Bicycle and Ped Happenings.

BPAC (Bike and Ped Advisory Committee) happened on Wednesday night and there were some interesting items.  These include recent bike count data, a parking day event (where parking spaces are reclaimed as room for people not cars), and the upcoming Nevada Bicycle and Pedestrian conference.

I'm feeling a bit lazy about typing, so here some shots of the handouts. 

Sorry, the bike count pics refuse to rotate this morning.

You'll just have to turn the phone or monitor.

Definitely what parking spaces should be used for.

This is a cool local conference and it's free.  You do have to register if you want to attend.  I'll have more on it in a bit.

Trainer classes.....old school!

New Adventure Cycling route released - 518 miles of off road fun in Idaho!

Just found this new route release over at Adventurecycling.org.  518 miles of off pavement riding....and hot springs to boot.  The write up below is totally stolen from Adventure Cycling....all credit to them.

Adventure Cycling is excited to announce the release of the Idaho Hot Springs Mountain Bike Route Maps!

Maps are now available for Adventure Cycling Association’s Idaho Hot Springs Mountain Bike Route (IHSMBR). The brand-new, two-map set guides cyclists through the breathtaking landscape of central Idaho along a spectacular 518-mile off-pavement route, offering four substantial singletrack options and featuring access to more than 50 hot springs in the Gem State.

The first IHSMBR map section features the main, off-pavement route — a looped route that primarily follows dirt roads for 518 miles, with a few stretches of pavement in the mix. Cyclists planning a trip on the main route need only to have a basic understanding of mountain-bike riding technique. However, cyclists attempting any of the four singletrack options, featured on the second, supplementary map section, should know their own ability and prepare for challenging conditions. Some sections of the singletrack are expert-only riding (or hike-a-biking for those who aren’t experts).

The Singletrack Options Map features 228 miles of singletrack, which is a departure from anything we’ve offered before. Riders who choose to ride any of the four unique singletrack sections should be prepared to face river fordings, unmanicured trails, downed trees, and plenty of hike-a-bikes. This can be daunting to some, but for those seeking a true backcountry experience with epic views, primitive camping, and mountain biking, it can also be incredibly rewarding.

Hike-a-biking on the singletrack options

We know you're as excited as we are to get out and ride the IHSMBR this summer. For those who have never bikepacked mountainous singletrack before and are thinking about attempting these sections, Adventure Cycling Cartographer Casey Greene, creator of the route, recommends 5 ways to prepare for the singletrack:

Do some off-bike training before your trip

This can include hiking, running, climbing, backcountry skiing, or upper body strength training. The point is to mix it up and get you body used to different scenarios so when it's late in the day and you're faced with a 1000-foot, off-camber hike-a-bike, you’ll be able to make it to your planned destination.

Lower your mileage expectations

First, figure out the mileage you’re accomplishing on dirt roads in a day. Then, to be safe, cut that mileage in half, or even a third to plan your mileage for these singletrack options. It all depends on the conditions you encounter on the trail — the conditions will dictate how fast you can move. For instance, one week a trail might have tons of downed trees, the next it may be cleared.

Take it easy

Don’t kill yourself out there. If you’re red-lining it up a climb early in the day, you may run out of juice before making it to your destination, which could be a sweet hot spring. Consider hike-a-biking to save some energy, and take lots of breaks if you need to — especially to stop and enjoy the scenery.

Go as lightweight as possible

It’s pretty simple: The less weight you carry, the easier it is to carry that weight up mountains.

Bring extra food

Trail conditions may force you to be out longer than expected. It will ease your mind to bring an extra half-day's worth of snacks.

Rough trails, river fordings, and downed trees are some of the obstacles riders will face
on the singletrack options.

At this point, I hope I haven’t scared everybody away from attempting these singletrack options. They are hard, I’ll give you that, but they also travel through some of the most spectacular country I’ve ever pulled a bike through. Some of the descents are world class, as are some of the hot springs. I could go on and on about an awesome view here, or a good fishing hole there, but at the end of the day, I think it’s best to let everyone pick up some maps and go discover central Idaho for themselves. I don’t think you’ll regret it.

