Electric Scooter crash

Amber and I rode Back bay on Sunday and came across a young electric scooter rider on the ground with road rash. She was pretty shaken up but surrounded by a group of cyclists who got there before us. I pulled out my Betadine wipe so she could clean up the road rash. I need to get a new one.

She explained that she was zipping along and all of a sudden the handlebars turned and she was thrown off the scooter.

I noticed she had slung her handbag over the handlebars and I have to wonder if that caused the crash. The steering on those scooters is very sensitive and a swinging weight could definitely cause the rider to lose control. This just re-enforces my belief that these scooters are more dangerous than most people realize.

As she was already surrounded by half a dozen concerned cyclists, Amber and I rode on to the Champagne Bakery and were dismayed to discover it has gone out of business. It was always so busy we can't understand how this happened. We feel guilty now for not going more often.

We turned around and rode to the Crossroads shopping center, one of the controls on my Five Rivers 300k. Ha Long makes the best Pad Thai and Amber tried the Garlic Noodles which smelled wonderful.

We ended up with 54 miles, a little climbing, and great weather and food. Next Sunday is Stacy's 10,000th km (k-hound) ride so that'll be a bit of a party!

Brompton and Crackerswamp

Brompton B75

Some time ago I was looking at a Brompton to make travel easier, but I just couldn't justify the nearly $2000 price tag. This year they released the Brompton B75 which uses some older components (probably left over after they upgraded) to bring down the cost to $995. You give up a few things to get this low price, but if you don't care about those things this is a great deal.

• Only one color is available - a kind of blue/green
• Only three speeds are available, no six speed option
• The gear ratio is -12% - suitable for hills but you lose top speed. You can upgrade the chain ring to a bigger one for $40.
• Non-integrated gear shifters.
• Old style M handlebars with more pronounced curves. Gives you more flat places to mount lights, computers, bells etc.
• No rack or mudguards but they can be added
• No front luggage block but it can be added
• Different grips - firmer and push on. Easy to upgrade.
• Cheaper saddle - most riders replace the saddle immediately anyway
• Platform, non-folding pedals - most riders replace the pedals immediately anyway
• Schwalbe Marathon tires - these are great tires

What you get is a real Brompton that folds and rides the same as the regular Bromptons. I suspect once they run out of the old components this model will be retired. A side-by-side comparison of the B75 against a regular Brompton with the same specs shows the B75 is $450 cheaper.

Crackerswamp 2020

Paul has announced he is running the Crackerswamp in November 2020. I rode this in 2016 and we just missed a big hurricane. He's moving it to November to reduce the chance of that happening again. He's also moving the start hotel and tweaking the course a bit. My biggest concern in 2016 was the abysmal hotel he used as ride headquarters. Although it kept the price low, it was awful.

It would be well worth an extra $100 or more on the fee to stay the five nights in a decent hotel.

I'm hoping I can persuade Amber and some other friends to come too.

Will New York become the new cycling Mecca?

I ran across an article on the Guardian website today. It says New York just passed a $1.7bn road infrastructure bill that will pay for more than 250 new bike lanes and 1m sq ft of new pedestrian space over the next ten years.

Although the number of frequent cyclists in New York has risen by 26% between 2012 and 2017, the number of cyclists dying has risen too with cyclist and pedestrian fatalities rising by 24%.

It's promising to note that these new bike lanes will be physically separated from traffic, which makes them far safer. Even a curb height barrier greatly improves protection from texting drivers and are widespread in Europe, but less so in the US. The 250 new miles of bike lanes will be built in the next five years.

The five years after that sees a commitment to a fully connected cycling network. We all know about bike paths and lanes that connect two bike unfriendly roads - that seems to be the default. For example, we have the upper SART that connects Waterman to Arlington - two very bike unfriendly roads with heavy traffic and no shoulders - which greatly reduces the value of the bike route. This bill recognizes the problem and seeks to avoid it.

Hopefully Corey Johnson, who introduced the bill, will get his vision in place, on budget, and on time.