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By Johnny, November 30, 2009 3:43 pm

For those of you who need a jump start in your holiday spirit go out and participate the first night of Los Angeles Departmenet of Water and Power’s 14th Annual Festival of Lights at Griffith Park this Thursday, December 3rd. Apparently this is the only night you can ride your bike to view each of the displays. After that, you’ll have to hop on a shuttle to see the display from December 4th until December 17th. From December 18th until December 30th is for car traffic.

I’ve only been there by car in previous years and never by bike so this will be an exciting experience. I think out of the 3 choices, this would be the best way to see the display since you dictate the pace and can stop and go as you please without impeding traffic. It’s ironic how LADWP is touting that they are going green when they only have one night dedicated to bicycle traffic and 13 nights for cars. Having car free nights with the shuttle is a good step but it could be better. Perhaps powering each light display like how folks at Copenhagen is doing it for their Christmas tree might be better?

Photo provided by sgroi on Flickr

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By Johnny, October 26, 2009 11:28 pm

This is the coolest thing I’ve ever seen. Kudos to Trondheim, Norway for implementing this bike lift to encourage more bicycling in their city. Thanks for @bikeoven for bringing this up. Not sure if this will work too well if you’re riding fixed. I suppose you would have to take your left leg off the pedal.

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By Johnny, October 7, 2009 1:00 am

Boulder Bike Story from Bikes Belong on Vimeo.

Found this on the BikeMore! LA blog. Like Ron, I too am waiting for LA to be more like Boulder, CO. I wished I had known about this when I went to Colorado 3 years ago. Of course, it was freezing then and when I visited Boulder, I didn’t remember seeing that many bicyclists around. Not to mention I was not in the bicycling scene as I am for the past 2 years so I did not seek out the bicycling scene. It was already strange being one of the few Asians there.

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By Johnny, October 6, 2009 2:27 pm

I’m floating around at various parts. Video compliments of Stephen Box.

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By Johnny, September 30, 2009 12:42 pm

As mentioned earlier, I was planning on attending the first Crenshaw Crush ride on September 27, 2009. I got up early Sunday morning to prep for the ride. Had to pump my tires and get my stuff together for the journey down to Leimert Park. Rode out to the North Hollywood station and took the train down to Hollywood / Vine stop. Got on the 210 bus line with the bike. It was the first time I ever used the front bicycle racks on a bus. Fairly straight forward and easy to use. The bus driver was patient. I’m think it’s because of the fact that it was a Sunday and not alot of people was using mass transit.

As soon as I get on, we pass Sunset and Vine, we see 2 guys getting into a fist fight on the sidewalk. They were still arguing and just as the bus started to leave, the fists started to fly. Obviously, I didn’t know how that was resolved. Interesting start to the morning to say the least.

The bus made it to Vernon and Crenshaw and I made my way to meet with the group. Finally had a chance to meet Jeremy and Ron who are LA Greensters who was going to lead our ride. I’ve been following Jeremy’s blog for a few months now and realized I’ve been following Ron’s blog as well. I also met Stephen who runs the SoapBoxLA blog as well as Enci who is an actress and director of the upcoming film, “At What Cost”.

For the sake of not being repetitive I am not going to do a ride report. A more comprehensive ride report can be found here on the LA Streets Blog. This covers all our stops and activities as well as historical background is detailed in the ride report. I can say I had a fantastic time riding through the neighborhood and experiencing it at a different point of view. Met very interesting people and was treated to some snacks on the way.

After the 21 mile ride, we made our way back to Leimert Park to take pictures and celebrate. I actually head back up towards Venice Blvd and San Vicente with Jeff (don’t know his last name). He was helpful in pointing me out on where to go since I was heading to a friend’s place.

Click on the picture above to see the photos of the ride.

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By Johnny, September 26, 2009 8:06 pm

• Crenshaw Crush ride
• LAGREENSTERS.com
• South Los Angeles, CA
• photo by Jeremy Grant
• editorial use allowed with credit
• contact jeremygrant.com

I’m going to be there tomorrow morning for this ride. Hope to take some pictures and learn about South LA.

