Naked bicyclists, folding bikes, balloon bikes, and more — enjoy this bicycle photo tour of Barcelona.

The third B in a row, Barcelona is next on this list of great bicycle cities (right ahead of Basel, Switzerland and Bogota, Columbia). As a dense city with a wonderful climate, Barcelona is naturally a wonderful place for bicyclists. However, a lot has been done to make it more so. The biggest carrot encouraging bicycling, by far, is Barcelona’s relatively new bike sharing program — Bicing. This is perhaps the best or second best bike sharing program in the world. It is one of a new generation of sophisticated, smart bike sharing programs. Read more about it on page 2.

Beyond Bicing, the city is also working on creating new bicycling routes and bike parking and it hosts fun Bike Week celebrations every year in May. Also, it has been creating better infrastructure for bicyclists due to so many more people bicycling within the past few years. It is transforming itself into a truly world-leading bicycle city.

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Since moving within blocks of a train station a few years ago, I sort of fell out of the cycling habit. I used to ride bikes all over town, and it’s time to get back onto two wheels and back into shape! The thing about riding bikes, especially during summer in the South, is the heat. There’s no way to get around it: by the time you reach your destination, you’re going to be a little sweaty. Maybe a lot sweaty. Here are some projects to help you beat the heat!

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With all that going for it, why aren’t more folks ditching their cars and pedaling their way around town? There are a ton of excuses, some legit, some not so much. You don’t have to cycle everywhere to make an impact. Even replacing a few car trips a week makes a difference, and you just might find that the more you ride, the more you want to ride. Here are some resources from around the GO network to help get you going!

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Unfortunately, riding bikes means occasionally dealing with pitfalls like bad roads, dangerous intersections, and theft. It would be great if drivers were more bike-aware, but this just isn’t always the case. Seattle-based BikeWise is looking to take some of the unknown out of bike commuting, providing a tool to “make biking safer and more fun by gathering good data on the things that sometimes go wrong.”

So how does it work?

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Londoners will soon be able to hire bikes in the centre of town for short journeys, under plans announced this week by the mayor, Boris Johnson.

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In another case of Critical Mass road rage, the driver of a white SUV received nothing but a citation after ramming a cyclist during Washington, D.C.’s ride last night, according to witness accounts.

After the hit-and-run, bicyclists took off after the SUV, which tried to escape on the wrong side of the road. Police arrived shortly, and instead of arresting the driver, detained a cyclist who aggressively pursued the vehicle.

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Yesterday Mayor Gavin Newsom’s office annouced they will be promoting Sunday Streets again this year, the wildly successful citywide effort to get people to go outside that debuted last summer. The campaign closed a 4.5 mile stretch of roads between Bayview and Chinatown on several Sunday mornings to make more space for joggers, cyclists, walkers and even yoga practicioners. Former arterial roadway, transformed recreational asphalt.

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Stimulus Bike says it wants to see economic stimulus funds work to promote cycling, something that could save us money over the long term (less gas money, fewer car repairs, etc.) and promote a healthier, more sustainable way of getting from here to there.

Now, under President Barack Obama’s currently proposed American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the average citizen isn’t expecting to see a check in the mail a la last year’s economic boost effort (which didn’t work anyway). However, it’s possible you could benefit from reduced tax withholding in your paycheck. Stimulus Bike would like to see you invest those dollars in a two-wheeler of some kind:

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23,000 cars will now be displaced onto the University of Pennsylvania’s campus and the surrounding neighborhoods.

Philadelphia’s South Street Bridge carried its last passenger on Monday morning, at least for the next two years. The decrepit structure, built in 1923, was declared “structurally insufficient” over twenty years ago, but has continued in operation under a close eye of weekly safety tests and vehicle weight restrictions.

