Minuteman Bike Path ride on Christiania

With Gem's cousin visiting, we had a lovely ride from Arlington Heights along the bike path to the playground at Spy Pond.

Ladies' town bikes

I had an email from someone recently who saw my thing about the Bobike seat, asking what kind of bike Kim rides. It's a VSF Fahrrad Manufaktur, and it's a perfect bike for riding around town. Step-through frame, basket, lights, mudguards, very strong and robust (only it is a bit heavy). We'd heartily recommend it to anyone - the only trouble is, they're only available in Germany (where they're made) andn in London through Bikefix.

A couple years ago, crapola Bicycling Magazine declared a revolution in the making, in the form of Joe Breeze's Breezer town bikes. They thought it was revolutionary to offer a comfortable, upright bike with a step-through frame, basket, lights, mudguards... when, of course they've been riding these sorts of things in Europe for years.

In any case it's nice to see that other US manufacturers are finally catching on. Here are a handful of bikes that seem to be made from a similar mold - from Breezer Bikes, Raleigh USA, Trek, and VSF.

Woods valves?

I was about to put some air in the tires of my Christiania today, and when I unscrewed the little cover on the valve, I wasn't quite sure what I was looking at. The valve looked like a larger Presta valve, only without the little screw stalk in the middle. A quick Google search revealed that it's a "Woods" or "Dunlop" valve. Very strange indeed. According to Sheldon Brown, they're "very rarely seen in the U.S." He also says that they my Presta pump ought to do the trick on them, which is good news!

Here's a photo from Sheldon's site.

NYC pedicab

NYC pedicab
Originally uploaded by ahconway.

We spotted lots of these around Midtown, though not many with passengers. Got into an interesting debate with the family about whether it's safe to use these things... Amy said she'd never let her kids in one, and Kim and I both said "why not?" The real question, I guess, is whether NYC drivers are any more mindful of pedicabs than they are of regular cyclists.