Post and photos by Casey Greene

To celebrate the release of our newest mountain-bike route, and our first-ever route featuring singletrack, we'll be giving away two complete IHSMBR mapsets this week. For a chance to win a mapset, simply comment on this blog post. We'll draw two winners at random on Friday. The winners will be contacted via email. 

SPREAD THE NEWS:
Online press release: http://bit.ly/idahohotsprings
Tweet: New 518-mile off-pavement cycling route provides access to 50+ hot springs and beautiful wildlands in Idaho: http://bit.ly/idahohotsprings
Facebook/Newsletter: Maps are now available for Adventure Cycling Association’s Idaho Hot Springs Mountain Bike Route. The brand-new two-map set guides cyclists through the breathtaking landscape of central Idaho along a spectacular 518-mile off-pavement route, offering four substantial singletrack options, and featuring access to more than 50 hot springs in the Gem State. http://bit.ly/idahohotsprings
—
BIKEPACKER is written by Casey Greene and Paul Hansbarger, Adventure Cycling staff, guest bloggers, part-time adventure seekers, and gear nerds alike.

Ten things every cyclist should do!

I found this over at dirtrag.com, buried several pages back.  While it's great from a mountain biking standpoint alone.....I'd argue it could be framed from any type of cycling you enjoy.  Either way it's a good 10 things to do list.  How many can you check off?

The list:

1)  Build a bike
2)  Ride at night
3)  Ride in the snow
4)  Ride in another country
5)  Sleep next to your bike
6)  Ride a new trail
7)  Cross a mountain range
8)  Ride in a bike race
9)  Visit a bike park
10) Ride to the sea



With varying degrees of success I'll lay out my list....

1) I definitely built up wifey's Soma from scratch and building an xtracycle probably counts.

2) I've done tons of night riding (although most of it on roads).....the most memorable is probably the only time I went night riding on a mountain bike. The grade 3 shoulder separation that resulted and the quality time in the emergency room at 2am did not make this a popular idea with wifey!

3) Peavine is awesome for this.

4) You pretty much have to ride a bike at some point when your in the Netherlands.

5) Technically, I slept right next to my bike in a snowstorm.  So what if I was in my truck camper.  I have many tent nights in Moab and on Cycle Oregon right next to the bike for street cred. 

6) This one is a gimme....everyone who rides, rides new trails.

7) I don't think I have this one.  Maybe during Cycle Oregon last year....I'd have to check the route.

8) Sagebrush cyclocross series last year.

9) I haven't ever been to a bike park....I'll have to hit Northstar this year.

10) Nope...never biked to the sea....adding to the to do list.

Pay to play parking...and you probably have the right tools to avoid it!

If you haven't heard, the city of Reno has a sorted history with parking meters.  Only a few years ago, it was pretty much free parking in most places in Reno (unless you wanted to park in the downtown parking garage).  With the tightening economy, they eventually put in parking meters on all the downtown spaces.  Then they got fancy and wanted a smart system that could tell if a spot was being used and had local computer terminals.

Here's a picture of the former...and the later....which turned out not to work too well, and was scrapped at a rather large cost to the city.

Once the fancy system failed, they returned the old meters  (which worked just fine) to some of the high traffic areas.  However, we still hadn't spent enough $$$ messing around.  They argued it was just too inconvenient to have to carry change to use a parking meter (the horror)!  So, this week we got round three parking meters....basically the same thing we had originally, but they take credit cards.

While this is probably a really good solution, the city sure has wasted a ton of time and money to try to make money of downtown parking.

If you want to steer clear of the whole mess, just ride your bike.  The parking is always free and almost always closer to your destination than if you drive!  The other up side to all these new parking meters, is each one provides an additional free place to lock up your bicycle!

Stellar weekend approaches....where will it take you!

Ok, kids.  It's gonna be an absolutely awesome weekend.  This should mean some blue bird groomer runs, delving into the back country for some hidden fresh snow, or an epic bike ride.  What's it gonna be....

Whatever it means for you....be sure to get out and enjoy it!

Intersection design that works for Bikes, Peds, and Cars!

Just saw this one over at BikePortland.org.  Give it a look, it's actually a pretty well thought out idea for how to design better intersections for everyone.  It does favor a separate cycletrack style approach to design which I have mixed views about.  But hey, if they don't put a yield sign at every driveway intersection to the cycletrack (like we do out in Sparks) they work pretty well!