Category Archives: Biking movement

Bikes and natural disasters

Bicycles have been used in man-made and natural disasters. One example of bike use was done in Second World War when both Allies and Axe took advantage of them to move behind enemy lines and carry supplies. Regarding natural disasters, bicycles are also very handful, for instance in the case of the DANA (High-altitude isolated depression) on the Valencia, Spain, region on 29th October 2024.

To sum up, the DANA is a succession of heavy rains in a short period of time. This time it flooded inner villages and those downstream, closer to the Mediterranean sea where heavily affected by a tsunami of mud. As a result, the area was under a deep lid of mud which destroyed stores, industries, some road and train infrastructures, and provoked hundreds of deaths. How did the Valencian bikers act? The Valencian Massa Critica coordinated to bring food and drinkable water since the next day (30th October 2024). That day dozens pedaled with backpacks and saddlebags plugged with basic food. In the next days, cars and vans were not allowed to access the villages due to there were destroyed cars all around and inside villages that had been moved by the force of mud and had created physical barriers for such wide vehicles. The tightness of bikes allowed them to overpass such barriers. The next days (31th October 2024 and 1st November 2024) social nets made it possible to see hundreds of bikers with traditional bikes, cargo bikes and bikes carts pedaling together in convoys to carry first need food and other products to villages such as Paiporta, Catarroja, Alfafar, Benetúser, Torrent, Albal and Sedaví. Indeed, bikers where the first volunteers to coordinate themselves in bringing such essential products for human life in La Rambleta, Valencia. After these days, additional volunteers (pedestrian, medical people and persons who provided APIs) used La Rambleta as a headquarter. The next week, food was not always wanted by those who suffered the disaster, rather they needed cleaning (bleach, ammonia, etc.) and  hygienic (shampoo, gel, detergent, soap) products. Again, bikers carried them to injured villages. Additionally, riders all over Spain donated bikes and others objects such as bicycle wheels, brakes or chain grease in order for urban bikers in those villages continuing pedaling.

This is the force of bikes in natural disasters: Bicycles reach places that cars can not come.

The next video shows the work Massa Critica did (in Spanish):

Maddy Novich

The use of cargo bikes has been increasing over the last years. Even in countries so pro-car as the USA, this kind of bicycles remains a clear alternative to cars. Maddy Novich, Criminal Law teacher at Manhattan University, knows it in deep. This mother of three has five cargo bikes and uses them to carry couches or big wardrobe, and also her three children. The children enjoy the rides while playing, eating, or chatting in the box. Moreover, she is always open to answer questions in relation to bikes and particularly cargo bikes to others moms who want to gain independence and take care of their health and environment. Maddy advises about issues like what cargo bike model to choose or how to drive a cargo bike.

She has also visited several European countries and appreciates specially those who offer good, physically separated bike lines from car lines. Indeed, Maddy started using cargo bikes in Amsterdam back in 2019. Moreover, she highlights the difference mentality of European and American car drivers. She affirms that in general European car drives respect bikers more in the sense that they reduce speed and keep more safety distance when they see a bicycle.

Cicloffice

Imagine that you are riding your bike without the essential tools on an inhabited, unknown place and it suddenly suffers a fault such as a tube puncture or a spoke break. Imagine also that there is not a bike store or a bicycle workshop. Some bikers would ask for help whoever they see in the street. Some others would try to solve the problem with whatever they have in hand. Finally, some other people would ask for a cicloffice.

A cicloffice is an informal place in which you can find a myriad of tools to repair your bike. Moreover, there use to be bicycle parts so that you can use them to substitute yours. And even you can find a bike technician who will teach you how to hone your bicycle, but the person who will do it is you. He will give you the theory and you will put into practice it. Thus, you will learn some handy tricks for the future.

Furthermore, you can carry to a cicloffice whatever bike or part of bike which you no longer use. This way others can take advantage of it. And guess what, it is free, you do not have to pay anything when using a cicloffice, neither for the master class of the technician. This is a clear example of a collaboration for a better future.

Going a step further

 

Urban biking intends to make a better world for everybody. It promotes a way of living differently from the one in Western countries in the XX century: More bikes means less polluting vehicles on streets, less noise, better human physical health, better human psychological health, better environment, more surface for people, you name it.

Social movements like feminism and LGTBI+ share an equal ultimate point: Make a better world for everybody. Thus, it is not rare to cooperate between movements with similar, universal targets. If as Susan B. Anthony said (“I think [bicycling] has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world”), and there are of course LGTBI+ bikers, we as urban cyclists should support and even encourage them. Summing up allies to growth is key to advance.

The European Cyclists’ Federation

The European Cyclists’ Federation (ECF) is an international organization that acts as an umbrella over the European countries bicycle organizations. There are at least one bicycle organization by country. It interacts with the European Commission, the European Parliament or the Council of Europe as well as the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe or the World Health Organization.

The ECF puts into practice its influence to support laws which promote biking, avoid those which harm it and maintain cyclist in the politics agenda. Moreover, the ECF coordinates the Eurovelo and organizes the Velo-City every year.

According to its president, three factors have contributed to the boom of biking in the last years: Climate change, COVID-19 and the Ukraine war. This last point contributed to increase the price of raw materials. Furthermore, he indicates that most moves within a city are as long as 5 kilometers, a perfect distance to pedal, and the main contribution to climate change and pollution at city level is produced by combustion engine vehicles. Thus, bicycles are perfect to face it.

Orxatona

The Orxatona is here!

