L.A.’s Bicycle District
I was excited to see a post on Metroblogging Los Angeles mentioning the Bicycle District this morning, as well as a link to that blog post from LAist.
What is the Bicycle District? About six months ago on an internet forum, L.A. Fixed, Sally aka Fixpert dropped the idea of establishing some kind of bicycle neighborhood in the area around Heliotrope and Melrose (aka HelMel or HelMo) where there is already a thriving core of bike activity comprised of the Bicycle Kitchen, Orange 20 Bikes, the cyclist-run vegan restaurant Pure Luck, and the cyclist-friendly and ever-popular ice creamery Scoops. As it is, that area isn’t really a part of any established neighborhood, lying somewhere between Wilshire Center, K-Town, Little Armenia, Silver Lake, and Virgil Village (who knew that Virgil Village is an official neighborhood, anyway?).
On the L.A. Fixed thread, we tossed around a few names. I had actually already been thinking of that area as the “Bicycle District” in my own head, like the Fashion District or the Toy District in downtown, so I shared my suggestion online and it caught on. Finally, to solidify the moniker Sally put together a sign and posted it at the corner of Heliotrope and Melrose on July 1st, 2007, during the Bicycle Film Festival block party. I made a batch of spoke cards and handed them out to anyone who wanted to represent.
Fast forward to a few months later and it seems the Bicycle District is finally spreading beyond the small internet circle of L.A. Fixed members. Fixpert lists several other references to the name that have appeared in the past, but these latest appearances on Metroblogging and LAist are encouraging since they’re read by a pretty wide audience. Sean Bonner, who wrote the Metroblogging post, even suggests that City Council folks consider making the neighborhood official.
I don’t think I’d go that far. While it would have the positive impact of demonstrating Los Angeles’ commitment to promoting alternate modes of transportation, I prefer the idea of the Bicycle District as being something underground. Additionally, there’s already a movement to designate that area as “East Hollywood”, and their ethos of recognizing and celebrating the area’s diversity is certainly more appropriate. For my part, official or not, I’m just happy that there’s a place a cyclist can call home. (Although I do live about four blocks away from HelMel in Virgil Village so the neighborhood is essentially home for me anyways.)
Filed under Bicycles & Scooters, Los Angeles | Comments (4)Rawland Cycles
I was in my favorite bike shop this weekend to pick up some parts for my latest project of adding gears to my formerly single-speed mountain bike. The owner, Chris, had just gotten back from Interbike. Knowing my tastes for all things BOBish, he had to share with me this frame from a vendor he had seen at the trade show and about which he was really excited.
It’s a 650B all-rounder frameset from Rawland Cycles that comes as either a single-speed/fixed model or a geared model. It looks a little more rugged than some of the other 650B options out there now at the same price point like the Kogswell PR or the Rivendell Bleriot. Whereas those models I see as being good townie and randonneuring frames, the Rawland seems like it would like something a little dirtier, like some easy single track or some cyclocross. This is all purely speculation, of course, as I’ve only seen pictures, but the compact geometry, which I tend to hate for road bikes, works really well for mountain bike applications since it provides more standover clearance. The Rawland also uses cantilever brakes as opposed to caliper brakes, like the Bleriot. I’d trust the better stopping power cantis can afford more off-road. Though I suppose to be fair, the Rivendell equivalent for this would be more like the currently-in-development Bombadil, their 650B mountain bike.
Check out the biplane fork! They used to have those on old Bridgestone RB-1’s, I believe. I haven’t ridden one, but I hear it helps dampen road vibration. In fact, I’d say this bike is a modern descendant of the Bridgestone XO-1, which has somewhat of a cult following, but with more nods to modern design than Rivendell would normally go for (the compact geometry, threadless headset, and TIG-welded construction for instance).
And look at that track end with the built-in bottle opener and viking dragon! I am a sucker for little details like that. In fact, there’s a lot of viking and Norwegian theming going on. The single-speed model is called the Olaf, and the geared version is the Sogn.
I really have no need for a new bike, but if money and space weren’t an issue (and oh how they are right now), I’d be all over the Rawland bikes.
Filed under Bicycles & Scooters | Comments (5)
