This was inevitable. With cities like Chicago and New York increasingly going out of their way to roll out the red carpet (or, in Gotham’s case, painting a chartreuse lane) for cyclists–you half expect Mayor Bloomberg to bypass his beloved 4 train for a Huffy mountain bike–the biker backlash has begun.

Some San Francisco zealots have argued that squeezing cars into fewer lanes to make room for cyclists is bad for the environment, reports the Wall Street Journal. Reporter Phred Dvorak (uh, listen to Phish much, “Phred”?) said the anti-bikers, spearheaded by unemployed activist/blogger Rob Anderson, are arguing that the bikers get way too much leeway in an era when everyone’s concerned with saving the environment and assuaging our national addiction to gasoline.  

Cars always will vastly outnumber bikes, he reasons, so allotting more street space to cyclists could cause more traffic jams, more idling and more pollution. Mr. Anderson says the city has been blinded by political correctness. It’s an “attempt by the anti-car fanatics to screw up our traffic on behalf of the bicycle fantasy,” he wrote in his blog this month.

Anderson likens San Francisco’s substantial pro-cyclist community to Islamic fundamentalist suicide bombers.

Mr. Anderson and Ms. Miles have teamed up to oppose a plan to put high-rises and additional housing in a nearby neighborhood. He continues to blog from his apartment in an old Victorian home. “Regardless of the obvious dangers, some people will ride bikes in San Francisco for the same reason Islamic fanatics will engage in suicide bombings — because they are politically motivated to do so,” he wrote in a May 21 post.

That’s just not going to win Mr. Anderson much support.

With more and more people opting to bicycle to work, the streets are getting a lot more crowded, reports the Sunday “Styles” section of the NY Times, and tensions are running high between cyclists and motorists.

Goosing the anxiety just a bit are cellphones and PDAs in the hands of motorists–and, occasionally, cyclists, for that matter–and the fact that a lot of these cyclists are new to the road, thanks to expensive gas.

Psychologists and traffic experts say the tension rises from many factors, including summer road rage and the “my hurry matters more than your hurry” syndrome, exacerbated when drivers feel captive to slower-moving cyclists.

“I’m working on a project,” he told the driver. “I’m taking photos of people who almost kill me.”

I have to say, I’ve been riding the bike to Hummerville station for a little over a year, and–knock on wood, then do it a second time, please–motorists have been pretty decent to me. The large majority of my ride takes place on quiet streets where I’m the only one around; only the home stretch, around four blocks, involves any kind of traffic. I can sense the frustration of cars slowed up behind me, but to date no one has beeped, given me the finger, shouted, etc. (Please, knock on wood again.)

Another thing that strikes me is just how wide a berth cars give me when they do opt to pass. Typically, they’ll be entirely in the opposite lane when they pass, when in fact, they only need about a third of that space.

Better safe than sorry, I guess, for them and for me.

[image: Hiroko Masuike for The New York Times]

I had five minutes before I had to hop on the bike this morning, navigate the sleepy streets of Hummerville, and make my 8:16 train.

I sat with Little G as we set up yet another “Big Car Party,” which sees 8-10 of his larger cars and trucks (White Hummer, Green Monster Truck, Kitty Cat Car [don’t ask]) arranged in a circle, talking about Big Car/Truck things (bad gas mileage, their mutual irritation with small cars and light trucks).

The skies darkened. The Missus suggested I hit the road a little early to avoid potential rain. I considered the suggestion and kept playing.

The skies darkened some more, and it looked as though the clouds were about to burst. I said my quick good byes and bolted the Big Car Party.

A drizzle fell as I stepped outside.

“Do you want a jacket?” The Missus asked.

“No,” I said, reasoning that I could beat the heavy rain in the time it took to retrieve a jacket from the front closet.

Just as I exited the driveway, the hard stuff came. Large drops soaked my shirt and pants. Puddled water kicked up off my back tire and soaked my ass, which is a wonderfully fresh feeling with which to start the day.

Twice I jammed on the brakes as I decided to return home, my wet brakes squealing loudly and unpleasantly. Twice I decided to forge ahead.

The rain actually slowed back to a drizzle within a minute, but I was good and soaked.

I pulled into the station parking lot and, for the first time since pestering Town Hall for a bike rack, opted for one of the makeshift spots under the overpass to provide a little shelter for my graphite horse.

I’d forgotten about the giant puddle–aspiring Great Lake, more like it–in front of the overpass and felt the water soak through my left shoe.

With a wet shirt, soaked ass and drenched left foot, I stepped onto the 8:16–the A.C. a constant reminder of every drop of water touching my skin.

Unlike White Hummer and Green Monster Truck, at least I’d saved a few pennies on gas.

A dramatic plan to promote bike-sharing–city-owned bikes stashed around the city for residents to use–kicks off today. The Forum For Urban Design has made 30 bikes available, reports the New York Times, through Monday in the East Village, West Village, Chelsea and SoHo.

Reports William Neuman:

“This is a really big deal,” said Wiley Norvell, a spokesman for Transportation Alternatives, an advocacy group for cyclists, pedestrians and transit riders. “In the realm of things you can do to boost bicycling in a city, bike-share is at the top of the list.”

Similar programs are also in motion in Paris and Washington. Participants pay a small annual membership fee, then have access to bikes stationed strategically all over the city.

Vital city officials appear to be on board.

“We’re really just dipping our toe in the water here, but it works in an awful lot of places, so we want to see what we can do here,” said the city transportation commissioner, Janette Sadik-Khan. “We’re a world-class city for biking. We’re flat, we’re dense, it’s ideal and I think we can create a world-class bike network.”

