Picasso’s Tête de taureau
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Road diets
Bungee cords
When transporting goods in a bike, one can put them in a basket or in a bicycle bag. There is a third option which consists in tying them to the luggage carrier with one or two metal bungee cords. Bungee cords are composed of one or several strands forming a core covered in a woven cotton or polypropylene sheath.
They are ideal for such a purpose as they are elastic, thus allowing to use extra length and making more pressure at the same time. Indeed, they end in hooks at their extremes in order to ease their anchorage. It is quite recommendable not to anchor the moorings directly into the luggage carrier, rather it is better to give a spin to the cord extreme you want to anchor to the luggage carrier and then put the hooks into practice. This is because you do not want the bungee cord extreme to be released in the middle of a ride and this way the anchor is secured. If you are thinking in buying bungee cords, I recommend to invert money in good, high quality ones since they will last much more time.
Rodando por el Clima
Pantomima Full: Bici
Ciemmona
The Critical Mass started in San Francisco (USA) in 1992 and since then it has disseminated for more than 300 cities around the world. It is impressive how this monthly event has spread up to the five continents (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anexo:Masa_Crítica_por_país, in Spanish). Bikers meet and ride the city in a good mood demonstrating that a different way of transport is possible even in the most extreme circumstances. Kampala celebrated the first Critical Mass in Uganda at the beginning of this year. Good for them! The desire of pacifying traffic, claiming for space, infrastructures and respect for bicycles, giving visibility to bikes, protecting the environment or making relationships are some of the targets it follows. Hence it is opened to everybody who loves these principles. Furthermore, it has a political point in favor of the issues I have indicated and above all the use of bikes. Conflicts between bikers and cochistas took place specially at the beginnings. Thus, the more bikes on the roads, the more respect we have.
On the other hand, there are countries which celebrate a national, annual Critical Mass. Well, in reality the national adjective here means one big Critical Mass in a country, although riders from other countries are welcomed. I talked about the Criticona. Today I am going to expose what the Ciemmona is. Basically, it is similar to the Criticona since both events offer routes, workshops, meeting places, accommodation, etc., but in Italy. 1,500 bikers joined the last Ciemmona. The 2018 edition consisted in the Firenze (monthly) Critical Mass on the 18th of May; workshops on the morning, the Ciemmona on the afternoon and a street party in the evening of the Saturday 19th of May; and a beautiful route on the Sunday morning.
If you want more information, you can check the Ciemmona official blog (mainly in Italian).
The Philadelphia Bike Story
NYC’s 8th Ave Needs More Sidewalk Space
Electric bicycle
Continuing with bike adaptations to specific problems people have, suppose you live in a hilly city and you want to climb a street up. One can use a electric bicycle (or e-bike) to ease pedaling. This type of bike is even more important for those who have heart problems and/or senior citizens. But what exactly is a e-bike?
An electric bike is a bicycle with an integrated electric motor which can be used for propulsion purpose. Although there are a variety of e-bikes, all of them allow pedaling without using the electric motor. Its starting in the late of the 19th century was rather discrete, but its popularity has been growing in recent years and is used in private and public bike sharing systems, i.e. in bike tourist tours.
E-bikes are classified as:
- With pedal-assist: the electric motor is regulated by pedaling. Hence, the effort of the biker is increased in this electric bike with pedal-assist (or pedelec). This effect is counteracted in smooth streets in which one pay extra effort to save it in hill streets. This bikes have a sensor to detect the pedaling speed, the pedaling force or both.
- With power-on-demand: the motor is activated by a throttle in the handlebar. Sometimes this e-bikes have more power than the ones with pedal-assist. In turn, this kind of system presents three possible uses:
- Riding with pedal power alone (only human effort)
- Riding by only the electric motor
- Combining both together at the same time
Tricycles can also have an electric motor.