Friday, October 28, 2011

Learning to Fix my Bike: Brakes First

I recently finished Bike Works' Adult Basics Class (ABC), where I'd been spending my Sundays for the last six weeks learning about basic bike repair. The teacher, stylin' bike advocate, comic book artist, and all around wonderdude Davey Oil, had started us out with some basics not about bike repair, but about the social dynamics of bike repair. He encouraged us to think about how the bike world does not necessarily interrupt the race/class/gender discrimination many people experience in their everyday lives. So, fittingly, he wrapped up the class by asking us to use our new bike knowledge to help people, not to bludgeon them with our insider status.

To me, Davey's observations were spot on. I've avoided learning much about bike repair even though I've been an urban transport cyclist since 2005. A big reason was having a partner who enjoyed learning about sprockets (guess who got the bike pump when we split up), but I also felt out of place in bike co-ops and other spaces where some people knew a lot more about how these machines functioned than I did. I tend to feel intimidated by my own ignorance, and it can get in the way of me learning new things. When I lived at the LA Eco-Village, even with the fabulous Bicycle Kitchen a few blocks away and many cooks as my neighbors, I didn't blossom into bike repair glory.

I did spend a few hours at the Bike Kitchen on a Saturday back in 2010, learning some bike maintenance basics. The thing that stuck with me, though, wasn't how to hang a bike on a repair stand, but that my front brake freaked bike mechanics out.





What we see here, folks, is a caliper arm that has been bent at an odd angle. Here's how it should look in context, the one marked 5:


Diagram source here.

Back in 2007, when I still lived in Portland, I came out of a shop on SE Hawthorne one afternoon, and discovered, as I tried to ride home, that my handlebars had a new shape and that the front wheel would turn only under duress. Baffled, I eventually decided that someone had attacked my bike with a blunt object. I took it in to the Bike Gallery on SE Woodstock, and they installed new handlebars. The mechanic there explained that though one of the front brake's caliper arms had been bent, it still worked just fine, so he wasn't going to replace it.

So I rode around for years, not having any problems with my brakes. I knew that my front brake looked funny, but usually I forgot about it until a look of horror crossed the face of the person-in-the-know examining my bike. Especially once I started doing outreach with day laborer cyclists, some of whom managed to get around on bikes with much bigger problems, I saw my front brake as a symbol of biking unpretentiously. Then, on the first rainy day I rode in Seattle this October, I discovered that my brake was all wonky. Living in a rainy, hilly city has made me more concerned about bike repair than I ever was in Portland or LA. When I asked Davey to take a look at it, his face reminded me about the bent caliper arm.

It turned out to be the quick release mechanism messing things up this time around, but on the last day of ABC, when we got to bring in our own bikes instead of learning on the kiddie bikes that Bike Works refurbishes, I knew what my project would be. Time for a new brake! In order to get the job done that same day with the shop's limited supplies, I ended up replacing my front brake with a simpler one that did not have a quick release for easy wheel removal. I gotta say, I felt pretty good about doing this thing myself. I even figured out that I could strip the replacement brake down to its centerbolt so that I could transfer everything onto the longer centerbolt that had attached the old brake to my bike.


I've got many more overhauls in mind for my bike, now that I feel more comfortable digging in and figuring this stuff out. If you find yourself learning about bike repair and feeling embarrassed, make sure you're in an environment that doesn't take itself too seriously. Davey really drilled us to accept that it's ok to not know what you're doing, and I also once spent a magical afternoon at the Bike Kitchen fixing a flat under the mad tutelage of cooks Eric Potter and Jonny Green, which showed me how fun bike repair can be with the right attitude. I mean, it was like Alice in Wonderland meets Mary Poppins up in there. Thrills galore!

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

A Brief Visit to the SLC Bicycle Collective

I like to get a little fieldwork in when I travel. My trip to Salt Lake City culminated in one incredibly busy day, where I presented on a panel entitled "Transportation Mode Choice and Behavior among Immigrants" at the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning annual conference, and also visited a local bike organization that does cool work.

This was my first time at ACSP, and I really enjoyed it. I ran into folks from my university, fell in with a flock of Canadian planning PhDs, and generally had fun. By going to panels, I also got a better sense of what I'd need to say to make my research about bikes, bodies, and public space in LA mean something to transportation planners. After listening to a rewarding roundtable discussion by recipients of the Paul Davidoff Book Award, I scooted out to the light rail and used the transit pass that had been included in my conference materials (what a great idea) to head south to the SLC Bicycle Collective. I was interested in visiting because their website talks about recycled bikes and serving low income communities. My research and activism focus on making connections between low income communities and the bike movement. Not only do low income cyclists exist in cities and suburbs, we should be doing more to promote cycling in low income communities. So I was excited to find out what's being done on this front in SLC!


