Green Options

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All of us at GO Media wish a happy Independence Day to our US readers! Here’s our contribution to the celebration: a reminder that we’re still fighting for independence…

I love discovering an occasional gem of a Website during minutes (hours?) of random Internet browsing, and today I found a real diamond: RUBARB, which stands for “Rusted Up Beyond All Recognition Bikes.”

Started by volunteers in March 2006 — about a half-year after Hurricane Katrina and the levee-failure flooding of New Orleans — RUBARB was inspired by a much-repeated experience of hurricane cleanup crews: pulling bicycle after unused, flood-damaged bicycle from the mountains of trash that covered the city. Rather than consign these flood bikes to the post-Katrina dump, these volunteers decided, why not clean them, fix them and then pass them along to residents and other volunteers who need them?

Bicycling it isn’t always easy. Busy streets, honking horns, and inadequate city funding for bike lanes and paths can make bicycling an uphill battle. However, with green in the news, the economy in a slump, and summer on its way, it’s getting easier to find reasons why there are some 1.4 billion bicycles and only about 400 million cars in the world today.

This week, EcoWorldly authors from six continents contributed articles on bicycling in their country. With exerpts from those articles and others in the blogosphere, here are seventeen very good reasons to bicycle no matter where you live. Click the headings as you go to read more.

If you want a blissful sex life, don’t ride a bike. I am not a keen biking enthusiast, particularly of the black mamba or Indian type, those old type ugly contraptions that are the primary mode of transport in most parts of Africa, other than human feet.

While walking is good for health and the environment, when you do it for miles and miles on end with a heavy load on your back or head as most men, women and children do in Africa, a bicycle comes in handy for it is in black Africa what a camel is in Arabia or a Llama is in some parts of South America.

Those who can afford a taxi ride take not the yellow cabs you’ll find idling on any street corner in New York City but a boda boda, as they are known in East Africa, literally a bicycle taxi that would take you from one border to another.

But the bicycle taxi riders here have learned the hard way and have taken to heavy drinking of cheap, traditional brew to drown their troubles. Becoming sexually inactive or rather a man who cannot sexually perform is the worst thing that can ever happen to a man, especially if his wife starts looking for fun elsewhere, risking catching the HIV/ Aids virus in the process.

HG Wells said, “When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the human race.” I agree.

Hate rising gas prices? Ride your bike! In cities like Copenhagen and Amsterdam they seem to outnumber cars. Portland and Chicago are catching up. People of all ages, all over the world ride them daily to school, work, the store, a friend’s house…

It’s THE #1 solution to rising gas prices, yet our fearless leader won’t even mention it.

Stupid, weak, bicycle lobbying groups…

This post is a photo gallery from the East Bay Permaculture Guild’s Permaculture Bike tour in Berkeley this past Sunday. It was glorious day and a slew of people came out.

But first a little background on permaculture:

The word permaculture, coined by Australians Bill Mollison and David Holmgren during the 1970s, is a portmanteau of permanent agriculture as well it is was permanent culture. Through a series of publications, Mollison, Holmgren and their associates documented an approach to designing human settlements, in particular the development of perennial agricultural systems that mimic the structure and interrelationship found in natural ecologies.

This tour shows what some folks in Berkeley are doing to live more sustainably: growing their own food, raising chickens, capturing, heating, and conserving water, and generating electricity.

This tour brings together two things that I think are very important - biking and permaculture. A $5 donation is requested, but no one will be turned away for lack of funds. We’ll have a snack break around the middle of the tour, with light snacks provided. Please bring water, weather appropriate clothes, your favorite munchies and your thirst for knowledge. See you there…

That’s right, it’s time for this year’s East Bay Permaculture Guild bike tour in Berkeley.
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It might be the biggest cliche about Christmas for a kid: coming down the stairs on Christmas morning to find a shiny new bicycle. I can think of worse things to buy your kid than a mode of transportation that uses no fossil fuels. Biking is a lifelong activity that takes place in the great outdoors, is good for your health and good for the planet. However, buying a child’s bike can be a lot more difficult than an adult’s, mainly because there are many more low-quality bikes out there, sold by people who don’t really know a lot about bikes. And how do you teach your kid the rules of the road so they can grow to become responsible adult cyclists? Here’s a few resources to answer questions you may have about your child and biking.

The International Biking Fund is a wonderful resource for information on cycling in general, and that means children’s cycling, too. I don’t think I could give you better advice on the ins and outs of buying a bicycle for a child of any age. They have a guide for sizing a bike and what to look for when purchasing a bike for you kid. Once you know what you are looking for, don’t be afraid to check out Gigoit, Craigslist, or Freecycle for used bikes that meet the specifications you are looking for.

Many people use bicycles for commuting and running errands. We love the fresh morning breeze, the easy parking, the health benefits, and the financial savings. Besides, what other commuting option has its own ’80s theme song? (Cue Queen’s "Bicycle Race"). Yep, while the sun is shining and the weather’s fine, you can’t beat bicycling for a great way to get around town.

But what happens when the going gets wet? With autumn and winter

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Sunday is Father's Day, and just like Mother's Day, it was inspired by tragic death. The modern American celebration of Father's Day  began in 1908, when 361 men were killed in a mine explosion in Monongah, West Virginia.