Random BETTER Bike Post

My neighbor's bike parked in her office. Photo by MiraHartford

As I sit shackled to my computer awaiting video rendering, I am reminded of some random thoughts from this past week. I had to run some errands the other day (Monday, to be exact) and hopped on the bike to get around. Full story after the jump.

First interesting encounter was riding up to one of Hartford's bicycle couriers. There is a small crew of them, and I've come to recognize them by sight, but never by name, so it was rather cool to be bike to bike with one I've seen around. We started talking and had a great conversation the whole way to downtown. Seems he lives in my neighborhood of Asylum Hill and built his bike up from parts. Wish I had a chance to take a photo but we both had jobs to do. It's super nice looking fixie. Can't exactly have a chat like that to meet neighbors while driving your cars side by side.

A stop at Hartford's City Hall encouraged me about biking by seeing two friends' bicycles parked in front of their offices. It would be inspiring if more people rode to work so that our fair city wasn't as dependent on the parking lot monopolies that scar the city's landscape where historic buildings once stood (don't get me started on that rant). First was my neighbor Jen's bike which introduced the blog post. We've ridden together a few times to our respective jobs. She's been working to promote adding more bike parking to the city. Down the hall from her commuter bike, fellow blogger (from The Beat Bike Blog), Brendan Mahoney had his bike in front of his office:

While I had their attention, I took it upon myself on behalf of our fellow bicycle riders and commuters to get their bosses to pass ordinances for more 'bike racks' in the city! I stopped at least 4 different spots that day between Downtown and West Hartford with not a bike rack to be had! How could the city that manufactured and popularized bicycles not have any bike racks?! (oh, right, because we also tore down the great factory that produce those bikes... ranting!)

Final stop was at the bank (one of the non-bike rack locations, so bike was attached to lamp post). Upon exiting the bank, I was approached by a cameraman and interviewer who were asking people downtown what they were doing to save money at home. Ok, the interviewer was just gorgeous, so naturally I blathered on like an idiot about the usual 'energy efficient bulbs', and 'turn off lights when no one is in the room'. Then I remembered, Oh, and I ride my bike around the city so that a) having to waste fuel on small errands (where most people do waste energy & fuel) and b) so that I'm not polluting. They must have liked that part because they grabbed a bit of B-Roll of the bike and then of me (and my fat tuchas) riding off on the bike. Found out that the show is actually an internet syndicated piece called Better.tv so hopefully it will be up some time soon.

Anyway, that was the fun bike adventures this week. Not going to talk about the creepy woman who accosted me on while I was unlocking my bike in front of Superior Court. No way! Right now, really kicking myself for not having thought of documenting Hartford's bike culture for Hartford.com's "Awesomest Art Thing Ever". Sigh. Guess I'm too damn socialist and political when it comes to my art.