I think David Filipov is trying to prove me wrong, and I couldn’t be happier. I am glad he followed through on his insinuation that he would cover other road users groups. His recent article about pedestrians highlights the problem with j-walking in Boston, and by it existence (not that it implicitly says this in the article) seems to highlight that not ONLY bikers are to blame for the problems on our streets.

Shortly after 11 a.m. on a sunny Thursday, a most astounding thing happened on the busy intersection of the Boston University Bridge and Commonwealth Avenue. Alexandra Slender, a BU sophomore, stopped at a crosswalk, waited for the white gleam of the “Walk’’ sign, and crossed.

It was a rare act of civil obedience for a pedestrian in Boston, repeated by almost no one else on this day at this intersection. Throngs of iPod-wearing, cellphone-texting walkers blew through the red “Don’t walk’’ signs, barely acknowledging the flustered drivers who slammed on the brakes and banged on their dashboards in futility.

He also seems to avoid the things that I thought he was guilty of in his first article. He makes it clear that the pedestrians j-walking are mostly endangering themselves, and stays away from junk statistics. He still makes it seem like only pedestrians are breaking the law, but in the context of the two articles together a grander picture is emerging. I doubt that people will look at both together, but at least both are there. I can only hope that the next group he tackles are motorists.

Thanks David, and if you do come out with an article highlighting the problem with motorists, or even better yet an article about motorists and then a follow up about ALL user groups and how they are ALL to blame, I would gladly eat crow and offer a public apology that I ever got snippy with you. Highlighting all of these problems will go a long way towards changing the culture of road use in the city, and allowing us all to get around safer and quicker.

I’ve been looking into the Boston Globe recently,  trying to figure out how they reported on bicycles in the past, and since my Lexis Nexis subscription only goes to the late eighties, that’s where my grasp on history has ended.

I uncovered this one (article below), which starts by using a young man’s death as a hook to talk about couriers, and how bikers don’t wear helmets, but know where stuff is.

The topic of a David Reuter’s death is slowly phased out, and the author finishes the story a discussion of Bike Messenger companies, and how they came into existence.

I’ve come to think that, embedded in the discussion of helmets and law breaking cyclists is, at best, a somewhat crass lesson that obscures the real tragedy of a person dying. At worst it is a sort of implicit blame, where the guiding thought is: He died. He should have worn a helmet. Although I highly endorse the use of helmets, and most cycling laws, I don’t like how they are the focus of cyclist deaths.

I think that this article embodies that. This doesn’t seem deliberate, but rather indicative of how some writers at the Boston Globe views these situations.

In any case, other than the morbid slant to the article, it is fun to read. Does anyone know the people interviewed in the article?

For fair use reference:

November 27, 1988, Sunday, City Edition

THE BIKE COURIER BUSINESS;

Fatality delivers message: It’s not all freewheeling

BYLINE: By Susan Bickelhaupt, Globe Staff

SECTION: METRO/REGION; Pg. 1

LENGTH: 1217 words

David Reuter, a 22-year-old student at Northeastern, started working as a bike messenger at 8:30 a.m. on Aug. 19. At 8:35 his bicycle collided with a small pickup truck on Beacon Hill. After lying in a coma in Massachusetts General Hospital for six weeks, he died.

Reuter, like many area college students, was attracted to the bike messenger business for the independence it offers, the chance to be outside, the flexible hours.

But his death was a sobering reminder that riding a bike in the city – whether for commuting, recreation or doing business – is more often than not a challenge. It also sent chills through the Boston bike messenger industry, most of which were felt by Reuter’s employer of five minutes.

“His death was really the first serious accident for the company,” said Neal Stone, owner of Boston Bicycle Couriers. Stone has always encouraged his messengers to wear helmets, but since Reuter’s death he has taken even stronger action. He now offers a loan program where the messenger can borrow money for a helmet over the course of four weeks’ pay. Reuter was not wearing a helmet at the time of the accident.

“It’s not the law, so you can’t force messengers to wear helmets, but we don’t want them to have any excuse not to wear them,” he said. “It’s just too bad it takes something like this to spur you into action.”

“David had phoned us the night before and told us he was going to start working,” said his father, Jerry Reuter, from his home in Plattsburgh, N.Y. “We were not really thrilled because we thought it would interfere with his studying. David was a political science major on his way to law school; he would have graduated in December. But he was an independent character and said this would fit into his program.”

The approximately dozen messenger services in Boston today attract new cyclists such as David each year and keep members of the business community in quick touch with each other.

Bike messengers dart through the city and into Cambridge, finding squares that aren’t squares, centers that aren’t centers and places that just don’t exist on any map.

