Today's first story is a great article from worldchanging.com about how suburban housing isn't as cheap as you think. They link to a map by the Housing and Transit Affordability Index that graphically shows what housing costs when you figure in a daily commute to the main part of town. Turns out living in the McMansion in the burbs costs a lot more than living the city.
Then 2 great stories about communities supporting bicycling and public transport. First a new free rent a bike program on the campus of Ohio State University available to students, faculty and staff. Story by way of The Lantern of Ohio State University. Secondly is a story about the Capital District Transportation Authority of Albany, New York giving away 5000 free transportation passes that can be used on April 22nd. The Times-Union also mentions that the passes can then be planted because they are imbedded with wild flower seeds.
Next, The Minnesota Daily reports on the acquittal of Augustin Ganley on charges of assaulting a police officer. Ganley was participating in a Critical Mass ride and was one of 19 people arrested. The officer accused him of yelling at him and then throwing a punch. Many riders had cell phone cameras that were taking video of the event which proved pivotal to the defense.
And finally we give you this, a story about a unicycle being stolen from the circus.
Cycling
Just a reminder that the San Diego Critical Mass ride for March is taking place on Friday at 7:30pm. Meet at the fountain in Balboa Park outside of the Reuben H. Fleet Science Center. Be sure to have your lights (white in front, red in back), some water and a good attitude.
Come find me, I’ll be the guy in the yellow jacket with a video camera.
I want to start out by apologizing profusely for not mentioning Critical Mass last Friday. Despite being excited for it all day, I forgot to mention on this blog. I’m sorry.
[For those of you who don’t know what Critical Mass is, check Wikipedia, they have a good write up there.]
Leap Year Mass last Friday was a great time. The announced count was 475 riders and my mileage calculation was around 35 miles (which is pretty long for Mass). I, of course, did not have my camera this month, but promise that I will post at least pictures if not video of March’s event.
At some point I hope to figure out how to give the route graphically, possibly through Google Maps, but for the time being, the following word description will have to do:
This years event, as usual, began at the fountain in Balboa Park and we started out heading west across The Prado. We then headed south into the Gaslamp Quarter and then out along Harbor to Ocean Beach. From there we went north to Mission Beach and took the boardwalk to Pacific Beach. From there we headed down Garnet Ave through the bar district and to the east shore of Mission Bay. Followed that back to Pacific Coast Highway which took us back downtown.
All in all a pretty good Mass. I witness very little hooliganism and there seemed to be only a few crashes. The vehicular traffic was unobtrusive and there was no police action.
For those of you interested in attending future Critical Masses, the meeting point is the fountain in Balboa Park in between the Natural History Museum and the Reuben H. Fleet Science Center; on the last Friday of each month at 7:30pm (we don’t usually hit the road until 8ish). Everyone is welcome; this month we had people from 12 to 65 years old riding everything from BMX to single speeds to vintage road bikes and hardcore mountain bikes.
I’ll post a reminder here before next month’s event.
