Fences and Rabbits

12/29/11 #242 27m

I had been out of town for a few days which kept me off the bike, but gave me a looking at all the bicyclists in Sadik-Khan's New York City. There are indeed a lot more bicyclists out there, and - in general - they're moving and advancing in the desired direction while the cars are stuck in traffic. There's a great variety of bicycles and bicyclists, of course, and the two surprises were that a lot of Chinese-food delivery bikes are electric-assist, and that the gasoline-powered mopeds of the 1970s have been replaced by quite a few electric-only mopeds.

Rude 27 miles in 38F tonight, a very nice day. Started at the Bastille and rode around the Casino and the Stadia to the 40th Street Bridge. Took Butler St. and Railroad St. to the Cork Factory and the Strip Trail and rode to the Point. There was a fence across the trail at the location shown below, it was there the last time I was here and I'm not sure what they're trying to accomplish. The fence did not seem to present a barrier to anybody's movement.



Rode the Mon Whorf Trail and surfaced near the Smithfield St. Bridge, and took the Jail Trail to the Hot Metal Bridge. I rode the (recently re-opened) Baldwin Borough Trail to almost the Glenfield Bridge, and then reversed northbound.

Took the SouthSide Trail and the Station Square Trail, enjoying the full measure of daylight (sunset today at 5:01 PM, oh yeah!) and the Ft. Pitt Bridge. As I descended off the Ft. Pitt bridge by the blockhouse and crossed Point State Park, (which is a great speedy transition, you catch a little bit of air in the descent) another cyclist came across the Portal Bridge and we were pretty much a DAT, he was in just front of me and I chased him up the Ft. Duquesne Bridge, it was great to have an unexpected sprint and very effective to have a rabbit to set the pace. This may have all been internal dialogue, who knows if he even realized I was behind him.


I got off the bike at the Bastille at 5.20 pm, a very nice ride.