SPEAKING OF BICYCLES – EJAY FARRALES

INTRODUCTION:

Hi everyone, my name is ejay farrales and as you may know or not know I am from San Francisco, California and today I will be talking to you guys about bike culture in the great city and my hometown San Francisco. The reason why I wanted to talk about this with you guys, is being in a first year seminar that involves bicycles, I wanted to give you give you information about the city and its bike culture.

With that said, I will be talking to you guys about 3 main things. number 1, what bikes are best suitable for the city. number 2, some information about the SF Bike Coalition (in which all of us signed up for temporary memberships not too long ago) and their strategic plan through 2017. and number 3, just some random things you should know about biking in the city as we are getting closer to the point in which we will start going on expeditions.

SO here it goes

My first point, what Bikes are best suitable for the city?

SO if you’re Commuting around the city during the week; doing longer road rides on the weekends: If you’re going to mix in some longer rides, it’s worth investing in a good road bike.  (go up hills, absorb vibrations

Mostly just for going around town on short-ish rides or for commuting:  Since you’re not going to be riding long distances, I’d optimize for a bike that can handle the annoyingly bumpy streets.  For this, I’d recommend a steel frame bike and a hybrid bike tire; Steel will absorb the vibrations from the road really well while the hybrid tire is wider than a road tire so you’ll feel a bit more in control.  I wouldn’t do a mountain bike as those tend to be super heavy and will not be any fun when climbing hills.

lastly, if you’re just planing on riding around the mission or Haight street for a couple of hours I’d recommend a fixie bike (or single gear) bike.

NOTE: WITH ANY PURCHASE OF A BIKE, BUY A BIKE LOCK!!!!!!!!!!!! THIS INVESTMENT IS CRITICAL AS IT WILL SAVE YOU A LOT OF MONEY, 20 BUCKS FOR LONG COMPARED TO REPLACING A WHOLE BIKE.

SHOW MAP, so here we have the green lines which represent the multi use and all purpose roads, so on these paths you can run on them, bike, scooter, bike, walk a dog, etc. on the purple lines, there are bike lanes as well however, these lanes are shared with roads and cars.

SO the next thing I will be talking about is the SF Bike Coalition and their goal

Their goal thru 2017 is to half at least half of San Francisco Biking and a quarter to be biking frequently, or regularly. In order to try to achieve this, there was four focus points. First focus point was to EXPAND AND CONNECT OVER 50 MILES OF BIKEWAYS, NEIGHBORHOOD GREENWAYS AND OTHER CONNECTIONS THROUGHOUT SAN FRANCISCO, TOWARD MAKING THEM ATTRACTIVE AND COMFORTABLE TO PEOPLE OF ALL AGES, FROM AN 8-YEAR-OLD TO AN 80-YEAR-OLD. Second Focus point was CATALYZE SAN FRANCISCANS TO TRY BIKING MORE OFTEN. By doing this they would close down streets on the weekends for families to bike and really push a bike to work day and bike to school day, among other things. The 3rd focus point was to INTEGRATE BIKING INTO MORE SAN FRANCISCANS’ LIFESTYLES TO MAKE IT AS EASY AND COMPELLING AS POSSIBLE FOR PEOPLE TO BIKE MORE OFTEN. (pause and show stats) and finally their last goal was to INCREASE SAFETY OF BICYCLING ON SAN FRANCISCO’S STREETS BY WORKING WITH STREET USERS MOST LIKELY TO CREATE SAFETY ISSUES.

FINALLY, I will be talking about were just 10 things all san francisco bikers should know. As you guys know, we will all soon start going on expeditions soon in this class. So these are some tips you guys can take away when we do start going on these expeditions.

• Biking is the best way to get around San Francisco.. its true, there is simply too many people and not nearly enough parking spots. I drive and it is terrible, parking is terrible traffic is terrible and the time to commute from one place to another is about the same amount of time you would take to park a car. Biking is easy and convenient, of course if it is not raining.

• The Wiggle is your best friend. This is very true, for those who do not know the wiggle. The wiggle is a bike route in SF (SHOW MAP) that gets you across the city to downtown thru golden gate park and around masonic. This bike path is one of the most effective bikes path and most used in SF.

• Know the rules of the road. (self explanatory)

• Get a good lock. (very true, like mentioned bike theft is huge in the city, so get a good lock and done

• The best routes that aren’t the Wiggle: (map out the best routes for you, be prepared and map it out, it will help make your journey easy and enjoyable)

• How to take your bike on transit.

• Ride across the Golden Gate Bridge, at least once. (this I strongly recommend especially those not from the bay area, the golden gate bridge is a landmark and on a nice day beautiful for bike rides as well as the beautiful view on the other side)

• Car-free places to practice riding: (refer to map)

• You don’t have to wear anything special to bike.

• San Francisco bike riders aren’t all the same.

CLOSING REMARKS

THANK YOU FOR LISTENING AND THAT CONCLUDES MY PRESENTATION.