Easily identifiable by the large canvas bags slung over their backs and the look of purpose in their eyes, messengers are at work as long as Boston businesses are open.

Greg Luce, of Brookline, remembers vividly his first day on the job.  “My last pickup of the day was eight packages from MGH that were going everywhere,” he says now, two years later. “When I got home, I threw up. It was so stressful.”

“Now I can see how really unnecessary that is,” said Luce, 22, now on leave from Boston University for a semester and working full time. “I know the city so I can see all the streets in my mind.” Which is a good thing, because as he and other messengers will readily point out, there are some addresses in Boston that elude even the most careful mapmaker.

One Boston Place is not on any map; neither is One Financial Center. But if you’re a bike messenger in Boston, you’d better know how to find them, “because it means the more money you make,” according to messenger Doug Sargeant.

Sargeant assesses the driving, walking and bike riding in Boston as “a totally outlaw situation.”

“I mean, I’ve seen pedestrians run into each other; there is no ordered process,” he said.

Boston police said that in 1986, there were two fatalities of bicyclists that involved motor vehicles; in 1987, there was one, and so far this year Reuter’s is the only death. The statistics kept, however, do not differentiate between messengers and commuters or recreational bikers.

While David Reuter lay in a coma, his father took walks around Boston and saw a lot of people on bicycles. “I would stop and ask them, ‘If you had a helmet, would you wear one?’ Everyone said yes, whether they were a youngster or middle-aged man. And I can’t tell you how many I asked – my wife says I’ve become the helmet missionary.”

Since Reuter’s death, his father and mother have started a fund that will go toward the distribution of free bicycle helmets.

Eric Trurin, who with his wife, Diana, runs one of the smaller bike courier companies, mostly attracts the Cambridge-to-Boston business.

Trurin, 29, worked as a courier himself when he was a post-college songwriter. “It fit my lifestyle,” he said.

Now the business he started three years ago serves 200 clients and grosses about $ 200,000 a year. “But it all goes back into the business,” Trurin said, rattling off expenses that include insurance, workers’ compensation and bookkeeping.

Stone, whose company is about 10 times as big as Trurin’s, said he grosses about $ 1 million a year. “But of course half of that goes to the riders,” he noted.

Depending on the company, messengers take home 50 to 60 percent of the delivery charge. A survey of several companies shows that a bike delivery from Harvard Square to Kenmore Square costs about $ 9, and from Kenmore Square to downtown about $ 5.

The key to making more money, though, is not just being a fast rider, but being able to change a flat tire quickly and knowing where all the streets and alleys are. “If you know what you’re doing, you can make $ 400 to $ 500 a week,” Stone said.

Trurin said he resents the image many people have of bike messengers as renegades, and in part blames the movie “Quicksilver,” which shows messengers bombing up and down the hills of San Francisco.  “It turned this job into Flashdance,” he said.

Sargeant, who has been riding for Cambridge Couriers for three years, agrees. “I went to MIT for two years, I’m not in a rock band and I have a computer,” he said.

Stuart Tabakin, who owns the oldest messenger service in Boston, Marathon Messengers, can recall the rocky start of his business 12 years ago.

Tabakin started with two others out of an apartment on Beacon Hill in 1977. “I told them, when we get 10 orders a day, I’ll take you out to Steve’s” for ice cream, he said.  It was August until they were able to collect.

But slowly, through word of mouth, the business grew, and he can now dispatch about 70 couriers a day to make about 1,000 deliveries.

Now there are several computers in Tabakin’s Back Bay office, telephones with a dozen lines to take incoming and outgoing calls, and shelves filled with computer printouts of bookkeeping records.

Now Tabakin’s biggest competition is not so much other courier services as it is technology; namely, the facsimile machine.

“Fax machines are our biggest competition right now,” Tabakin said. “They took the gravy away; there are no little jobs across the street anymore.”

But, he added, “you still can’t fax airplane tickets, legal documents or photographs that need to be reproduced.”

Stone, of Boston Bicycle Couriers, also pointed out that “when the refrigerator came into being, all the icemen thought they would go out of business, but there are still trucks that deliver ice.”

In addition, he said, “We’re a service industry.” Messengers, after all, don’t just deliver things, but wait in line for people, too.  “No one wants to stand in line at the Registry, so we do it for them.”

“What we’re doing is a throwback to the 1890s, when everyone used bike messengers. We’re just completing the circle,” Stone said. “I can only thank God the post office is so inefficient,” said Stone.

