Author Archives: jm

30 días en bici

30 días en bici is the Spanish campaign of 30 days of biking an international, one-month event for promoting the bicycle use. It consists in riding every day in the April month and taking photographs. Participants share images online. The American version, the pioneers, use the hashtag #30daysofbiking.

Founded in 2010, 30 days of biking started in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Its power lies in its simplicity. Bikers just need to pledge to bike everyday in April, no matter the weather (indoor photos are welcomed), and share their adventures. An easy and powerful idea as thousands follow it around the world.

Why 30 days? Rumor has it, one of its founders read a paper about developing a yoga habit by practicing it for 30 days. Then he asked himself if 30 days were enough to develop a habit, why do not we use it to promote the bike use? Again, easy and powerful.

Ok, but why April? April was chosen as the ideal month since is the first complete month in Spring and people love it after the Winter. Moreover, daylight hours increase (in the north hemisphere) and hence riding is increased at least for those who appreciate moderate temperatures.

The Spanish version has spread to more than 50 cities. It started in 2013 thanks to a bikeaholic group leaded by Carlos Rodriguez. But they do not limit the activities they do to April. Their ambitious targets tend to generate a social change by promoting the bicycle daily use, inspiring bikes as the main way of transport, educating citizens about the benefits of using the bike regarding health, and transforming cities in human-friendly spaces and caring for the planet.

Puncture: How to repair it

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One of the worst situations in cycling is produced when riding a bike and suffering a puncture without the proper tools to repair it. In that case, the best you can do is calling somebody to help you or walking while pushing your bike. But lets be positive and think about what you can do if experiencing a puncture and do have tools. In such a situation, you need tire levers, a spanner (in case you do not have quick-release wheels), a bike pump and a repair kit. The process has two parts: Dealing with the inner tube and fixing the puncture.

First of all, take a look at the tire and remove whatever object that has caused the puncture like a thorn or a nail. Then, loosen the wheel nuts with a spanner, or undo the quick release bolts if your bike has them, and check that the inner tube is deflated. Continue with grabbing the wheel on the opposite side to the valve. Move the tire around some inches, repeat it with a second lever and repeat this process by using two or three levers. Finish this first part by removing the inner tube and checking its inside to confirm that whatever caused the puncture is gone. This last step is important.

Second, repair the puncture. Find where the puncture is either by listening for air or putting the tube in water and looking for bubbles. It is a good idea to mark the hole with a crayon or a pen. After that, roughen the area around the hole with sandpaper, then stick on the patch from the repair kit. Some patches are pre-glued, while others come with a separate tube of vulcanizing solution or rubber cement so stick them on with. Then, put a small amount of air in the tube, put it back into the wheel and tuck the tire back over the wheel rim. Push the valve back into the hole, seat the tire and pull the valve back through. Finally, pump the tire back up to the correct pressure and put the wheel back on the bicycle.

Due to the fact that it is much easier to just replace the inner tube if you puncture when riding, it is a great idea to carry a spare one while enjoying your bike.

Puncture: Wheels

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There is a fact when riding a bike that is considered a handicap for some people and an opportunity for some others as these last put into practice what they have learned. Traditionally, this issue has been usually presented when riding on a surface clogged with tacks and crystals. Of course, I am referring to punctures.

Punctures constitute a headache for some cyclists. Putting aside how to repair them, which I will talk about in the future, this post is dedicated to wheels that are able to avoid them. You can find two solutions for them in the market: Flat tyre, and gel wheels.

On the one hand, the flat tyre makes impossible to puncture a wheel. The absence of air inside it allows you to ride on tacks without any problem. Moreover, most flat tyres are made with long-lasting materials as they work for thousand of kilometers. On the other hand, the gel wheels incorporate a gel material inside them. This material vulcanizes in contact with air, hence the puncture is automatically repaired. In fact, biker does not usually realize he or she has a puncture after finishing the ride. However, this wheel should be changed after a high number of punctures since the gel quantity reduces after every puncture.

