Joe Chapline
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Joe Chapline
ParticipantFor the reasons Arlingtonrider gave, plus it could be embarrassing for my employer (Arlington) if I got a ticket for breaking the law on a bike. I keep hoping for smarter lights that won’t keep anyone — cyclists or motorists — waiting when there’s no one coming. I did recently find out that it’s legal to turn left on red from a one-way street to a one-way street, which helped me with my commute. However, motorists probably think I’m a scofflaw when they see that; and I’m not sure if the cops know about it.
ParticipantNice to see some love for pedestrians on a bike forum.
ParticipantThat’s just outside of Arlington, just north of Alexandria, my map says it’s in Fairfax County. So that rules out official channels through Arlington County, but the property manager may be receptive to a suggestion. Good luck!
Participantcatamountred6:
Welcome to the forum. What’s the address of Skyline 6? If it’s in Arlington, and if bike parking is required by site plan requirements, there might be a way for Arlington County government to encourage the property manager to separate the bike racks from the smoking area. It’s a long shot, though. A more direct approach would be to contact the property manager yourself, and/or ask your employer to speak to the property manager.
ParticipantGreat photo. Would it be OK if I posted this picture and caption on CommuterPageBlog?
ParticipantThat’s a nice rig, almost a cargo bike. Mt. Nittany Wheelworks? I don’t know the shop, but I’m a Penn State man myself. Mt. Nittany was much bigger then; mountains naturally erode over time.
ParticipantSorry hoyawolf. It’s a long shot, but I hope you get it back.
Participant@Dirt: I have one of those Kryptonite Fahgettaboudit chains. That requires a pannier — or a trailer.
Participant@Diane Kean 265 wrote:
Wow, thanks for all the feedback!
Does the style of wheel make the bike heavier? Currently I have knobby mountain bike tires, thinking I would like something a little smoother but not the thin road tires.
Diane, I agree with other posters that you don’t want knobby tires for your commute, and that resistance is a bigger issue than weight. Something that hasn’t been mentioned is wheel size. Your bike with the knobby tires probably has 26″ wheels. Road bikes have larger-diameter wheels — designated 700c, although I’m not clear what’s being measured. Anyway, there are two common sizes of wheels, and you probably have the smaller one. I think you’ll find a road bike or hybrid with the larger size wheels and road tires (not knobby, not too wide) will take much less effort to ride on pavement.
I also want to throw in here that it’s very important that the bike fit you. You need to get the right frame size, for starters. Beyond that, the frame geometry and handlebar style will affect your riding position, and what works for you is a matter of preference. I don’t know any way to test this out except to ride some bikes.
One more note, about budget — make sure you figure in the cost of the accessories you want (lights, rack, maybe fenders, maybe kickstand). Some bike packages come with that stuff, some don’t.
ParticipantDiane, I agree with jabberwocky that you should ride a bunch of bikes. That’s one reason I mentioned bike stores — although I buy almost everything online, I don’t recommend buying any bike without riding it. I wanted to add — before you go out and do anything rash — that you don’t necessarily have to pick from what’s in store. Although it might look like there’s a lot of bikes in there, once you do narrow it down to the type of bike you’re looking for and your price range, there probably won’t be very many. But if you find out what brands the store sells, you can then look online at ALL of the models those manufacturers offer. (The bike store won’t have them all.) Do some research online. All of the technical specifications will be there, and you can see the exact difference between models at different price points. If there’s something you’re interested in, or several, you can ask the dealer to get one in for you to look at. That’s what I did.
ParticipantThere ARE a lot of questions to ask to narrow it down. You already said “new,” that narrows it down some, unless you mean “new to you.” A lot of commuters ride “beaters” for their commute, but then a lot of them have other bikes at home.
I don’t have room for a fleet of bikes; I have one all-purpose bike that cost about $600. In my opinion, you have a lot of good choices at that price point, but it won’t be crushing if it gets stolen. (I leave it locked up at the Baltimore train station all day when I commute. I’ve had one stolen, but now I have bigger locks.)
If you’re going with a new bike, I suggest seeing what bike stores are convenient to you, and what brands they sell. (Usually a given bike store will sell about 4 brands.) I like the fact that I can go back to a store I like and can get to easily, when the bike needs service. So picking a store or two might help narrow down the manufacturers you look at first. I would have looked at Breezers, but there wasn’t a dealer around. I ended up with a Specialized, which I love.
ParticipantWelcome to the forum, thanks for registering. (You too, AJ.) I’m going to try to move this thread to “Bikes and Equipment” and we can have a good discussion of what kind of bike you should get.
ParticipantYou can also think of public transportation as backup options. If you lived in Alexandria, for example, you could bike to work most days, but be able to take the train when it’s too icy to ride. There are also several Metrobus routes that serve Crystal City. There’s more information about transit and bike options here: http://www.commuterpage.com/art/villages/crystalcity_tran.htm
ParticipantYou will have lots of options, and here are some more. Crystal City has a Metrorail (subway) station, served by the Blue and Yellow lines, and a Virginia Railway Express commuter rail station. If you want to consider a multimodal commute, you could look at neighborhoods in biking distance of a Metro or VRE station. Metro: http://www.wmata.com VRE: http://www.vre.org
ParticipantBikeArlington.com has been around for years; it’s one of a family of websites offered by Arlington County Commuter Services (ACCS). They’re all “dot-coms;” I couldn’t tell you if “dot-org” was even considered. That’s a decision that was made way back when. The forum is new, and it’s ACCS’ first one. Since we were under a deadline and had no experience with the forum software, we decided to have it hosted by a company that specializes in hosting forums. So the forum isn’t on the same server as BikeArlington.com. It may be that we still could have made the URL BikeArlington.com/forum or /forums, and it may be that we could still do that. I’ll look into it when I have the time. But when I set it up, the basic instructions I had in front of me included choosing a free domain name. Being in a hurry, I didn’t look for other options. I chose BikeArlingtonForum.com. To make the forum .org when the website is .com would have been more confusing, I think. BikeArlington.com/forum does redirect to the forum.
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