[PotomacCyclist]

Did anyone mention the old Alexandria Canal? It used to connect the C&O Canal in Georgetown with Alexandria. It ran through Alexandria County (now Arlington).

The canal was used from 1843 to 1886. Apparently the section in modern-day Arlington County ran along S. Eads St. for at least part of its route. I don’t think any of the canal is visible today.

https://alexandriava.gov/uploadedFiles/historic/info/history/OHAHistoryCanal.pdf

Some of the abutments of the Aqueduct Bridge and a pier are visible in the Potomac River near Rosslyn and Georgetown. [The Tidal Basin and Lock was excavated and restored in Alexandria in the 1980s. This is part of the Alexandria Canal Center.]

All the other structures of the canal were removed or buried.

[PotomacCyclist]

After mapping a lot of racks in Arlington and DC over the summer, I took a break for a while, to focus on other activities. I also thought it would be a good idea to avoid certain neighborhoods during the summertime crime wave. Some of the victims were random targets, not those involved in criminal activity already or acting aggressively. It didn’t seem smart for me to spend a lot of time riding or walking around in the hot spot zones multiple times a week.

Now that school has started and the weather is cooling down, the crime rate is likely to fall, as it usually does (whether it’s a bad year for crime or not). I might go on some RackSpotter runs again shortly. I still have a set of notes about which neighborhoods to cover, and which streets in those areas that I’ve visited before.

[PotomacCyclist]

I added more bike racks in central Baltimore, mostly on Charles St. near Penn Station, and around the convention center. Someone had already mapped two bike rack locations next to Penn Station. Other people have added a lot of bike racks at Fort Meade, Odenton and Anne Arundel Community College. And bike racks from Annapolis to BWI. We’re gradually filling in more of the Mid-Atlantic areas on the map, outside of the immediate DC suburbs.

I found it easier to take photos (on a camera or phone), then type out brief notes about the bike racks on my note-taking phone app. Then I mapped the locations on RackSpotter back on my home computer. It’s difficult to map bike racks outside of the immediate DC area on a phone. The map will re-set frequently, centering the screen back on Arlington, instead of on the other city or area. Since the map started in Arlington and is primarily used by Arlington/DC-area residents, this makes sense. But if the goal is to have the map become a national tool, it would be useful to have the option to set a home area in the Settings.

Perhaps the user can type in the home city and save it. Then when the map resets, the home city appears, not Arlington VA. The default setting could be Arlington, But it would be nice to have the option to change the setting. This might be a better approach than setting up a GPS-based location service. Some of us turn off GPS on our phones because it can drain the battery charge rapidly.

[PotomacCyclist]

Additional programming notes:

I think there was live streaming coverage on the Richmond 2015 website, but I didn’t discover it until just now:

http://richmond2015.com/live/

Now, I can only find a few promotional videos for the championships, but no race videos.

They do confirm that the Sun. Men’s elite road race was broadcast on CNBC.

FUTURE BROADCAST SCHEDULE

Mon. Sept. 28, Wrap-up Show, Universal Sports

Sun. Oct. 4, One-hour broadcast summary on NBC. Obviously they won’t provide in-depth coverage of each event with only one hour for the entire race series.

[PotomacCyclist]

To be fair, Arlington does have many “cool” things and events, some successful, some not as successful. Not all of them bike-related though. We do have the Marine Corps Marathon, the Army Ten-Miler and the Air Force Association Cycling Classic. (The Artisphere was an attempt at coolness, but not as successful.)

[PotomacCyclist]

It’s about 335 miles from Pittsburgh to DC on the bike trails.

[PotomacCyclist]

http://www.amtrak.com/bring-your-bicycle-onboard

Info about bikes on Amtrak, including specific routes, number of bikes per train, reservation required or not, fees and rules.

[PotomacCyclist]

No national TV coverage this weekend, except maybe Universal Sports (which Comcast still doesn’t carry).

Sat. Sept. 26
Men’s Jr Road Circuit, Women’s Elite Road Circuit

Sun. Sept. 27, Men’s Elite Road Circuit

[PotomacCyclist]

I mapped a few bike racks at Camden Yards.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]9709[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]9710[/ATTACH]

[PotomacCyclist]

@PotomacCyclist 124097 wrote:

The Leaderboard has been displaying the following error message recently:

Fatal error: Call to a member function fetch_assoc() on a non-object in /var/www/rackspotter.com/htdocs/leaderContent.php on line 24

It only occurs on my computer: Google Chrome. It displays properly on the Android mobile browser.

[PotomacCyclist]

I rode around the airport a few times when I mapped the bike racks for RackSpotter. No one ever said anything. I passed by some security personnel and other airport employees. I didn’t even get any “go away” or “you don’t belong here” looks. But I stayed off the main circulator roads. I rode either on the sidewalks or on the low-traffic side roads at the airport.

[PotomacCyclist]

You can’t spell EPO without goa… uh, never mind.

[PotomacCyclist]

Spotted on S. Eads Street last night

[ATTACH=CONFIG]9701[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH=CONFIG]9702[/ATTACH]

[PotomacCyclist]

Too bad they aren’t opening in Pentagon City, Crystal City or Potomac Yard.

[PotomacCyclist]

The latest weather forecast for Sept. 30:

Partly cloudy, 81F high, 61F low
25-35% chance of precipitation in the afternoon and evening

[Author]

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