Furiosos ciclistas

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Furiosos ciclistas (https://www.furiosos.cl, in Spanish) is a Chilean bike group that aims at promoting the bicycle use in the urban scenario. Bikeactivists compose it and fight for their legal and cultural recognition, increment in security when riding, teaching other stakeholders in the streets, improving human health, creation of bike infrastructures and crashes reduction.

They propose specific points to reach these targets: Planning, design and engineering, promotion and education. Why have they chosen bicycle as the ideal issue to manage them? Bikes are efficient, economic, environmentally friendly, accessible, allow progress towards human contact, and human health. Back in 1995, this group began as a yield to the dominant abuse of motor-based ways of transport, what they call Imperio Motorizado Sin Freno (Non-brake, motorized empire, in English). Notice the Chilean humor.

You can read posts and watch short videos about different aspects related with urban cyclist on its website. Subjects range from activities and highway education, to the Critical Mass and bike-tourism, including both national and international news as it comes to bikes.

Mujeres bici-bles

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Andrea María Navarrete is the founder of Mujeres Bici-bles, a bike women group with the aim to empower themselves. Mujeres Bici-bles is a Latin American social movement with headquarters in Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Bolivia and Argentina. Their main target is to help women to ride bikes in urban scenarios. Urban biking can be difficult for men, but it is more problematic for women specially in the patriarchal societies. Thanks to the mind of its founder, who is also a university teacher, urban cyclist and touring cyclist, this movement has quickly spread. They support other women who want to start riding a bike. For instance, in the Colombian cities of Bucaramanga and Salta, they have informal schools to teach more women pedaling.

OK, but what if I want to create a Mujeres Bici-bles group in my city? Well you can contact to Andrea María through [email protected] or Twitter (@MujeresBicicles).

She offers a talk, the group creation and, if future bikers want, interesting teachings about how to create the bike school for women in every city she travels. In return, Andrea María asks for help to move to another city and a place to spend a few days. Once the group is created, she proposes talks regarding genre perspective, and pedaling and mechanics workshops.

Bike monuments

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Monuments have been using to honor or commemorate somebody or something for ages. Kings, conquerors or discoverers overcrowd them as it comes to persons. Regarding buildings, there is a myriad of them with different architectures across the world. Thus, we are used to seeing them in most cities.

What is more surprising is to come across with a bike monument. This is a structure in which a bicycle appears alone or as part of a sculptural ensemble. As the bike movement develops, more and more bike monuments are built to express the change that society is experiencing. Similarly to queens and kings sculptures, bike monuments constitute what people gives importance.

Perhaps there are more bikers collecting bike monuments, but I only know one person who is truly doing this. In the Bicimonumentos (in Spanish) webpage one can consult bike monuments in a lot of countries. It is impressive realizing that the love for bikes is so widespread. By the way, if you want to send it some bike monuments photos or locations, you can do it by sending a private message to https://www.facebook.com/LaMujerDelTiemp. Also, the blog http://www.salamancaenbici.es/ could receive bike monuments information but I am not completely sure about this last point.

Less waste grounds

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In some pro-car cities, waste grounds are usually occupied by cars. These empty lands appeared as a result of the house bubble crash or because of numbness politicians. The fact is that these areas can be better places for instance by transforming them into public gardens. This way the neighbors’ life quality increases, children can play without risk of being run over, senior citizens can drift around and everybody can play sports. Thus, everybody benefits.

When brave mayors decide to convert waste grounds into gardens, some car drivers normally claim against it due to the fact of losing free parking lots. The most idiot ones argue that as they lose them, they should pay less car taxes. What they do not see, or do not want to understand, is the problems cars cause because of driving or having them. A car is like a weapon. It has been used in the past by terrorist to cause victims, the poison expels by exhaust pipes kills every year hundreds of thousands of people around the globe, thousands more are killed in car crashes and millions probably die because of global warming. Indeed, driving polluting vehicles is the source of 20% of all US emissions (http://www.ucsusa.org/clean-vehicles/car-emissions-and-global-warming#.Wa7nNdRLdAg) or 17% of the UK’s total carbon dioxide emissions (https://www.theccc.org.uk/publication/impact-of-real-world-driving-emissions/).