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

GRAPHIC: PHOTO, 1. Globe staff photo / David L. Ryan / A bicycle messenger rides through traffic on Federal Street downtown.  2. Globe staff photo / Barry Chin / Messenger Greg Luce of Brookline: “I know the city . . . .”

Copyright 1988 Globe Newspaper Company

Remember a while back that absolutely off base op-ed in the globe about sneaking up on cyclists in a hybrid and scaring the crap out of them (it featured talking butts if that helps you remember), well I tried to contact the Author Monique Spencer to get her involved in a more productive dialog…and she responded…sorta. I have been waiting for weeks for her to get back to me so I thought perhaps I would publish our correspondence in the hopes that it gets her to respond.

I contacted her after tracking down her email on one of her blogs (she hadn’t provided a way in the original op-ed for people to get a hold of her)

Hello

I run BostonBiker.org. I read your recent Op-ed in the Boston Globe and frankly found it, well less than stellar. However in the interest of good will I would like to invite you on a bike ride through the city. It doesn’t have to be with me, it could be with anyone, but I think that after you ride around on a bike for a while you might see things from a different point of view. Plus it seems a shame you are forced to drive in this town, driving in Boston traffic seems like some sort of punishment, and you seem like a nice lady.

Anyway if you are interested in responding to my response to your op-ed it is here, and if you would like to discuss bike stuff more feel free to check out my website (it has most of my views on bikes and bike related things) and let me know what you think.

BostonBiker.org

After about a week and a half I get this (poor in my opinion) response.

Thanks for your note, and yes, I did read your piece. Unlike many cyclists, you did not threaten me or my family, which is not a terribly persuasive way to make a point!

Unfortunately my cycling days are over, along with horseback riding, both activities that have given me great joy. Otherwise I would happily accept your offer. It would be fun to cycle Boston with someone who knows what they’re doing. I have to restrict my exercise to water.

Thanks for writing. I had hoped to start the road to a fair ground for everybody but after receiving 90 percent extremely hateful comments it’s hard for me to imagine helping that effort.

I’m glad you wrote,
Monique Doyle Spencer

Frankly that sounded like a blow off to me, so I tried again with a longer more detailed response…

Hello Monique

I would never think of threatening anyone, as a cyclist on the streets of Boston I have been honked at, had things thrown at me, told to “get off the road”, had people threaten to kill me, had people bump into me with cars, had people run me off the side, etc. I know the terror of having a couple thousand pounds of car miss you by mere inches. These things were done mostly by people who are trying to get to the next red light several seconds faster. I would never wish that on anyone.

I have to point out that in your op-ed you stopped just short of threatening violence against cyclists, you may not have realized this, but that is how a lot of people saw it. If you take a slow rider, or an inexperienced rider and you sneak up on them, say in a prius, and honk the horn loudly behind them, they can lose control of their bicycle, fall under the wheel of the vehicle and have bones forcible broken, or die. Imagine for a moment what that would be like, and you will see that it was not funny at all. I am not sure you took that into account when you wrote your piece. Like you said threatening people is not a terribly effective way to make a point.

I don’t want to mince words with you, I found your op-ed pretty off-base. I thought you advocated a “me first” attitude that in no way will make anyone’s life better on the road, and as I stated above I think you feed into the “cyclists don’t belong on the street, lets harass them” mentality. Weather you did this by design, or by accident makes little difference to people who read it without knowing you personally. Perhaps the fact that you received 90% hateful responses would indicate that you were unsuccessful in starting a dialog.

If you take some time to read through my other opinion pieces on my site you will see that we actually share views (on laws, on how they should be enforced and other points), I would love to think that we could come to some sort of middle ground. Perhaps we could meet over coffee and talk about this, or perhaps we could simply dialog over email. I would be happy to chat, I would also like to offer you the chance to write a follow up on my site. I don’t think you are a bad person, I simply think that you might not have considered all the implications of your writing, especially when it is published in a nationwide newspaper.

Just remember every person on a bike is one less person in a car taking up space on the road, more bikers = less traffic

BostonBiker.org

The ball is in your court Monique, I would really like to further this dialog, and if you have enough get up and go to bother to publish an Op-ed in a national newspaper you should have the courage of your own convictions to respond to a critic.

I read David Filipov’s newest article at the Globe with some amount of disgust this morning. For those who have yet to glance upon this masterwork of investigative journalism let me serve up some tasty snippets.

Boston has launched a high-profile campaign to become a friendlier city for cyclists. Now the question is whether bicyclists will become friendlier to Boston. On any hour of any day, Boston bicyclists routinely run red lights, ride the wrong way on one-way streets, zip along sidewalks, and cut off pedestrians crossing streets legally – even though bike riders are supposed to obey the same traffic laws as motorists. Sometimes, a bicyclist will do all of these things in one two-wheeled swoop. The city seems unable to stop it.

