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"Try the Patch" uses the metaphor of smoking on an elevator to unveil the truth about transportation pollution. The myth of the "green" car is similar to myth of the "light" cigarette. Both are still toxic. Just as the patch offers a cure to cigarette addiction, the bicycle can end our addiction to cars. Many times more energy efficient during all phases of their life and fueled by willpower bicycles offer promise for a sustainable future.

This film was made by my buddies Jim Swanson and Kristen Steele (scroll way down) and stars Bill Stender, Kristen Steele, our own Andy Thornly and Laura Lent.

Go and rate this film right now at treehugger.com. If my friends win the contest they will win two air tickets to Alaska to watch the glaciers melt. (No kidding.)

a tour of octavia boulevard in 2005

This is a repeat of a March 7, 2005 show. Its being reposted as a follow-up to the previous podcast about Octavia Boulevard.

As Octavia Boulevard rises from the rubble of the old Central Freeway, Bikescape takes a tour along with about thirty others led by Robin Levitt and Tom Radulovich from Livable City. The walk was jointly sponsored by Walk San Francisco and Transportation for a Livable City.

The downfall of the freeway and the rise of the Boulevard is another chapter on San Francisco's ongoing freeway revolt, a grass-roots movement that goes back to the fifties. San Francisco owes its livability, charm and cohesive community to the individual neighborhood activists who banded together at strategic times to fight the auto culture that was treatening to choke the city with cars and blight. Imagine what almost happened: an elevated freeway on Polk St. and six lanes cut into a trench where the Panhandle an Golden Gate Park now stand! And most of these victories (and some of the losses) squeaked by on six to five votes!

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San Francisco Better Neighborhoods plans

Photo by Brian Kustler

this right is wrong- cars and bikes in conflict at market and octavia

A woman gets hit (and nearly killed) by a truck making an illegal right turn onto a freeway ramp and San Francisco's cycling community mobilizes. Seventy people gathered last Friday for a rush hour protest demanding that the city re-engineer the intersection to make it safe for cyclists and pedestrians. Bikescape attends the demo at Market and Octavia and reports back with interviews and commentary.
Photo courtesy San Francisco Bicycle Coalition

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Media reports from ABC7, SFist, NBC11, KTVU, KRON, KCBS, BeyondChron, FCJ.

A typical day at Market and Octavia... More sfbc video here.


Sat. 3 - 15th Annual 49-Mile Ride meets at 9.15am at the Pool of Enchantment at the DeYoung Museum in Golden Gate Park. Usual counterclockwise route. For more info, contact Joe.

An interview with Grant Petersen of Rivendell Bicycleworks

What do you look for in a new bike? One made of exotic, high tech materials also found in fighter jets and moon landers or a traditional lugged, steel ride where the "performance" is provided not by high tech but by you, the rider? In this episode, we take a trip out to Walnut Creek in the East Bay to chat with Grant Petersen of Rivendell Bicycle Works to gain insight into his philosophy of the bicycle craft.

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Grant also had a chat recently with Sheldon Brown when they ran into each other at Interbike, the industry trade show.

I mentioned The Bike Hut during the calendar segment (they're looking for a database volunteer) but I didn't say much about this great institution. Here's a link to chase.

critical mass-a self criticism

Born in San Francisco, Critical Mass has been the focal point of a new vision for the future of cities. It has brought together a diverse community of cyclists and has changed the way the city looks at transportation and the use of public space.

But in San Francisco when the ride gets big as it
did last Halloween, the ride sometimes becomes a victim of its own success as newcomers to the ride find license to act destructively. In this episode, Bikescape gets together with some long time Critical Mass riders to discuss how to deal with very large group bike rides.

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Photos by Adam A.

Contested Streets- New York and San Francisco look to the European model

San Francisco and New York are studying congestion pricing, a scheme that charges people to drive into central cities and turns the revenue over to transit, ped and bike improvements. The system has been successfully used in London for the last three years.

Contested Streets is a new film that shows how the European model might point the way towards humanizing American cities.

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Interview with Chris Daly

Chris Daly has been a dependable ally for San Francisco cyclists. His record on transportration and housing is spotless. As we head into the last week before the election, a few downtown interests have been spending a lot of money to dump Chris to replace affordable housing and safe streets with offices, expensive condos and a lot more traffic.

Find out why we should reelect Daly as this episode takes us to a District 6 campaign mobilization where we talk to Chris about biking in the city.
Photo by Adam A.

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I'll be posting more links later in the day...

reelect chris daly

San Francisco Supervisor Chris Daly traverses the city on his bike in his quest to build affordable housing and champion public transit.

Chris is endorsed by the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition and many others.

PARK(ing): remixing your landscape

A few months back in an episode about the intrusion of cars into Golden Gate Park, Bikescape posed the question: what is a park? In this episode, green strikes back at grey and the question gets turned around as we reclaim street parking spots for people. Even if only for a few hours…

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The Rebar Group conceptualized and produced the installation and the Trust for Public Land paid the bills.

Clarence from Bike TV was there and shot an episode.

Berkeley's Pedal Express took care of some of the heavy hauling.

San Francisco Chronicle/SFGate archtechture critic John King wrote this article about the installation. The pictures in this post are also curtesy of the Chronicle.

petrolius

Courtesy freedomfromoil.org