This Just In: Citi Bike Guest Post! (And other stuff too.)

As a cyclist, blogger, and cycling blogger, I've got an extensive résumé:

--Artisan curator of locally-sourced verbiage;
--Published book author of published books authored by me;
--Underpants model;
--Profligate embellisher of my own accomplishments.

You can also add accomplished Citi Bike Cat 6 racer to the list.  Indeed, I'm such a fan of Citi Bike that I've officially contributed to their website:

The idea here was to undertake some trips by Citi Bike in order to highlight their eminent utility for New York City neighborhood-hopping.  As you'll read in the above post, for my first trip I cut a diagonal swath through downtown Manhattan, and I've got a second and third post covering the Great Hipster Silk Route through Brooklyn and Queens currently in the works.

Sometimes I wish I didn't live here so I could visit as a tourist, because it must be awesome--and now I doubly wish I could visit as a tourist and use my own incredible Citi Bike blog posts as guides.

So read it now, because for all intents and purposes it's basically today's post.

Speaking of Citi Bikes, residents of Cobble Hill, Brooklyn will NOT let them destroy the very fabric of their neighborhood:

Pro tip, you nitwits: if "traffic and parking is a nightmare" you're gonna need more bikes, and that includes Citi Bikes.  By the way, I used to live in that neighborhood in a past life and pretty much all the traffic is due to drivers cutting through Downtown Brooklyn to avoid the toll on the Battery Tunnel and the traffic on the BQE.  It was a shitshow long before Citi Bike and it will continue to be a shitshow as long as the East River bridges are free.  So if you want to improve the situation you should be pushing for toll reform and not whining about losing three or four parking spaces to Citi Bikes, you friggin' dimbulbs.

By the way, the developers are going to peg you with shiny new high-rises no matter what you do.  The Citi Bikes and bike lanes are just red herrings.  (Or blue and green herrings respectively.)  So go ahead and argue about them, because you're playing right into their hands.

Lastly, via Streetsblog, Professor Putz over at Columbia University wants a mandatory bicycle helmet law based on his own anecdotal evidence:

I had spent the afternoon at Chelsea Market and the High Line and was in great spirits as I opened the door to my apartment and heard my phone ring. I picked it up and heard a voice inquire, “Is this Pendray Winkleman’s father? I’m calling from the emergency room of Weill Cornell. We have your son. He was in a cycling accident.”

My heart stopped. I listened and then jumped into a cab not really knowing what to expect.

SPOILER ALERT: The kid's pretty banged up, but ultimately he's fine.  So is his wife, despite her reckless driving:

My wife arrived, having driven at the speed of light down from Harriman State Park. We spent the evening explaining whatever we could and encouraging him to speak with family members and a few friends. Some memories began to reappear, but others disappeared. Fortunately, he stayed overnight in the ICU for further observation. By morning, his memory was jelling quickly, and in the early afternoon he was released.

I mean sure, she arrived with three or four cyclists plastered to her hood, but it was an emergency.

Anyway, Professor Putz--who teaches Healthcare Marketing at Columbia, and as far as I can tell is neither a medical doctor nor a physicist--knows that it was a helmet that saved his son's life, even though nobody knows any of the details surrounding the crash:

Without his helmet, the story would have ended differently. While we may never know what led up to the accident because my son’s memories of the 18 hours surrounding the event are MIA, there’s no doubt that beyond the magic care by New-York Presbyterian and Mount Sinai, it was his helmet that saved his life.

OK, why is there "no doubt" if you don't know shit about what led up to the "accident?"  How do you even know it was an "accident?"  Maybe it was a hit-and-run.  Maybe you should be outraged that people like your son are left bleeding in the streets every day, and that the prosecution rate is abysmal.  You might also take issue with the fact that Albany won't let the city install more speed cameras, though you're probably not because then your wife Lady Leadfoot might have to drive more carefully.

Nah, it's much easier to write off your son's misfortune as an "accident" (just like the police and the media do) and then ascribe mystical powers to a plastic hat.

And just like a true religious zealot he's practically foaming at the mouth with righteousness:

In the days since the accident, I’ve watched cyclists, even loudly urging some to wear a helmet, and have been distressed by the number of Citi Bike, messenger and business cyclists weaving in and out of traffic, ignoring bike lanes and all sans helmets.

If this Winkleman character ever, ever, EVER loudly urges me to wear a helmet I will unleash upon him a flood of withering invective of Biblical proportions.  In fact, as soon as I hit "publish" on this post I'm heading down to Columbia and riding helmetless laps up and down Broadway in the hope that he'll try it.

And now he wants a helmet law:

These are young people embarking on careers, parents heading home from work and hardworking people making deliveries — many without health insurance and the majority without helmets. They are all risking their lives.

In New York, bicycle helmets are required by law only for bicyclists younger than 14.

That’s not enough. New York must pass and enforce a helmet law — especially for Citi Bike riders who aren’t experienced in urban cycling and for businesses that use messengers. Health insurance companies should give a benefit (as they do for safe driving or not smoking) for riders who use a helmet.

Wow, what a sanctimonious schmuck..  Hey healthcare marketer: maybe instead of making these people wear foam yarmulkes we should be working for safer streets and better access to healthcare.  And at the very least the police should crack down on people who drive "at the speed of light," right?

Wrong:

And the Police Department must crack down on cyclists who are not using bike lanes or using them incorrectly (going the wrong way, for instance).

Dick.

You know, there's a difference between riding a bicycle in the city and, well, this:



Now that's Fred "Woo-hoo-hoo!" speed.