(emphasis mine)

Ahh yes, Boston cyclists scourge of the streets. I don’t actually disagree with the authors claims of wrong doing by cyclists. In fact I am just as annoyed and pissed off when I see cyclists running red lights (news flash, running red lights doesn’t make you faster…being faster makes you faster), mostly because I then have to pass their stupid asses as I take off after waiting at the red light, but also because I see them regularly muck up traffic, almost get run over, or fail to yield to pedestrians. In short the same numskulls who run red lights on their bikes, are the same people I worry about when in cars. So why might you ask was I so disgusted with this article?

In short the article is guilty of two things. One, it insinuated that only cyclists are breaking the law, and two, it tries very hard to neglect that different user groups produce different consequences when they break the law.

So to the first point, ‘only cyclists are bad’, lets take a look at some of the crack statistics work that the author did.

At that particular intersection, 12 out of 28 cyclists were observed ignoring the red light over the course of 45 minutes. Some cruised right through; others paused and then went forward. A dozen more rode along the narrow sidewalk, weaving their ways among joggers, people walking to work, and students toting instruments toward the Berklee College of Music. Four more cyclists rode the wrong way on Newbury Street, dodging oncoming vehicles.

…

On Wednesday, over the course of 40 minutes, 20 cyclists ran the light at Charles and Beacon streets; only one did not. Monday morning, over the course of 35 minutes at Copley Square, 12 cyclists sailed through red lights (five waited for green). Monday, during a half-hour at lunch time, 10 out of 23 cyclists ran the red light on Tremont Street at the beginning of Beacon Street, where tourists commingled with hurried business people. Ten more rode the wrong way on Tremont. Dozens more took the sidewalk, scattering walkers.

Nice, random sampling times, no methodology, no sampling of other user groups, tiny samples, in short these numbers mean nothing. They also fail to capture the entire picture. How many pedestrians walked out against the signal, how many cars failed to yield, how many cars failed to use turn signals, how many were speeding? I feel that a detailed multi-user group study of any intersection would show that every user group in Boston has a problem, and that problem is that they simply don’t give a fuck about anyone else.

If you are a pedestrian and you want to be “over there” and the little walk man isn’t showing what do you do? You look both ways (sometimes), if no one is coming (or often even if they are, cause ‘hey fuck it’ they will stop) and you step out into the street. You don’t care if you force the cyclist to move into heavy traffic to avoid you, you also don’t care if a bunch of cars have to suddenly stop to let you cross when you have absolutely no business being in the road at that time.

If you are a cyclist and you want to go through a red light, well ‘hey fuck it’, off you go. You have no regard for the fact that you might get run over, that you might hold up traffic, that you might strike a pedestrian that is crossing the street, that you might hit another cyclist that is following the law, that you might then cause a headache for the cyclists behind you who then have to deal with you when the light does turn green.

If you are a motorist and you feel like getting from point A to point B as fast as possible and you don’t feel like signaling, checking your mirrors, obeying the speed limit, looking before you open your door, yielding to pedestrians, giving cyclists room on the road, well ‘hey fuck it’ it’s your car and you will do what you want.

In short no user group is any more or less lawful than any other. They each break different laws in different frequency, but they are ALL breaking the law with great regularity and mostly because of the “hey fuck it” attitude that so many have in this city.

That brings me to point two. The consequences for different user groups breaking the law are not the same. When a car decides to run a red light, it carries a much greater risk than when a bike does. Similarly the danger to pedestrians who cross against the light are predominantly to themselves, with cyclists a close second, most motorists will not be physically harmed if they strike a pedestrian. All of these actions are illegal, and stupid, but the risk vs reward for each is different. If you are going to write an entire article about how unruly cyclists are, well then you should have lots of facts about how this behavior is dangerous to the public. Statistics showing the hundreds of deaths caused each year by cyclists running red lights, and the carnage caused by sidewalk riding. Don’t get me wrong, I think running red lights and riding on the side walk are stupid and shouldn’t be done, but in all honestly they don’t pose a major threat to public safety. However literally thousands of people are killed each year by or in cars. When a 4000 pound box of metal and glass gets going fast and doesn’t signal it’s turns, people die.

