Newsletter - Cycling News | October
Sent: Fri, Oct 3rd 2008, 14:32
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Welcome to the October edition of the electronic newsletter from Life Cycle UK, the cycle promotion charity. In this issue:
Life Cycle Centre – grand opening
Website makeover
Bicycle black hole
Take a Stand
Chanel bike
Thank you, Doctor
Make an exhibition of yourself
Meet the team
Cycling Demonstration City
Wedding gift
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Life Cycle Centre – grand opening
It’s official! The Life Cycle Centre, our fully-equipped bike maintenance and repair facility is open for business. In September Dawn Primarolo MP Minister of State for Public Health and MP for the Knowle area where the Centre is based, cut the green ribbon and performed the opening ceremony.
Dawn Primarolo said "This is a fantastic scheme, which I am delighted to support. Life Cycle’s projects will give a new lease of life to old bicycles, which will really benefit people all over Bristol. Riding a bike can improve both physical and mental health and is a fun and accessible form of exercise. Thanks to Life Cycle, it will now be even easier to take up cycling."
The Centre is the home of Life Cycle's BikeBack project which recycles unwanted bikes and then passes them on – free of charge – to people on low incomes, refugees, job seekers and people with mental or physical health issues. It's also the HQ of our Bike Generation project which offers a range of bike maintenance training courses and cycling activities to disadvantaged young people.
We also us the Life Cycle Centre for BMWs (that’s Bike Maintenance Workshops!) one-day courses that show you how to set a bike up for maximum comfort, how to cope with a puncture, how to keep your brakes in good condition and your gears changing properly. You’ll get to use a proper tools and a cycle workstand. A place on a BMW costs £60 and includes spare parts such as inner tubes, brake pads and cables. Plus, all participants get a free copy of the Haynes Bike Book – the complete guide to cycle maintenance (usual price £14.99)
Visit our website for more information.
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Website makeover
As well as launching the Life Cycle Centre we’ve also given the Life Cycle website a bit of a makeover. It’s now easier to navigate around the site, get the latest Life Cycle news, learn more about our various projects request cycle maps or apply for free cycle stands. Huge thanks to Mike and Sam at Brightstorm for all their help.
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Bicycle black hole
Just what exactly was he planning to do with 2,865 bicycles? That is one of many questions Toronto police have been puzzling over since the arrest last month of Igor Kenk, the owner of a used-bike shop.
Mr Kenk’s legacy now fills a former police garage with a leaky roof. Organised by brand name and mostly resting on their handlebars, wheels pointed upward, are 2,396 of the bicycles that police say Mr Kenk either stole or arranged to have stolen.
The jumbled collection of bicycles suggests that Mr. Kenk is the unofficial world champion of bicycle thieves. His arrest provoked an outpouring of anger amongst the cycling community, some calling him “the most hated man in Toronto”. About 15,000 hopeful cyclists, some teary-eyed, have since scoured the Kenk collection in search of their missing bicycles.
Oddly enough, the police and many cyclists were aware that Mr Kenk’s little shop was a black hole that consumed stolen bicycles. Victims regularly discovered their missing bicycles there, and were often able to recover them, either through vigorous argument or for a payment of $30 or $40. While he had been arrested once before, Mr Kenk was acquitted because prosecutors could not prove that he knew that the bicycles in his possession had been stolen. After that, the police lost interest in pursuing him, and it became part of the culture in his neighbourhood to visit Igor to recover a stolen bike.
The only reason Mr Kenk was arrested was that bicycle thefts rose sharply in June, finally prompting police to take action.
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Take a Stand
It’s almost impossible to deter a really determined low-life specimen such as Igor Kenk, but there’s lots you can do to deter the casual, opportunist bike thief. Buy a decent D-lock (one that carries the Sold Secure endorsement) and always use it – even if you’re leaving your bike for just a few seconds. Lock up somewhere prominent, ideally to a proper Sheffield-type bike stand (which, incidentally, organisations can get free of charge from Life Cycle). And remember that all bikes have a unique individual frame number. This is the bicycle equivalent of a fingerprint. Make a note of it (it’s usually on the underside of the frame), take a couple of photos of the bike and register it online. The police check any stolen bikes they recover against this database and try to return them to the rightful owner.
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Chanel bike
Vogue magazine recently featured the latest stylish accessory from fashion house Chanel: a hand-finished, retro-styled, eight-speed bicycle. The bike is embellished with Chanel’s signature quilted leather look – on the special pannier bags and chainguard – and it sports the distinctive double-C logo.
The bike has been created to celebrate the heritage of the brand and to reflect founder Coco Chanel's love of sport. In the early part of twentieth century Chanel pioneered new, liberating designs of clothing that departed radically from the stuffy orthodoxy of the times. Doubtless she would be proud to ride the elegant bicycle that now bears her name.
Vogue advises style conscious women to add it to their Christmas lists now. And to start being very good indeed. The bicycle will be available in Chanel boutiques from December – priced at a modest £6,200.
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Thank you, Doctor
It’s unlikely to make the pages of Vogue, but Life Cycle recently made its own modest fashion statement! We’ve invested in stylish apparel for all our bike mechanics who run Doctor Bike surgeries. They’ve been kitted out with natty white coats and smart polo shirts and they now look as professional as the service they offer. In fact some of them have been getting fan mail…
Hello Life Cycle,
Would just like to thank you for the support which you gave us for our Lena Street Party on Saturday. George was the Bike Doctor on the day and worked like a man possessed from 3pm until nearly 7pm on Saturday afternoon. He had a constant long line of cycles and cyclists which he dealt with very well. The fact that it chucked it down at regular intervals didn't put George, or the Street Party off! We had a great time!