So, the more green areas, the better quality of life for citizens.

A different bike line

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Riding a bike uses to be a happy activity. If you do it in a park or a forest, then it turns into a relaxed, quiet trip. The relation of bicycles with environment has been deeply studied regarding the avoidance of pollution and the replacement of motor vehicles. As you know, bike lines constitute the specific paths for bikes. It would be ideal if these points could be joint in a unique infrastructure.

It turn out that this building already exist. Genk is a city in Belgium which has made it possible. They were to build a bike line in a park, but faced a problem: How to cross a lake. Engineers thought over it with the intention of integrating it into nature. So, traditional bridges were discarded. Finally, they came up with the following:

Every cyclist I know want to ride it. It is awesome, marvelous, cool, you name it. And above all, it represents the complete integration of bikes with environment. The optic effect makes as if those bikers were riding on the water, although it presents a little trick:

When raining, the special pavement and the lateral guides evacuate the water.

Donostia

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Donostia is one city in the north of Spain. It has gone after making citizens lives healthier for ages. Back in the 90s, the city started changing its goal towards people and sustainable mobility. As a result, pedestrianization was shyly used with the opposition of some businesspersons and political opponents at the beginning. The first group feared a reduction in sales, whereas the former made noise just to try scratching some votes. Fortunately, sales in local businesses increased in pedestrian areas since potential buyers had more time to walk absentmindedly, hence to enjoy the short-noise, pleasant spaces. These interventions have improved people life quality and showed other cities the right path. Such actions were spread out strategically to historical and tourist areas like the Concha beach as time went by. In turn, satisfaction indicators boomed. Today, local businesspersons demand strengthen pedestrianization to the mayor conversely to what asked for at the end of the last century.

Regarding bicycles, Donostia has made efforts to build bike lines, increase the bike road network to more than 52 km, implement Dbizi (the local public bike sharing system), create the Bicycle Observatory, a bike registry, etc. The Bicycle Observatory (http://www.cristinaenea.eus, in Spanish and Basque) aims at promoting the bicycle use in the city by giving practical tips, rules and explaining the relation between bicycles-pedestrians / bicycles-cars to urban bikers and stakeholders. Moreover, it gives advice about what to do when your bike is stolen. And finally, it organizes courses and workshops to foster the bike use.

Pontevedra

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Pontevedra is a city in the northwest of Spain. It has been internationally recognized for its efforts in promoting healthy life among its citizens. Others cities in the world copy its actions at urban planning to improve life quality by the process in which if an intervention works in one place, it is about to be successful in another one. But how has it been acknowledged towards sustainable mobility?

Miguel Anxo Fernández Lores has been its mayor since 1999. At the begging, he put his hands on his head as 14,000 cars passed along some streets while much less neighbors lived on them. He had in mind ending with this nonsense. Today, Pontevedra is one of the quiet cities in the noisy Spain.

In this time, he has transformed the city by following a simple and powerful idea: Owing a car does not give you the right to occupy the public space. This philosophy confronts to what has been the dominant model in cities: Throwing out children and senior citizens from streets because of cars. At the beginning pedestrianized all the medieval center (300,000 squared meters). This allowed natives and tourists enjoying so vast area. They realized people looking for a place to park caused the most congestion, thus stopped cars crossing the city and got rid of street parking. They incorporated other actions like extending the car-free zone from the old city to the 18th- century area, substituted traffic lights by roundabouts and traffic calming areas by reducing the speed limit to 30 km/h.

An interesting and copied idea was the launch of the Metrominuto. The Metrominuto is a map centered in the aesthetics of metros maps, which marks the pedestrian distances between the most important points of the city and the time it takes to travel them:

Thanks to this beneficial interventions nobody has died in car accident in the city since 2009, whereas 30 people died from 1996 to 2006. CO2 emissions reduced 70%. Almost three-quarters of car journeys are made on foot or by bike. Withholding planning permission for big shopping centers protected small business. The works were exclusively financed locally and received no aid from regional or central government.

To sump up, motivated leaders with the unique target of benefit society and a sustainable mobility vision is what cities need.