NYU journalism prof Mitchell Stephens embarks on a bike commute from Ossining to Greenwich Village in the latest issue of Westchester Magazine (this is not to be confused with the psychotherapist who bikes from Pound Ridge to the Upper West Side in the January edition of Westchester Magazine).

Stephens has about 2 hours and 45 minutes to get to his office to meet some dubious Norwegians, and encounters no shortage of bumps in the road as he follows the North and South County Trailway rail-trails into Gotham. Among them: a dead end in Tarrytown, onerous hills in Yonkers, and finding a suitable bridge into Manhattan.

There comes a point in every great bike ride when thoughts turn to Lance Armstrong. It had arrived. Lacking only a motorcycle escort, a cheering crowd, and allegations of drug use, I flew ahead. Not a soul, of either sex, passed me. (True, I didn’t pass anyone either; indeed, that day I can’t say I spotted many—or any—other Westchester-Manhattan bicycle commuters.) My legs pumped piston-like. My eyes stared resolutely ahead. Nothing hurt excessively. I’m not generally known for speed; however I raced—that’s the only word for it—under another highway. Could it be the Cross County already? Time? Why only about ten o’clock!

Connecticut Governor Jodi Rell says the 380 new M-8 cars on order for Metro-North’s New Haven Line should be modified to allow for bike storage, reports the Journal News.

Rell told New Haven Mayor John DeStefano that the design can be modified because the first of the new cars are not scheduled for delivery until next year. The changes will be made by the state Department of Transportation.

She’s getting resistance from the Connecticut Rail Commuter Council, who says commuters’ asses should have first priority over bikes.

Some Westchester residents and local-business figures are pushing for a four-mile bike lane along what’s known as the Platinum Mile, reports the Sunday NY Times, just outside White Plains. Despite the fanciful name, the Platinum Mile is actually a stretch of office parks that borders busy I-287; Morgan Stanley and Starwood Hotels are among the major employers based there.

According to Patrick Natarelli, a county planner, writes Annie Correal, the bike path would lie directly on Westchester Avenue, the service road for I-287, but would probably be separated from traffic by a barrier and outfitted with bridges or tunnels around intersections.

Not surprisingly, the plan has run into some money woes, but county exec Andy Spano has urged the planners to apply for a $3.5 million federal grant for the project.

An intrepid Times reporter tested the potential corridor on their bike.

On a recent afternoon, Michael Oliva, the Mid-Atlantic coordinator for the East Coast Greenway Alliance, drove with a reporter along Westchester Avenue. Mr. Oliva said that he had ridden his bicycle on the route and that the wide shoulders and gentle curves of the service road made it an easy ride. A curtain of trees mostly separated the road from the freeway. The only real problems were a few intersections, he said.

“It was O.K. riding back there, but here you can see how tricky it would be,” said Mr. Oliva, pointing at the intersection of the Hutchinson River Parkway and I-287. “People coming off the Hutch and trying to get on 287 are just flying across here.”

First it was the TV writers, then it was the Broadway stagehands.

Now it’s strike three, as we say around these parts, as the French transit workers have walked off the job, locking up much of the country in an ugly gridlock mess.

A little background: the French strike the way you and I shower. Last time I was there, we were stuck at the airport for several hours because the pompiers–the guys who pump the gas into the planes–had decided to strike. I did my best impersonation of an Ugly American–something about crucial surgery scheduled back in the States–to no avail.

So the French are certainly prepared, writes the NY Times, and have taken to walking, roller-blading and biking; many of the 10,000 rental bikes around Paris have been grabbed, reports Katrin Bennhold.

At issue are the early retirement benefits for “a small group of public sector workers.” As it appears to work in France, when one group goes on strike, everyone else decides to strike to show their support. Like if the pompiers were to strike again, it’s likely the dry cleaners or the speech therapists might strike in a show of brotherhood and bonhommie, as they say ’round those parts.

Many bikes around Paris had messages for the strikers. One outside the St. Lazare station, writes Bennhold, read: “Stop the strike. Today I pedal because of the strike and it works me up.” 

That ought to show them.  

I love this. The Times reports on a social experiment that’s putting free bikes on the streets of Manhattan for people to use and return. The five-day project is sponsored by the Forum for Urban Design, with 20 bikes available at Kenmare Street and Cleveland Place in SoHo, for up to 30 minutes. Bicycles can be dropped off at a number of locations, including Washington Square Park and Tompkins Square.

The experiment ends tomorrow, and is being watched by the city’s Department of Transportation. “We are studying it with interest,” a spokesperson tells the Times.

 The free bike-as-mass transit model of course works in much of Europe; a Paris program will see more than 10,000 bikes at 750 depots around the city, the Times says.

Maybe this can be my next project for Mount Pleasant.

It being MLB All-Star week and all, we came through with a most memorable commute today–in fact, the greatest commute in our nine months of riding the rails. Yes, the elusive 1-hour door to door was a reality today for the first time, as the planets (and trains) were aligned just so, and we cruised through the work doorway a mere 59 minutes after departing the leafy nether regions of Westchester.

Some dozen things had to fall into place perfectly. A few of them:

* No congestion on Rte. 100 delaying my crossing

* No one coming at the stop sign at Elwood, so I didn’t have to break stride on the bike

* Ample space along the lock-your-bike section of the fence (thanks to a forecast of 95 and muggy, for sure)

* Train on time at Hawthorne

* Train two minutes early into GCT (Editor’s Note: Metro-North kicking serious ass in the first-annual Trainjotting Puts Metro-North to the Test arrival time study).

* Minimal congestion on steps descending to 6 train.

* Subway waiting on platform

* Lack of sick passenger on train in front of us.

Fifty-nine freakin’ minutes, folks. It’s mornings like these where I start thinking I might actually be able to do this for the next 30 years.