Publishing an entire article about one user group without putting it in context is disingenuous, and dishonest. There is already a strong pubic opinion that you “have to be crazy to ride a bike in Boston” or “bike riders are assholes.” Which is a horrible thing, biking in Boston can be a fun and relaxing activity. Bikers are not crazy, and biking doesn’t have to be a war of US v Them. The car lifestyle has brought us a lot of things, but the most obvious is obesity, congestion, pollution, sprawl , global warming, wars for oil, and as of late an economic crisis. People could do a fair amount of good by simply leaving the car in the driveway and taking the bike out for a spin.

This article was a simple attempt to get some ad revenue for the Globe, shallow sensational journalism lacking context or good research. But the fact still remains: Cyclists break the law, a lot. What can we do about that? The article itself, and the user comments are long on “this is the problem” and lacking completely the “this is the solution.” The solution seems to be two fold.

Education: You need to know what the laws are. This goes for drivers, pedestrians, and cyclists. You should have a deep understanding of what exactly you are supposed to be doing out there (check out MassBike’s website for a good run down of cycling laws if you are rusty, they just passed some new laws so it might be time for a refresher).

Attitude: Boston must put aside it’s “hey fuck it” (or even worse “hey fuck you”) attitude. What really keeps us all safe and happy out there is not the law, but the social trust. That little white line, or that little red/green/yellow light, isn’t what keeps you from getting run over by that truck. The trust you put into that truck driver to treat that light like it means something, or stay on one side of that white line is what keeps you safe. When you break the law what you are really doing is breaking the social trust that someone else put in you. You are saying to them “everything is chaotic you can’t count on anything” and that makes them mad, afraid and unsafe. If you are a cyclist you count on cars coming to a stop at red lights, otherwise you would never cross an intersection (imagine if cars ran reds with the frequency that bikes do). The entire system is based from the ground up on trust of strangers. Every time a cyclist runs a red light they are eroding that trust.

If each use group continues to erode the trust (by doing all the things mentioned above and more) then eventually the streets will be nothing more than a war zone, and whoever is fastest and toughest will get around, and everyone else will be road kill. Not a happy scenario, but also far from a likely one if some simple things are changed. But hey, at least we can count on the Boston Globe to provide us with poorly thought out, and poorly researched articles so that we can scape goat one group while ignoring the bigger problem. Thanks Boston Globe.

Okay, yeah, it’s out now. I’m coming out of the closet.

Sure I let people see pictures of my feet and I even went so far as to make a very identifiable bag. But I never posted anything that would really identify me…until now.

It’s on the internets, as the Boston Globe was at the last Boldsprints I went to. I’m not sure how I feel about coming out – it’s a little scary…but hey, for someone that slid down Mass Ave on her butt to get to the Middlesex, I don’t look so bad, right?

Awww will you look at those smiling faces! How could you not want to buy a bicycle from this man. Marty is an amazing guy, and I suggest you all start saving up your money and get one of these bad ass bikes from him asap!

Read all about him and other cool local bike biz in the most recent article in the Globe.

It was late at night and I was riding home, tired. The mild slope of the Boston University Bridge seemed like a pothole-strewn mountain, and the curve of Putnam Street to Harvard Square, with nary an inch to spare for cyclists, took forever. Then at Mount Auburn and Massachusetts Avenue, I saw a flash. A cyclist flew by, and I got a jolt of adrenaline.

The bike was like a greyhound, narrow and forward-leaning, the essence of motion. Its rider had a U-lock stuck in his back pocket and a black T-shirt over his shoulders. He sat straight up in the saddle, easily smoking a cigarette. Though I’d stayed back, he’d sensed my presence, and the cranks started to churn. His bike – unencumbered by derailleurs, levers, or even conventional brakes – leapt forward. In a moment he was gone, and I was on my own again.

I’d just met a member of the fixed-gear tribe.

Hey I had no idea I was part of a tribe! Fellow tribal members, lets go ride bikes!

They also have some purty bikes in a gallery.

Here is a small taste.

Here are three pieces found recently in the Boston Globe. Tip o’ the hat to Shane Jordan being mentioned and quoted in the second link.

Look Ma, no car!

Only one question remains for many area commuters: Is it possible to bike to work and get there alive? Boston has a horrible reputation on the national bicycling scene and for three good reasons: lousy roads, bad drivers, and car-centric civic attitudes.

Re-cycling effort

Getting on a bike for the first time since she was 16 years old, 42-year-old Priscilla Power rode 5 miles to her Wakefield office as part of her company’s “Bike to Work Day” last month. Though she remembered how to pedal, the inexperienced biker detoured through a Dunkin’ Donuts’ parking lot to avoid a busy intersection.

10 tips for cycling commuters

In Cambridge alone, the number of people bicycling has risen 70 percent, according to this recent story.