ever allowed that." I shook my head in disgust as just then a giant white bird with huge wings landed in the water right next to us.
"I agree, I wonder how those neighbors put up with the noise," Don who had joined us observed.
"Man we've come a long way. As I think about it, there were drag boat races everywhere back then. You know that estuary by Jack London Square where the Ferry let us off?" Not waiting for an answer, I continued, "they used to have them in another little inlet about half a mile down where it rejoined the Bay. Talk about unconscious, they also had this major garbage dump there and they also were dredging the little mini bay for fill so they could build even more homes in Alameda. And then you know that lake that we see when we cross over the freeway when we ride from Berkeley to Oakland in the Mayors' Ride, that used to be a full on water ski park, More noise and more oil and exhaust fumes and a lot of it ending up in the water."
"Well I don't think people mean to be harmful, they just don't know. And as they learn they start making smarter choices. That's kind of how I see our ride this summer, we're just reminding people there are options," said Don, as he slowly swept around the lake with his video camera.
Looking out on calm, tranquil waters that were sparsely populated with wind and human powered boats, it is this beautiful setting and resulting peace that Oaklanders still use to escape the stress of city life. But it wasn't always this way. In fact, by 1890, in only the thirty years after Mayor Samuel Merritt had ordered a dam be built at 12th Street, the lake that was soon ringed with large, gracious homes owned by many of the city's wealthiest businessmen, had turned into a cesspool. By the time the pollution from their mansions had caused them all to leave, the talk of filing it and turning it in to a railroad station grew serious when it was discovered that railroad baron and university founder, Leland Stanford, owned the land that had been submerged. However, when he talked his partner into their donating the land to the city so that it could build a park on its shores, a new vitality was given to the lake.
On weekends, the path we were riding on, marked by the occasional business person out for a stroll, would normally be filled with walkers and joggers. While if the sun was out, every kind of people powered watercraft would be visible. While there were a few of them to be seen today, if it had not been a work day, kayaks, canoes, windsurfers, little sailboats, pedal boats and even Venetian gondolas would be turning these waters into a shimmering playground that glistened under the summer sun.
What a setting for a bike race I thought as I reflected back on the Columbus Day races that used to encircle this epic setting. Put on by the legendary Peter Rich who still owns Velo Sport in Berkeley, one of the nations oldest and most revered bike shops, the bike contests ran from 1956 to 1978. Barely noticed, they took place at a time when bike racing in America did not have the benefit of television or corporate sponsorship that it enjoys today.
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F) Heard from Nick Hein here over the weekend. He will be joining Troy Bogdan and Concetta Curtis and whoever else signs up to ride the Washington DC to Pittsburgh relay leg. Power house that he is, Nick is also arranging for Morgantown, WV officials to be a part of our ride and Nick will be leaving the group at Ohiopyle to bike to Morgantown, West Virginia. He will partake in an NBG Day ceremony there and then lead yet another group ride to Pittsburgh.
In working with his councilman, he is asking that they celebrate:
- A year of operation for the Caperton trail
- 4 years of operation for the Decker's Creek trail
- All of the tourism, quality of life and health benefits these amenities have brought
- Extension of the Caperton Trail to Connellsville, PA
- The beautiful bikeable roadways in Morgantown and surrounding areas
Nick Hein's web: http://NationalBicycleGreenway.com/Events/Mayors_Ride/bios/Nick_Hein.php
Southwest Flank
A) Enjoyed a longish visit with the Los Angeles Bike Coalition director on the phone a week and half ago. Kastle Lund, whose primary love is rock climbing is a hard charging, know-how-to-get-things-done kind of woman. Like all bike activist leaders, hers is also an overflowing plate of exciting projects, that I know in her case will soon improve LA cycling in a big way. And despite all the fires that she has burning down there, she told me that we are on her radar and that by the time we get down her way, July 18, she will have singled out one she wants us to help her bring attention to when we meet with her Mayor!!
B) Palo Alto has a new HiWheel cyclist. The co-founder of ebrary.com, Christopher Warnock recently purchased a HiWheel replica from Rideable Replicas and will be biking with us in the San Jose to Palo Alto relay as well as the Palo Alto to San Francisco and Berkeley to Oakland runs. Soon he and I plan to ride together at which point I can tell you more about this big cheery man. Soon, we will also have his bio on line so you can look a little deeper into a great guy who just wants to make people smile.