Orxatona is the Spanish Criticona based on the Critical Mass which takes place in one city every year. This time the fortunate city is Valencia. The first Criticona in Valencia took place back in 2014 and after a decade it will be again surely a great party for urban biking this year. It is a huge event from 1st to 5th May in which local and external bikers will enjoy the city, its bike infrastructure, the good mood and many more. The Orxatona offers routes, parties, a bike polo exhibition, an alley cat race, the Valencian Critical Mass support, a workshop to tune your bike, an impressive ride (the official Criticona) and the XiquiMassa (a kind of Critical Mass for families and children), among other activities.

You are more than welcomed! Are you going to miss it?

Bikebus

It is said that bikebuses started in Brussels, Belgium, in 1998. But what is a bikebus? It is a secure and organized way to go to school by bicycle. It travels the neighborhood and makes stops in previously determined spots in order to allow bikers to sum to the bikebus, similarly as buses do. At the start there are only a few bikers, but the more pedaling and stops, the more riders. Thus, a pack of cyclists arrives at school. Participants share experiences, learn existence, increase their social skills and improve road safety knowledge while pedaling. Additionally, they start the day with extra energy. As it comes to the city, it is more quiet, secure and clean. Regarding children, a bikebus contributes to make independent, healthy and caring adults.

In Spain, bikebuses started more than a decade ago, but the boom was in Vic in 2020 when the teacher and mother Helena Villardel plus the associations Canvis en Cadena and Osona amb Bici agreed to create one. It was replicated in Barcelona almost instantly where they recorded a 11 seconds video and uploaded to Twitter. It was shared around the world and soon TV channels showed it. As a result, eleven bikebuses ran on Barcelona with more than 700 people every Friday in 2022.

Today, you can find bikebuses in Vienna, London, Melbourne, Washington, San Francisco, Mexico, Vancouver, Brooklyn, Bombay, Portland, Glasgow, Philadelphia, Santiago de Chile and Galway to name a few. To create a bikebus is needed to have five or six families who support a new one, determine the route and start pedaling. At the beginning, it will be a small bikebus, but the more children see it, the bigger bikebus. Parents will join it when their children want it. This is very important if the route crosses avenues and your city is dominated by cars. Adults block perpendicular streets as in the Critical Mass and police may help to do this task.

As Francesco Tonucci wrote in his book The city of children: If there are children playing in streets, it means the city is healthy. If not, it is ill”

Urban Freestyle

Urban Freestyle is considered as a way of living. BMX, Street Trial, Dirt Bike or Fixie are examples of such a concept which goes beyond making tricks with a bike. It also comprehends specific garment, how you speak and living based on concrete music and images.

The Freestyle comes from BMX which popularized in the seventies. Then, riders competed in races on earth and some of them started doing some tricks after competitions end. Regarding Street Trial, it comes from trial when some riders used street furniture as a playground. As it comes to the Wheelie Boys, it was born in New York (USA) when riders improved wheelies to the next level.

Inside the BMX style, we have Flatland in which riders use light and small bikes to allow complete maneuvers around the bicycle. On the other hand, in Street BMX, street furniture is used as playground and no matter whether it is handrail or curb, all is accepted. In this case bikes are a heavier, so bikers use to be strong. Finally BMX Park is an Olympic discipline in which riders jump in spectacular, innovative ways on their bikes, made mainly from titanium and carbon.

Street Trial combines street furniture with height and was created by Danny Macaskill. So, Street Trial is the most multipurpose discipline in the Urban Freestyle. Light bikes with carbon bicycle frame are used.

Wheelie Boys is a New York discipline in which riders make wheelies in artistic ways. No matter which bicycle they use, all bikes are appropriate to practice this sport.

A possible path for the biking movement

We, as bikers, know all the benefits that riding a bike produces like human health improvement, environment protection, more free surface for people in cities, less dangerous crashes, you name it (or at least we should know them). Making efforts to promote it is an encouraging task which gives back pride in return. The problem is that sometimes we focus too much in people who are already cyclists or concern about the benefits of using bicycles.

I consider there are three types of persons in this regard: Those who are already convinced of the advantages of pedaling, those who are in the path of arriving to the previous group, and those cochistas who will never allow themselves to see positive points in bikes. I reckon the bike movement should focus more on convincing the group two of people, as indicated before. Most of them see bikes daily, have some concern in human and environment, check bad mood in car drivers, see cars and car infrastructure occupying too much surface in the neighbors stealing it from people, among others. They just need a little push to become riders and we, as experimented bikers, should constitute an example for them, transmit our good mood, explaining how it feels when riding a bicycle, all the benefits it has. This way more and more bicyclers will be seen on the streets which will encourage more people to pedal, politicians to build bike infrastructures and diminish car lines. In the end, all the people will benefit including those in the group three, though they will probably continue opposing bikes. Do not worry, their sons or grandsons will appreciate bikes.

Todobici

Workshops fix your bicycle indoor and some of them do it outdoor. Going a step further, few workshops not only fix bikes indoor and outdoor, but also do it free on streets, parks and pedestrian zones in order to help no-bikeholism. These workshops think people as customers as well as key persons to improve Earth as it comes to environment, better health and happier.

One of the workshops is called Todobici which is located in Valencia, Spain. It has promoted biking for more than a decade in which, in addition to fix and sell bikes and components, has contributed to develop the neighbor and the bike activism. Todobici shows adapted workshops outdoor as master classes with the name of “Con las manos en la grasa” (something like Fill your hands with grease, in English). They say that it is important that those who pedal bikes know their vehicles and names of parts and basic repairs. It has done workshops for children in schools, senior citizens in several locations, women in Todobici and online in the 2021 Ciclosferia. Moreover, it is a workshop in which you can find Ciclosfera.