The collapse of a bridge in Minneapolis last year heightened concerns about the integrity of our nation’s infrastructure. Chunks of concrete have fallen from the South Street Bridge into the river and onto the highway below, and the bridge was not expected to survive the winter months. The South Street bridge connects several residential neighborhoods in Center City and South Philadelphia with the University of Pennsylvania (the largest private employer in the city) and two major hospitals.

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The Pensacola News-Journal reports this week that the city welcomed its first pedal-powered taxi service this fall with the launch of Foot Taxi. The business offers eight pedicabs in a service area that encompasses most of the old downtown area, including many of the city’s popular nightspots and restaurants.

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Each year, community bicycle projects from around the country (and abroad) come together at the Bike!Bike! to talk shop and come up with ideas for making their communities more bicycle-friendly. Atlanta’s Sopo Bicycle Co-op is teaming up with Bike Collectives Network to bring this annual conference to the Southeast for the first time this January!

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A new report reveals an estimated 389,300 children and adolescents 18-years and younger were treated in emergency departments for bicycle-related injuries, making bicycles second only to cars in consumer products that cause childhood injuries.

Even with mandated helmets and safety programs, children are experiencing contusions and abrasions (30 percent), lacerations (30 percent) and fractures (19 percent) mostly to their extremities followed closely by face and head injuries. According to the study, boys are 70% more likely than girls to be hurt on bikes. Tracy Mehan, a research associate at the Center for Injury Research and Policy of The Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital and author of a new study explains the results:

While the number of injuries decreased slightly over the 16-year study period, in 2005 an average of 850 children per day were seen in emergency departments for bicycle-related injuries.  The magnitude of bicycle-related injuries each year is evidence that prevention of these injuries needs to remain a priority.

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With a gas-guzzling Blazer on its last legs, the only thing that’s been holding me back till now was the lack of an alternative. Stroke of luck number one came a few weeks ago, when I passed a house with an 18-speed women’s bike in the front yard with a sign that said “Free: Please take.” So I did.

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Via:  New York Times

Image: University of New England

Bicing — Great (3rd Generation) Bicycle Sharing Program

Bicycle sharing programs started out as simple systems in which bikes were painted a certain color and then made available for use for free by anyone in the community, to be picked up or dropped off at undetermined places. The problem with these systems, naturally, was that there was no accountability or security and the bikes would eventually disappear.

In recent years, some more sophisticated programs have been developed in various European countries. One type of more sophisticated program requires that a cash deposit be made to borrow a locked bike and then once the bike is returned the deposit is returned. More sophisticated than this, a few newer programs (such as Bicing) were recently launched in which a customer must become a member of the program to borrow a bike and then the person is able to unlock bikes with their membership card through a fairly sophisticated computer system (similar to carsharing programs such as Zipcar and Flexcar).

Barcelona’s system is one of the most successful to date. It is interesting because it is only open to Barcelonians — not tourists. They can pay a yearly fee of 30 Euros and then get a bike for free for half an hour anytime. If they want it for more than half an hour, they pay 30 cents per every extra 30 minutes. They can return bikes to any of the hundreds of bike parking “stations” around the city. The system started with 100 stations and 1,500 bikes. The system blew-up, was hugely popular, and today it consists of 6,000 bikes and 375 stations.

The system cut into the transportation infrastructure for cars a little bit, and generated some controversy at the beginning, but it seems that people have come to realise more and more the benefits of bicycle transportation for their city. Similar to Bogota, Barcelona has transformed its city into a more bicycle and pedestrian focused place, and as a result “the number of cars coming into Barcelona (has been reduced) by 15 percent.”

Enjoy the photos and YouTube video of this great bike sharing program below!

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Image Credit 1: synes via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 2: Paco CT via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 3: Altamar via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 4: frodrig via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 5: almogaver via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 6: JesuSarmiento via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 7: Maufdi via flickr under a Creative Commons license

Beautiful Places to Bicycle

Barcelona is beautiful, and that makes bicycling there that much better. Rather than close yourself in a car, tram, or bus, you can enjoy the beauty and atmosphere of Barcelona better on a bike.