Rideable web: http://hiwheel.com
C) Palo Alto, one of America's top bike cities, is also home to arguably the top bike campus in the nation. Officials at Stanford University estimate there are 15,000 bikes on its grounds. And everywhere you ride, you can see that provision is made for your two wheel efforts. Where stairs block your path there is always a ramp nearby. Cutouts always fill the curbs at strategic places. And they let you park your bike close to wherever it is that you need to be, so you can keep an eye on your machine. If you can, try to imagine the biggest campus in the US (at 8400 acres, it is the second biggest in the world) filled with bikes and smooth, car-free bike pathways everywhere you look! On sunny days, on some of the main arterials, the wall of bikes coming toward you could almost make you feel like you are in China where the only thing missing is the incessant ringing of bike bells.
It's obvious that the legacy of its founder, railroad baron, Leland Stanford continues today. Mr Stanford, who named the school after his son, Leland Stanford, Jr., who died while still a teen, pioneered HiWheel cycling on the west coast when he bought his son a bike. Back when only men of privilege could afford to bicycle, Leland Jr and his friends rode all throughout this part of the San Francisco peninsula. There are also stories about the rides that were made over the challenging Coast Range to the nearby ocean by members of the Stanford Cycling Club.
When Leland Stanford was shopping around for a location for his college, it seems that he must have been looking from a bicyclist's perspective. What he found is a spot with possibly the best weather on the planet. Not too hot or too cold, too rainy or too dry and with a varied terrain of easy flat lands and rolling to steep hills and mountains that separate it from the Pacific Ocean, this could be one of the best places to ride a bike in the world.
There is even a bike shop located in an old building in the very dead center of all of this. Unless you're a student, there's a good chance that you wouldn't even know it existed but like everything else about biking on the campus, called Campus Bikes, it too is open to the public.
Campus Bike web: http://www.campusbikeshop.com
D) If you want to see why Stanford comes very close to being Bicycle Heaven, they are opening their doors to the public with their third annual Stanford Community Day on April 10. The University grounds are always open to people on foot or on bicycle, since it houses more than 90% of its students, but on Community Day, they open parking lots right on campus for those in town who do not have the time to venture into this learning center under their own power. Besides seeing this beautiful college, April 10th visitors, from the family to the individual, will all have a broad spectrum of fascinating exhibits, tours, lectures and activities to choose from.
For those of us cyclists who train in the nearby hills, Stanford is a crossroads, a safe haven where you can warm up for the climbing ahead or warm down from it. And if you come to Community Day, you will also get to see me and some of our other Mayors' Ride HiWheel riders, including Mike Sutton, Marty Wilson, Ted MacDonald, Richard Katz and Greg and Adam Barron in the fun HiWheel bike competitions!
Stanford Community Day: http://www.stanford.edu/dept/news/neighbors/communityday/
Northwest Flank
A) The people at the Center for Appropriate Transport (CAT) might trade us a rider for a welder. Check this out that I got from the amazing bike builder Jan Vandertuin:
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Martin,
Thank you. I wonder if I could get someone from here to do a leg.
On another subject. I am absolutely swamped and need to find an experienced framebuilder to help me. Is there any way thru you that I might get the word out?
Say hello to everyone for me.
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To be able to sit at the feet of this true master and learn what he knows about building bikes is a once in a lifetime opportunity. To be able to say you worked with Jan Vandertuin will take you far in the bike world. If interested, you'd also get to live in a the Bicycle Heaven of Eugene, OR. Do send him an E!
Jan's email: cat@catoregon.org
The CAT web: http://www.efn.org/~cat
NBG General:
A) A lot of you are probably familiar with the new phone service provider named Vonage. And are familiar with the fact that for one flat fee you can make unlimited phone calls from your computer. Depending on how much you make long distance calls Vonage can be a real bonanza. Even though I had a cost effective long distance plan with SBC,I still picked up Vonage because I could peel away some of the services Vonage gives me for free and because of the flexibility. It has voice mail for example that lets me know when I have calls by sending me an email. It gives me an added number I can give out if I am working a certain area so that calls returned to me are local. As well, you never lose your phone number if you move. I have yet to unlock the full potential of this service but I am excited. And the phone quality is very good!
B) Andrew Morton is going to send me a light show that I can run on my HiWheel. What he has created can be found at
http://drewish.com/blogger/archives/2005/03/17/2sided_pov_toy.html
He calls his present creation a hack but you can get the idea for what he wants to fine tune by visiting the above.