Located in a light industrial neighborhood, several long blocks from a light rail station, the Collective has an impressive workspace full of bikey materials. When I arrived, there were only a few people wrenching, since they had not yet started their public hours. Over coffee at the vegan café down the block, I met with Jonathan Morrison, a co-founder of the space and the executive director, and learned a bit about their goals and programming.


Jonathan moved to the city in 2000, and met some other bicyclists through Critical Mass. Someone at a local government bike advisory committee suggested opening a tool cooperative, but the city passed on funding something like that. Thinking it'd be cool to have a place to fix their bikes, a kind of shared garage, a group of people decided to take the project on. They incorporated in 2002, and decided to focus on offering bike education to low income kids and promoting bikes as transportation. Almost ten years later, they're going strong.


Most impressive to me, the Collective has relationships with groups that support refugees and other immigrants in Salt Lake City. A person in need of transportation can get a voucher from a participating organization, bring it here, and walk out with a recycled bike. I like the idea of nonprofits working together like a machine.


And, similar to what happened in Los Angeles around the Bike Kitchen, the Collective's presence seems to have encouraged more businesses to open up in the neighborhood. The vegan café (where the very sweet server treated us to coffee) and another bike shop have opened up nearby since they settled into this location.


When we walked back over so Jonathan could open up the space for fixing hours, we found a group of people waiting to get to work. Before I left I happened upon a volunteer trying to communicate with a Latino man who spoke mainly in Spanish. Jonathan had mentioned that the collective hasn't yet managed to establish relationships with SLC's Latino community, and it did seem like this man was having a hard time getting started on his repairs. I tried to help facilitate understanding, but having gone months without talking about bikes in Spanish, I struggled too. Fortunately it seems like a space that would welcome more involvement by Spanish speaking volunteers, and I admired the effort the volunteer made to cross the language barrier.

As I walked back to the light rail, I thought about how if I lived in SLC, I would be volunteering at the Collective and helping bridge that gap, being human infrastructure to make their services work for Spanish speakers. Then I thought, how come I'm not doing that work in Seattle? Thanks for reminding me to take initiative in my community, SLC Bicycle Collective!

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Notes on Salt Lake City


1. Here industry does not refer to pollution or exploitation. It refers to group harmony.




2. The streets are very wide. My hostess told me an urban legend about the streets being made wide enough to accommodate wagons turning around. The city's grid centers on the LDS temple.



3. Because religion shaped the urban form, public and private space can be hard to differentiate. What look like city parks or shopping malls are actually church properties.



4. At one such park, the LDS church "honors" Brigham Young as a colonizer. They gloss over his polygamy though.




5. The sturdy old buildings remind me of other southwestern cities like Flagstaff and Denver.

6. Across the railroad tracks on the west side of downtown, you can find some industrial urban decay.


7. The City and County building looks like a fantastic castle. It's the grandest example of Richardsonian Romanesque architecture I've met. The security guard inside let me wander around after giving me a mini lecture about the building's history (this dude was well informed).



8. They've got the most picturesque capitol I've seen, up on a hill commanding the valley. The interiors were very impressive, but it all felt too clean and neat rather than maturely aged.



9. The City Library blows my mind! Rooftop garden, check. Lots of seating next to windows, check. They also have shops inside an atrium, a very engaging layout, and a fantastic public space outside. Also it's open till 9 pm on weeknights. Last but not least, beekeeping in the rooftop garden.


10. There's a garden called Gilgal that looks kind of like a cross between a miniature golf course and the Watts Towers. Like the Watts Towers, it was developed over many years by one guy. My hostess described it as a different expression of LDS faith than one would find at the tabernacle complex.




11. As I left Gilgal, I saw a woman who was texting and driving very nearly run over a young girl riding a bike in a crosswalk. I don't think the texting motorist ever noticed the girl, she didn't slow down or look up from her phone. The girl had to stop short, about an inch from being hit. I tried to shake the chill from my spine. Later I discovered that the U.S. Department of Transportation has a campaign around distracted driving. Here's their website.