Thank you George!! Thank you Life Cycle!! Lets do it again next year!?
All the best, David
(Organiser of September’s Lena Street party)
Hi Alex
Sorry not to see you to say goodbye and let you out – I got caught up on a call!
I just wanted to say a big thank you for the 2 Doctor Bike surgeries that you did for us. Everyone has been really pleased with their results and thought that you were fantastic.
Hope to see you again soon.
Best wishes Laura Rowley
(Travel Planner, Burges Salmon Solicitors)
Dear Life Cycle
On behalf of the University I would like to thank you for Alex And José’s [mechanics] excellent work at out Travel to Work event last Friday. They did an absolutely fantastic job on the bikes and coped with the lunchtime rush. I think they may also have saved the life of one particular gentleman who was riding around without any brakes!
Thank you for being able to organise the two mechanics at short notice – they were a definite highlight to the event.
Regards, Anna
(Travel Plan Assistant, University of Bristol)
Thanks so much to the kind 'doctor' who sorted my (potentially lethal) bike today in Easton. He sneaked off before I had a chance to shake his hand enthusiastically!
I am well chuffed - thanks. Andrew
(Cyclist)
If you’d like a dapper Doctor Bike to run a cycle surgery at your community event or at your workplace simply send us an e-mail or phone the Life Cycle office.
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Make an exhibition of yourself
Preparations are in hand for the opening of the new City of Bristol Museum in 2011. Curators are putting together an exhibition on the theme of movement that will show how people have travelled around the city over the years. They’re looking for volunteers to be interviewed.
If you're a regular commuter cyclist and you’d like to share your experiences of cycling in Bristol contact Andy King at the museum.
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Meet the team
Life Cycle UK’s mission is to help more people take up cycling and we do this through a range of practical services such as cycle training, teaching bike maintenance, providing maps and information, and giving away free cycle parking. We also run various special projects such as tandem rides for blind and visually impaired people, and bike activities for disadvantaged youngsters.
Here we introduce you to one of our lovely team members…
Name: Tamar Thompson
Role: Training manager
Tell us a little about yourself and what you do:
I started working for Life Cycle (then called Cycle West) back in the year 2000 (!) as a project worker developing a cycle training programme for adults. We soon realised that there was a lot of demand for child cycle training too. I travelled the length and breadth of the UK seeing what other providers were doing and then got down to writing and creating Life Cycle UK’s unique approach to teaching all-comers how to ride a bike.
We now offer training to anyone and everyone from 5 years up to 80 years old, to those who can’t ride a bike at all right through to those people who want to train to become instructors themselves. The majority of our work is in the former Avon area but we also work throughout the UK. I have recruited a fantastic team of cycle training instructors who are enthusiastic, hardworking and professional (and lovely!)
Best thing about working for Life Cycle:
My instructor team who are out and about every day in all weathers really making a difference to the quality of people’s lives helping them to enjoy cycling more.
Would you like a cycle training lesson? Simply give us a ring. It’s £30 – but we’ll refund every penny if you're not delighted!
Do you do much cycling?
I cycle to work (of course) and I use a cycle trailer to transport my little boy as much as I can plus some leisure riding too.
What bike(s) do you own?
A Thorn Raven Tour and an electric bike but my favourite is a re-sprayed 1960’s step-through, sit-up-and-beg frame with a 5-speed hub gear, front hub brake and mountain bike sized wheels, plus a wheel lock and a rack. It is so lovely and so comfy for riding around town or to ride with a skirt on. I also have a part share in a Tony Oliver tandem which I really like for longer distances and a part share in a Brompton.
Favourite cycle journey:
Right now, anywhere where it’s not raining!
Tamar's top cycling tips:
Invest in the best wet weather gear you can afford that is designed for cycling and you will never regret it… don’t forget you can buy waterproof socks too!
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Cycling Demonstration City
You might recall that, back in June, Bristol was nominated to be the country's first Cycling Demonstration City and was awarded a government grant of £11.4 million. Look out for a BBC TV programme fronted by the architect and keen cyclist George Ferguson. He travels to the Netherlands to see how the city of Groningen was transformed into a cycling nirvana using a similar amount of money. Will Bristol, he wonders, have the courage, the vision and the skills to do something just as exciting?
The programme is on on BBC One at 7.30pm on Wednesday 8th October. It will also be available on the BBC iPlayer for seven days after the original transmission and there'll be a phone-in debate on some of the issues raised by the programme on BBC Radio Bristol at 9am on Thursday 9th October.
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Wedding gift
We received a cheque in the post recently together with a lovely letter. We were so touched that we thought we’d share it with you…
Dear Life Cycle
We recently got married (30th Aug) and chose you as one of two charities to receive a proportion of our wedding present money. So, please find enclosed a cheque for £100
We are both daily cyclists and very much support the work that you do – and even have one of your bike stands in our front garden!
As some of our guests were travelling some distance to the wedding we also see this as off-setting some of the carbon emissions, since we wanted to try and make our wedding as Green as possible.
Please put this towards whichever project is most pressing.
With best wishes. Anja Dalton & Steve Dale, Bristol.
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Over to you…
You don’t have to get the chequebook out to support Life Cycle’s work. Simply use the Everyclick search engine. Every time you search the Net they make a tiny donation to Life Cycle UK.
To start using Everyclick, you need to click here. Then away you go. You’ll see the donations clock up remarkably quickly.
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Fri, Oct 3rd 2008, 14:32