Taking your show on the road has a completely different meaning for muscians Ben Sollee and Taylor Ho Bynum.
Separately, the two are bicycling to their schedule of far-flung gigs. For cellist/vocalist Sollee, it's a cross-country tour. For jazz trumpeter Bynum, it's bike tour to concerts in New England.
Although it's unusual, they're not the first. They'll be following in the virtual bicycle tire tracks laid down by the Ditty Bops four years ago.
The Los Angeles-based girl band duo known for their music, as well as their love of bicycles, took off on their cross-country bicycle performing tour in 2006. At the time, band member Abby DeWald said that it was better to move their bodies “than sit in a mush pile in the back of a dirty van.” ……
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/14/musicians-hitting-the-road-by-bicycle-for-fall-concert-tours/
Cash infusions to four bicycle advocacy organizations will help pump up bicycling programs in four communities.
The $103,000 was handed out earlier this month by the Alliance for Biking and Walking as Advocacy Advance grants, funded by SRAM, as well as Bikes Belong and Planet Bike.
The four lucky programs are Bicycle Coalition of Maine, The Community Development Council of Greater Memphis' Livable Memphis Program, the Missouri Foundation for Bicycling and Walking, and the California Bicycle Coalition Education Fund.
“From rural to urban communities, from the coast to the Heartland …
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/14/more-funding-for-bicycle-advocacy-programs/
One of the best things about using the Washington State Ferries System to cross the Puget Sound — beyond the awesome 360-degree views — is that bicyclists are first on and first off.
That's a nice little plum for a cyclist like myself who only makes the trip a few times a year for a recreational ride.
But it's an essential time-saver for the many cyclists who commute to and from work in downtown from the islands or the Olympic Peninsula.
I've taken the ferry by car, too, and it can take 10 minutes or more to unload the vehicles. Unless the ferry is loaded for the Chilly Hilly, like in this picture, is takes maybe a minute to let the bikes off and scoot on up the road.
Just today, Cascade Bicycle Club is reporting on their blog that a report by a team of nationwide experts suggests reversing the load/unload order so that bicyclists are the last ones on, and the last ones off, the ferry ….
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/14/report-recommends-sending-bicyclists-to-the-back-of-the-ferry/
Approximate location of crash; click map A truck driver who struck and killed a bicyclist early Sunday morning in a rural area southeast of Seattle pulled over and shot himself with a handgun after realizing he had just killed a friend.
People in the Enumclaw area who knew the two young men are trying to come to terms with the tragic events. They created a small memorial with flowers and a candle at the scene.
Dead are Steven D. Relford, 20, the cyclist and Geoffrey M. Godley, 24, of Buckley, the driver of the pickup truck, according to the Seattle Times. Godley's cousin, 27, was a passenger in the pickup, which he owned.
Acquaintances told the Times that Relford and Godley hung out together ….
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/13/man-commits-suicide-after-running-down-his-bicycling-friend-victims-identified/
Major Taylor may have been a world-renown bicycle racer in his day, but he died forgotten and penniless in 1932 and was buried in a pauper's graveyard in Chicago.
In the past few years, however, more people are learning about the world-class African-American cyclist, due in part to the many bike paths, clubs and even a statue erected in his memory.
Columbus, Ohio, is the most recent city to honor the cyclist by renaming a four-mile section of the Alum Creek Greenway as the Major Taylor Bikeway. It was dedicated last weekend.
It's only fitting that Columbus honor Taylor in this way ….
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/12/columbus-honors-cycling-legend-major-taylor-with-a-bikeway/
It wasn't faulty electronics that nearly washed out the centerpiece of the Seattle Bicycle Music Festival on Saturday. It was some cheap skateboard wheels that started melting.
But the show must go on. Organizers fixed the problem, and the audience enjoyed pedal-powered music all day long and into the night in the festival that everyone's calling a huge success.
The technical gurus behind the pedal-powered sound system had stayed up until almost midnight on Friday putting the finishing touches on the “Bike Bar.” That's the name for the 16-foot-long hand-made generator that holds the five bicycles that provides wattage for the PA system.
They thought they had worked out all the kinks for the first show at Bergen Park at 9 a.m. Saturday morning. But they noticed the cheap skateboard wheels they had used to support the Bike Bar's drivetrain against the bicycle wheels weren't up to the task of constant spinning. They started to melt.
Jon Murray, one of the folks who worked on the Bike Bar for the festival, said they put in a call to the local board-sports shop ….
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/12/the-pedal-powered-seattle-bicycle-music-festival/
Traffic fatalities involving bicyclists dropped 12% in 2009, marking the second lowest number of bicycling deaths recorded by the Department of Transportion in the past 10 years.
Although 630 traffic deaths of bicyclists is still too many, the overall decrease is a good sign considering the increase in cycling that many have observed in the past few years.
The figures were included in a report issued by the Department of Transportation on Thursday that showed the number of people dying on America's highways dropped 9.7% between 2008 and 2009, to its lowest level since 1950.
The decline in bicycling deaths out-paced the rate of decline in most categories ..
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/09/bicycle-traffic-fatalities-continued-to-decline-in-2009/
A cross-country bicycle tour by two friends trying to raise enough money to buy 1,000 bikes for the children of military families has been side-lined in Portland for a few extra days.
You guessed it. Someone stole one of their bicycles.
Paul Lebelle and Adam Burkowske pedaled themselves and their gear 3,500 miles across the U.S. from their homes in Baltimore on the trek they dubbed BikeFree. Along the way they spoke to organizations and raised funds to buy bicycles for the children of military families. Their destination is San Diego.
The two arrived in Portland over Labor Day weekend, and Monday afternoon Lebelle's green Cannondale T2 bicycle – nicknamed Buttercup (above) – was stolen from the front porch of a house where they were staying in north Portland. ….
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/09/charity-cross-country-bike-ride-bike-free-delayed-in-portland/
For those of you who like to check the freshest thing, here's something very new from a brand that's very old.
At first glance this Schwinn Vestige might look your typical hip commuter bike. But closer inspection of its “ingredients” will reveal that the frame is actually made from biodegradable flax fibers and covered with water soluble paint.
Further, the grips and fenders are fashioned from bamboo and the Schwalbe tires use a recyclable rubber insert.
No wonder this eco-friendly bicycle received the 2010 Eurobike Gold Award for innovative design last week ….
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/08/schwinn-vestige-new-materials-for-a-venerable-bicycle-brand/
“Bicycles in Africa, especially in this part of Zambia, they are more valuable than a vehicle, because they use them even for grinding mill, they use them for transport to the hospital, to the clinic and to the school.”
School headteacher Michael Gogolola explaining the value of bicycles provided to schoolchildren by World Bicycle Relief; “Bicycles offer a lifeline in rural Zambia,” CNN, Sept. 8, 2010 (with video). …
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2010/09/08/quote-bicycles-in-africa/
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