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By Johnny, September 23, 2009 12:02 am

Monday marks the completion of my first week of living car-free. So far I have commuted from home to work strictly on my bicycle. I had some after-work events like 2 happy hours and a MANAA meeting in Chinatown. Each time I had to ride home later than normal but was able to do so without any issues. On the weekend, I had a housewarming party over at the Wilshire district on Saturday and visited my folks on Sunday. All of that accomplished without driving my car.

Saturday, I rode the Xtracycle over to the party along with a money tree, my Timbuk2 messenger bag, and a foldable chair (since she asked visitors to BYOC). The ride wasn’t too bad for the most part. LA is surprisingly hilly. I got caught on some mean hills and was fortunate to ride some down towards Wilshire Blvd from Los Feliz. I got there in about an hour and half. Hung out until about 8PM and started my journey home. I primarily took 4th St to La Palmas Ave which runs parallel with Highland. I pretty much had a quiet ride without much traffic through very “rich” neighborhoods. I eventually made it to the Hollywood and Highland Metro station and hopped on the train towards NoHo. Luckily there wasn’t alot of people taking the train at the time so I was able to take the elevators down with my extra long bike and walk right on the train without worrying about blocking the door. Even getting off the North Hollywood station was a breeze.

On Sunday, I had told my parents I was going to visit since I didn’t the week before. I had to swap some bicycle tubes at the Flying-Pigeon store. They had a dim-sum ride in the morning and I got there just in time to join the huge group of people who participated. I also learned that there is a bike path in the area. Very convenient to ride back and forth from Highland Park to South Pasadena. Along the way we had a few things happen. I opted to stay behind to look over folks and make sure no one was left behind. The first incident, we had some fainting. Luckily a few of us was there to hold her up and seat her on the side. She ended up walking back to the shop after eating some candy. I’m guessing she was diabetic. The second incident was that a lady who had not been riding for 12 years had fallen down while trying to ride onto a sidewalk. Fortunately, she scrapped her knees but nothing serious. Myself and another fellow rider rounded up about 5 riders who were straggling at the end and made sure everyone reached their destination. I bid farewell and went home to see my folks. On the ride back, I rode non-stop. Found some new routes and had to turn around because of some closures to the LA River bike path. It took me about 2 and half hours to ride home. A lot longer than I expected. All I knew was that I was exhausted and thirsty coming home. I had to go to a 7-11 to pick-up some Gatorade to recharge.

7 more weeks to go! This week will have some birthday dinners in Pasadena so we’ll see how that’s going to work out. I’m planning on taking the train and having friends pick me up and drop me off. It should be interesting so I’ll report back again.

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By Johnny, September 15, 2009 11:30 am

So beautiful, simple, and important.

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By Johnny, September 11, 2009 4:05 pm

This past weekend I decided that I needed to take another big step in the future car-free lifestyle. I went out and bought me a FreeRadical & Longtail Kit by Xtracycle from Flying-Pigeon LA. This would convert my current commuter bike to a longtail bike. Essentially my bike becomes a Sports Utility Bike (S.U.B.) in which I can haul can carry load up to 200lbs. Impressive huh?

The kit sat in my garage until this Wednesday when I decided to begin working on my conversion. In the process, I rip apart my current commuter bike, a 1997 Specialized Rockhopper. I removed the rear brakes, derailleur, chain, rear rack, wheel, and rear fender.

I was ready to add the FreeRadical on. The instruction called for the installation to happen upside down first so I can mount it easier. The thing to note about this product is that they have very creative names for some of the parts. For example, there’s a “Boss Hog”. That’s the part that holds your bike’s rear drop out in place. Very unique.

After the FreeRadical was mounted I was told to install the derailleur and rear brakes back. That wasn’t the hard part. The hard part was re-cabling the rear brakes and rear derailleurs. Adding the FreeRad essentially stretches your bike. The brakes was pretty easy but the derailleur was a struggle. I had issues getting it out of my grip shifter and installing it back into place. The cables started to come undone in the process which caused lots of painful pricks to my fingers. Let’s just say they are very tender at the moment. Imagine getting a needle stuck into your thumb. Yes, painful. The worse part was that I ran out of the cable because I had kept on cutting the cable to make it more “neat”.