Image Credit 1: ras263 via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 2: JorgeMiente.es via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 3: _Asane_ via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 4: lcrf via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 5: Juan Carlos! via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 6: Plug 1 via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 7: Tuquetu via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 8: JaulaDeArdilla via flickr under a Creative Commons license

Bikin’ in the Rain, Kids on Bikes, & Men in Suits

Image Credit 1: vitelone via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 2: vitelone via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 3: vitelone via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 4: vitelone via flickr under a Creative Commons license

Folding Bikes

Easy to travel with or bring to work, these folding bikes are very popular in Barcelona. (There’s one on page nine, too.) The photographer for the first picture here writes: “Barcelona seems to be something of a magnet for Bromptons and other types of folding bikes. It recently hosted an event specifically for Bromptons.” A few artistic pictures of these super utilitarian bikes for all of us to enjoy:

Image Credit 1: identity chris is via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 2: Brújulo via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 3: . SantiMB . via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 4: Juan Carlos! via flickr under a Creative Commons license

Big Bike Taxis

Image Credit 1: uayebt via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 2: uayebt via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 3: jose_gonzalvo via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 4: james. via flickr under a Creative Commons license

Balloons on Bikes

Image Credit 1: karuleta* via flickr under a Creative Commons license

Naked Bicyclists

Mix Spain and bicycles and you get a few naked people! What a free look this picture has.

Image Credit 1: sheenabizarre via flickr under a Creative Commons license

Moving or Shipping Bikes & Critical Mass Bike Rides

Image Credit 1: Liz Castro via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 2: funkyfabriz via flickr under a Creative Commons license

Flowers or Pac-Man in the Bikes Lanes?

At first, I thought these were tulips. Then, I realized (partly by seeing the title of the second one) that it is actually a tribute to pac-man! Interesting bike lane art.

Hope you enjoyed the photo tours of Basel (Switzerland), Bogota (Columbia), and Barcelona (Spain). To keep yourself updated on the next seven photo tours, keep your eye on EcoWorldly or even subscribe to its feed or email list. Have something extra to add? Comment below!

Image Credit 1: Ibán via flickr under a Creative Commons license
Image Credit 2: Ibán via flickr under a Creative Commons license

A few folks asked for a followup to the post about Colin Beavan’s run-in with Senator Jeff Klein. After Beavan posted about the Senator almost mowing him down with his black Mercedes, people around the country called Senator Klein’s office to express their outrage. All of that action made a big difference! The Senator set up a meeting with Beavan, and the two men met yesterday along with Paul Steely White from Transportation Alternatives.

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That’s what backers of the long-awaited Bicycle Commuter Act are hoping, as the measure that’s been kicking around for seven years was among the many added as a “sweetener” to the $700 billion financial system bailout bill passed by Congress last week. Oregon Congressman Earl Blumenauer has been pushing for the bike act for years, arguing that similar benefits have long been granted to car-driving commuters.

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Do cyclists belong on the road or the sidewalk? Should cyclists defer at all times to motorists? Who has right of way in any given situation? How can bikes and cars peacefully coexist?

Various municipal and state laws address these questions, among others. To identify what statutes apply to your home area, view the Mass Bike list, which links to various state’s laws online.

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The letter below reminds me a lot of something that happened to me.  I was riding down 10th Street in the right hand lane.  Rather than pass me in the empty left lane, a giant SUV swerved towards me, nearly running me into a ditch.  At the next light, the driver rolled down the window to shriek that I should be riding on the sidewalk (untrue/illegal), and he knew because he was a cyclist, too!  I guess he was a cyclist with no belief in Karma?

Colin Beavan, aka No Impact Man, had a run-in today with a NY state senator today.  Or, I guess, you could call it a near run in?  Here’s his open letter to Senator Jeff Klein:

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