Overheard on the California Zephyr


Amtrak's California Zephyr line runs from Emeryville near San Francisco to Chicago. It crosses the Sierra Nevada, the deserts of Nevada and Utah, and climbs again over the Rockies. I took it from Sacramento to Salt Lake City, spending a sunny afternoon in the observation lounge watching pines and mountains pass by. I read my book, but I also eavesdropped.
 

A large group of elderly people had boarded with me in Sacramento, apparently part of some paid excursion. My trips on Amtrak's long distance trains have shown me that many of the people with the wealth and leisure time to buy sleeping car accommodations have lived long enough to remember the glory days of passenger rail. This train, though, with its particularly scenic route, seemed to attract even more old folks than usual.


My ears caught the occasional murmured remarks of a man traveling alone who seemed to know an awful lot about the terrain through which we traveled. Perhaps he'd worked in some industry here? Though others listened to his words and sometimes asked questions, he never struck up a conversation with anyone, staring out the window as he spoke. Over the intercom a volunteer shared facts about our route, and the quiet man seemed to enjoy naming landmarks before we heard them announced by the official guide.


To my left I heard a woman with leathery, oversunned skin strike up a conversation with another woman. Their husbands played peripheral roles in the interaction. She assumed that this woman would share her Republican partisanship, and launched into an enthusiastic overview of her economic and political beliefs, probably culled from the radio pundits to which she claimed allegiance. "We go to the Tea Party," she shared, before claiming that "half the kids at Occupy Wall Street don't know what they're picketing for." Then she and her husband praised their favorite resort in Mexico, down south near "Kawsta" Rica. So cheap! In the same breath, they talked about how they wouldn't go near Ensenada or other towns near the border because of the drug violence. These people did not support "handouts" here, but they did not seem to grasp the exploitation people suffer in Mexico. What would happen to their suburban enclave in the bay area if they got their myopic way, destroyed all social services, and more people turned to lucrative trafficking of illegal goods? Maybe they don't understand that what they experience as affluence, the freedom to ride their motorcycles around the country and to visit all-inclusive resorts in parts of the world they can't pronounce, wouldn't be considered crumbs off the table of the people whose economic interests their twisted politics support.


After the talkative couple returned to their seats, I overheard the husband of the accosted woman express his frustration at the tanned woman's presumption. They had voted for Obama. "I thought she was nice," his wife retorted, going back to her seat alone in a huff.

Thursday, October 20, 2011

Drifting in Sacramento

The Coast Starlight chugged into Sacramento around 5 am last Tuesday. I picked up my things and went into the station and sat there until the sky lightened, around 7:15 am. Using my handy internet phone, I identified a source for caffeine and set out for Temple Coffee.

The café's overhead lamps reflected in the window.




As I've remarked before, I really like that layovers on the train happen in the middle of cities rather than in contained non-places like when traveling by air. I needed to be back at the Sacramento train station for an 11 am train to Salt Lake City, but I had a few hours for exploring. Despite having grown up in California (fourth generation, yo! My great great grandfather drove a streetcar in San Bernardino at the turn of the century), I'd never been to the capitol. So I knew my drifting needed to take me there.








The morning gloom burned off while I made my way around. I saw some neat buildings and public spaces, and lots of people biking, but also a surprising number of empty storefronts and decay. I found some helpful maps posted around downtown, so I didn't manage to get fully lost. Good thinking, city peeps!











Then I found the capitol by following a lovely pedestrianized avenue.


I went inside, expecting them to hassle me about carrying a backpack and full tote bag (no lockers at the train station, unfortunately. The only cities where I've been able to use lockers are Chicago and Portland, where you can find lockers in the adjacent Greyhound station). The guards didn't care, so I got to wander around the stately old halls. Pretty much by myself, too.

All up in your rotunda.

Fancy lamps in a stairwell.

I think this was in the midcentury East Annex.

Heading back to the train station, I saw a shopping mall. It could be that there are so many empty storefronts cause of this mall in the city center.
Personally I'd rather go to a store in a handsome edifice like this one.
Lots of lovely California architecture.
Getting to the train station, which is part of a regional transit center, isn't exactly pedestrian friendly. First you have to cross a street where they've limited your crossing options.
And then the public space in front of the station is filled with parking.
I made it back with plenty of time. I could see from the train platform that there was a secret passage to Old Sacramento.
Intrigued, I passed through. It's neat that there's a pedestrian connection to the park under a highway, but I felt let down when I got there.
I love old buildings, but in a case like this, where the city relocated old buildings to this spit of land between a highway and a river, what you have is a tourist trap and not a thriving neighborhood. My willing suspension of disbelief couldn't overcome the roar of traffic on the highway.