Your latest bike purchase?

[hozn]

@DismalScientist 84501 wrote:

C) C’mon there’s only two. Who cares if they intersect?

Well, there’s E/W Glebe, N/S Glebe and then Old Glebe. Or so I thought, but apparently there is actually a N Old Glebe and a S Old Glebe which do not even remotely touch.

We live on one of the smaller roads that apparently was cut up by the larger ones as things evolved. I think there are 5 or 6 non-continuous segments of our street out there, probably more including the “south” variant. Can’t imagine trying to navigate around here pre-google maps (well, pre-mapquest).

[DismalScientist]

@hozn 84515 wrote:

Can’t imagine trying to navigate around here pre-google maps (well, pre-mapquest).

Oh, please…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arlington_County,_Virginia,_street-naming_system

[mstone]

@DismalScientist 84526 wrote:

Oh, please…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arlington_County,_Virginia,_street-naming_system

Yeah, Arlington has a quasi-system, which ends up being useless because of all the disconnected streets, streets that aren’t actually straight but are arbitrarily named e-w or n-s, all the “exceptions”, etc. E.g., 26th St S intersects with 28th St S, which intersects with Army Navy north of 24th St S, which is close the amusingly (or perversely) named 23d Rd S which runs south of and parallel to 23d St S. In some parts of the county where there’s an underlying grid the system mostly works (except for the exceptions) but that’s not true for most of the roads in the county. Other than as a historical curiosity to entertain people at a happy hour I’m not sure what the value is of bringing up the naming system–certainly, it’s not something that visitors can use to find an unfamiliar location.

Quote:

Can’t imagine trying to navigate around here pre-google maps (well, pre-mapquest).

Everyone kept some of those map books in the car. It sucked. The map books didn’t fit in a bike bag, so you had a folding map which sucked even more because they either weren’t indexed or were indexed in microprint. But you did stand a much better chance of getting useful directions when you asked a random person for help.

[chris_s]

@mstone 84531 wrote:

Other than as a historical curiosity to entertain people at a happy hour I’m not sure what the value is of bringing up the naming system–certainly, it’s not something that visitors can use to find an unfamiliar location.

It’s possible actually – I’ve done it when my smartphone battery died. I have some “personal business cards” that I use for advocacy networking and I had the “block numbers on east west streets” chart printed on the back for just such an occasion. It isn’t terribly efficient (because you often end up running into dead ends due to the mediocre grid connectivity) but it’s very doable.

[mstone]

@chris_s 84536 wrote:

It’s possible actually – I’ve done it when my smartphone battery died. I have some “personal business cards” that I use for advocacy networking and I had the “block numbers on east west streets” chart printed on the back for just such an occasion. It isn’t terribly efficient (because you often end up running into dead ends due to the mediocre grid connectivity) but it’s very doable.

Wandering around until you find what you’re looking for doesn’t count as “doable” for most people (even if you start out heading in the right direction), but different strokes for different folks and all.

[dasgeh]

@chris_s 84536 wrote:

It’s possible actually – I’ve done it when my smartphone battery died. I have some “personal business cards” that I use for advocacy networking and I had the “block numbers on east west streets” chart printed on the back for just such an occasion. It isn’t terribly efficient (because you often end up running into dead ends due to the mediocre grid connectivity) but it’s very doable.

It’s not hard at all. If you know the alphabet, and can count syllables in words, you can get a pretty good idea of where any address is. If you know which streets do run through (e.g. Wilson, Washington, Quincy, Barton) you can get within a few blocks fairly quickly.

Of course, I enjoy navigating London with an A-to-Z to I may be an anomaly.

[consularrider]

@dasgeh 84566 wrote:

…Of course, I enjoy navigating London with an A-to-Z to I may be an anomaly.

I still like having that type of reference volume for cities I visit. Plus, I may have been the only one navigating Kill Bill V11.1 with a printed cue sheet (at least when I was solo between the second Lyon Village rest stop and the first pass on N Montana).

[thucydides]

@mstone 84531 wrote:

Yeah, Arlington has a quasi-system, which ends up being useless because of all the disconnected streets, streets that aren’t actually straight but are arbitrarily named e-w or n-s, all the “exceptions”, etc. E.g., 26th St S intersects with 28th St S, which intersects with Army Navy north of 24th St S, which is close the amusingly (or perversely) named 23d Rd S which runs south of and parallel to 23d St S. In some parts of the county where there’s an underlying grid the system mostly works (except for the exceptions) but that’s not true for most of the roads in the county. Other than as a historical curiosity to entertain people at a happy hour I’m not sure what the value is of bringing up the naming system–certainly, it’s not something that visitors can use to find an unfamiliar location.

It’s imperfect, sure, and I can name some other examples where it gets really crazy. But if you know the system you really can get by fine sans map of whatever flavor. My son is about as directionally challenged as you can get. He was 11 before he could reliably find his way to and from our elementary school, which is a quarter-mile away and requires one turn. So last summer we started biking to far flung areas of Arlington and I’d say, “Okay, find our way home.” Invariably there were some deadends here and there but he quickly figured out how to do it. I only intervened when he was taking us onto a road we had no business biking on. “Uh, no, we’re not taking the on-ramp to 395.” He now can find his way home from anywhere in Arlington. Cross ten feet over into Fairfax however….

[chris_s]

@thucydides 84585 wrote:

So last summer we started biking to far flung areas of Arlington and I’d say, “Okay, find our way home.”

I am totally stealing this idea as soon as my son can read.

[rcannon100]

@thucydides 84585 wrote:

So last summer we started biking to far flung areas of Arlington and I’d say, “Okay, find our way home.”

I am waiting until The Kid is old enough to do these type of things. I figure its probably about a decade before this is safe to try.

(BTW The Kid is working every weekend now at Revolutions. Please feel free to go in and embarrass him. I hear he was harassing Bike Arlington employees Tuesday evening. )

[Tim Kelley]

@rcannon100 84675 wrote:

I am waiting until The Kid is old enough to do these type of things. I figure its probably about a decade before this is safe to try.

(BTW The Kid is working every weekend now at Revolutions. Please feel free to go in and embarrass him. I hear he was harassing Bike Arlington employees Tuesday evening. )

Not so much harass, as give a friendly Hello as he passed me going up Military. I think I get the most Rule 5 points for pulling the baby trailer with the 29er on that ride.

[DaveK]

@rcannon100 84675 wrote:

I am waiting until The Kid is old enough to do these type of things. I figure its probably about a decade before this is safe to try.

(BTW The Kid is working every weekend now at Revolutions. Please feel free to go in and embarrass him. I hear he was harassing Bike Arlington employees Tuesday evening. )

He’s a beast on the bike (and in running shoes!). Someone needs to get him into a racing development program.

[rcannon100]

@DaveK 84693 wrote:

He’s a beast on the bike (and in running shoes!). Someone needs to get him into a racing development program.

Any recommendations for this summer?

It is one of the reasons he wants to go to Colorado for skul.

I promised him if he got himself a job, I would buy him some proper shoes.

[hozn]

What size shoes does he wear? I likely have some pedals + cleats he can have.

[Tim Kelley]

@rcannon100 84697 wrote:

Any recommendations for this summer?

I promised him if he got himself a job, I would buy him some proper shoes.

He should buy himself a pair of shoes with that sweet employee discount…

For this summer have him go out and just ride a ton. Then we’ll drag him out on some group rides too and see what he’s got!

(And the Greenbelt Training Series would probably be a great intro to racing…)

[Author]

Posts