It was also a pain to get the handlebar grip off but to do it three time was tiring. Luckily I learned that a little bit of Simple Green on the inside makes it slides on and off nicely. I had to postpone the finish one more day so that I can buy longer cable, cable housing, and some grease for the grip shift (since I started wiping that away while figuring how assemble it again).

Nevertheless, I continued with my build Thursday night and got all the cabling corrected. I proceeded to tune my derailleurs. Which was surprisingly easy compared to the ordeal I had gone through. The tough thing last night was attaching the extended chain together. I had to devise a way to hold the derailleur arm so that it gave me enough slack to connect the chains together. Took me a good hour to get the chained hooked in.

I assembled the rear fender and added the Longtail kit. Attached the snap deck and the secured the bags securely to the Vbars. Pretty easy compared to what I had gone through earlier. I installed the kickstand and oiled the chain. I was pretty proud of my construction. Unfortunately I couldn’t take it out for a spin because by the time I was done, it was 1 in the morning and I was exhausted.

I couldn’t wait to check out the ride this morning so I took it in to work. Friday’s are usually my “fixie” day (Fixie Friday) but I’ve been riding the fixie into work Wednesday and Thursday so I was pretty much done with that plus I wanted to really ride this beast I put together.

This rides very well with the center of gravity moved a little further back. The bike now absorbs shock a lot better than before and the ride is a bit more comfortable. Why I did notice is that the chain started slapping the frame. I’ll have to find a way to protect the frame and may have some Teflon tape that my co-worker is willing to let me use. He’s got a Xtracycle as well and said it worked very well for his bike. I’ve gone out a few times today to meetings and can’t help but admire what I built every time I walk by it. I can’t wait to get back on the seat and ride it home today/tonight. One small build for myself but one big step towards one less car on the road.

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By Johnny, September 4, 2009 11:21 pm

I’m so glad this week is over. It’s always hard to get back into the groove of things after a vacation. But luckily I was able to do so this week. I’ve been trying to sleep early and wake up early. I’ve been somewhat successful. I’ve gone to sleep around 11 a few times but most of the time I’ve been turning in around 12 to 1. Waking up at 6:30 to 7 has been consistent.

Why the sudden shift in habit? Over my vacation, I had the opportunity to finish a book called SIMPLIFY YOUR LIFE: 100 WAYS TO SLOW DOWN AND ENJOY THE THINGS THAT REALLY MATTER by Elaine St. James. This book had suggested many interesting ideas which I wanted to practice. Her book came highly recommended by a blog I’ve been following over at Zen Habits. I realized that I need to do some simplification in my life which would include some decluttering as well as keeping things simple. I believe this will help me focus more on what really matters to me the most.

I realize I’m pretty fed up with the way we Americans consume. We over consume and we’re not ashamed of it. We waste things in the process and we still complain that we don’t have enough. So by simplifying I will get rid of everything until I am left with the things I am happy with. I am not going to let the media dictate my lifestyle and what I “need”. Many people know I am planning to be car-free in the near future. That would certainly help my simplification cause but I’m still working some things out before I pull the trigger and sell my car. The plan is to try to get rid of it by the end of year.

Just to digress, I got to ride my bikes from Tuesday to Friday. Yes even through the smoggy conditions but I promise I took it easy until Friday. I took the fixie out to work on Friday morning just to discover that I suffered a flat about 1/4 mile away. I ended up walking back and instead of driving my car, I just hopped on my next bike and rode into work. I was a bit late but no later than when I went into work after 9am. I was sweaty and hot but I freshened up when I got to work and was enjoying the a/c. Because of Labor Day holiday, we were allowed to leave early. I ended up leaving around 3PM and rode in the blistering sun. Came home sweaty of course but I immediately changed into shorts and went back out to the grocery store to buy oat bran. I was going to bake muffins but needed oat bran. Again I chose to go by bike instead of car. It only took about 30 minutes to go to the supermarket and back. Well worth my time in the setting sun.

I finally got to wash my car when I got home because the sun had set and the temperatures began to fall. I was so ambitious that I spent more time fixing my flat, clean my bike, and oil the chain. The fixie is running like new. I made dinner and baked my muffins. It felt like I did so much today! If this is what they mean about doing things that matter then definitely sign me up with this simplification movement.