In sum, it is glow in the dark lettering that becomes legible when your wheel rotates. He tells me he needs to figure out the math so that it will work on my large 48 inch wheel (great for all the hill work I do but I will have 52 inches by the time I get ready to go across the US in 2007). Taking him up on his offer, the message I asked him to create:
National Bicycle Greenway Connecting Cyclist to Cities
C) Here is the body of the proclamation text that the city of Boston asked us to draw up for this year:
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WHEREAS, the city of Boston honors its rich bicycle heritage, where, as the home of America's first bike club, a greater number of cyclists once traveled on its roads than anywhere in the United States; and
WHEREAS, the city of Boston has been chosen as the Northeastern starting point on the National Bicycle Greenway's 50-city, Fourth Annual Mayors' Ride relay that begins in all four corners of the United States and ends in San Francisco; and
WHEREAS, the city of Boston recognizes that the more bike trips replace car trips, the more the livability of a city is increased; and
WHEREAS, bicycling improves personal health and sense of well being while teaching responsibility to our youth as it expands their horizons; and
WHEREAS, the city of Boston recognizes the work of two of its nonprofit advocacy organizations, Mass Bike and Bikes Not Bombs, to carry Boston's cycling tradition forward; and
WHEREAS, the city of Boston recognizes the National Bicycle Greenway mission to build our city into its nationwide network of bike friendly roads and bicycle pathways;
NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that I, as Mayor of the City of Boston, welcome the bicyclists to our beautiful City and do hereby declare Tuesday, May 3, 2005, to be "National Bicycle Greenway Day" in the City of Boston.
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D) Faye Saunders found this in some of her reading:
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BICYCLE COMMUTER ACT: Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) and Mark Foley (R-FL) have reintroduced the Bicycle Commuter Act (H.R. 807).
The goal is to reduce traffic congestion, pollution, and wear and
tear on the roads. Under H.R. 807, employers could offer monthly
cash reimbursement of up to $100 to an employee who commutes to work
by bicycle, providing a tax benefit to the employer and helping
defray commuting expenses for the bicyclist.
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It is hopeful to see that legislators are coming forward with tools to help get people out of their cars.
E) In lieu of the Pocket Mail device our riders have been using since 1998 to stay in touch with us here at NBG Central, we have found a cost effective replacement that is always on line. No more looking for the fast disappearing phone booth to stay in touch with the on line world. Or for that matter carrying a hard to keep charged cell phone to send and receive Pocket Mail data. Or then use an antiquated technology to attach the handpiece to the device. AT&T Wireless/Cingular has come out with a product, one third smaller than a Pocket Mailer, that sends and receives EMail in real time. Wirelessly!!
Called the OGO, I paid $79 for mine and there is an $18 a month connect fee. It places your Yahoo email account in your pocket for instant access, all the time, anywhere they have coverage (which looks pretty strong along all the routes our Mayors' Ride will be covering). Be forewarned, however, that its keys and its screen are tiny but I am finding it is a serious tool that I have been having great success with!! I've even written some of this newsletter with it. From the road!!
To find out out more about the OGO: http://ogo.com
F) Our blogs at NationalBicycleGreenway.com are not interactive because we don't have have anyone who can serve as an moderator for them. They are a one way street because the spam artists take over when someone is not watching. If you have a minimum of mail list experience, you can greatly assist us by serving as a moderator for our blogs. We're talking probably less than 10 or so minutes a day to approve or deny those posts that are pending. Let us know you can help and we'll get you the password and login. It would be great if we could increase the noise level of Greenway discussions at our site!!
G) If you are riding with us this summer, shoot an email to the SlipNot people c/o Kevin at Kevin@slipnoteyewear.com. Send them the URL for the schedule page with your name on it along with your physical mailing address and they'll send you a really cool pair of sunglasses for your ride!! I love mine! Here is the review we did for SlipNot: http://www.bikeroute.com/Recumbents/News/Archives/000068.html
H) If you are riding for us this summer, you also get handsome business cards that you can start passing out NOW! Send me an email and I'll reply with a pdf of the handsome NBG Scout business card that Faye Saunders will have created for you. It has the NBG logo, the graphic Adam Krohn created for us for our Cycle America 2000 ride, your email address and the URL for your NBG bio (which we will shorten to read bikeroute.com/YOURNAME). If you want us to publish your cell phone number, reply with that as well! Once you get the camera ready copy from us as a pdf in your email box (make sure to include your physical mailing address), all you have to do is buy some ink or laser jet business card stock (we will spec out the product # when we send you copy), about $13 at most office supply stores, stick it in your printer, hit print, and presto you have NBG Scout calling cards.
I) If you are riding for us this summer, you also get "How to Bike America" (HTBA). The bulk of HTBA, an on-line book, was written over a two year period for cyclists riding TransAm to Cycle America 2000 in Washington DC. It continues to be updated and edited online and reflects many contributions from the on line cycling community as we yearly cross America with our Mayor's Rides. Send me an email for the login and password.
J) If having a Ride Partner would make it easier for you to join us, try placing an ad at our classifieds
http://www.bikeroute.com/ibrd_cgi/Classifieds/class_ad.cgi?database=personals.setup . We get a million + unique visitors a month at our site so you may very well have good luck!