Cruisers, low-riders and choppers

The bicycle has become the most fashionable way of getting around town. With summer here, there's little excuse not to get on two wheels and take in Warsaw. The Veturilo urban bike hire scheme has proved wildly popular - there's a marked increase in bicycle sales (new and used), and being on two human-powered wheels is increasing seen as healthy, ecological and trendy.

Mainstream hipsterism has settled on the fixie as mount of choice; minimalism, lightness of weight, commitment - swiftness, instinct and fluidity at the expense of comfort. Fixed gear, single speed, one (or in extreme cases no) brake, a light frame designed for the track. I've written about these over the past four years.

Today, we witness a new cycle culture taking root in Warsaw - that of the beach cruiser. This is the antithesis of the fixie. Based on 1930s,'40s and '50s American designs, beach cruisers are slow, heavy, laid-back, comfortable rides, with big fat tyres (up to 3 inches/75mm separating rim from road), sprung mattress saddles. The aesthetic comes from motorcycles of the era; these bikes being more for show than for go.

Earlier this season I noticed a new bike shop (PlumBike, ul. Puławska 67/69), which sells nothing but retro-style beach cruisers, painted your way. A quick Google of Warsaw bike shops suggests there are other shops that sell this (and other non-mainstream) category of bicycle.

Below: here are some beach cruisers out in force in Park Skaryszewski. Unlike snooty Łazienki, there's no bike ban here, just proof that cyclists and pedestrians can mingle happily (as long as the former take it easy and don't treat the latter as moving slalom poles).

Although the ladies tended to be more conventionally mounted (on equally hip Amsterdamki - lady-framed roadsters from Holland), the chaps are riding some gorgeous machinery.

Below: Yes - that white one. Hard to ignore! It's so Gothic, it looks like Toruń Cathedral on wheels. Super-long wheelbase necessitated by the low-set back saddle position, long, swept-back handlbars whitewall tyres on huge rims - a work of art (but don't try getting more than 20km/h out of it). Click to enlarge - it's worth admiring all the details.

The cruisers take to the wide paths of Skaryszak, mixing it slow'n'easy with pedestrians. These are members of Warsaw Bratz, a group of cyclists who revel in all manifestations of cruiser style.

As the cruisers headed off in the direction of the National Stadium, I wondered whether my five bicycles are indeed enough, and whether something beach-cruisery wouldn't make for fine summer time leisurely riding... (Some interesting designs here!)

After a few minutes thought, I dispel the notion. To use a bike like this the way it was intended, one needs to live in the city centre, not on the fringes. Pumping swiftly up and down Puławska all the way from Jeziorki and back, I need a bike that's fast and focused. Cruisers look gorgeous, but they need dedicated cycle tracks and a leisure destination at the end of the ride.

Update, Sunday 7 July: Here's another one! This beautiful example of a stretch cruiser was snapped on Most Siekierkowski bridge. Note how far back the rider sits - the lower riding position means lower air resistance. At 30kmh, 80% of a rider's effort goes into overcoming air resistance on an upright bike.

A wide, well-paved boulevard, connected to cycle paths at the Stegny and Gocław ends; on a sunny Sunday evening, a cyclists' mecca. Show and go!

This time three years ago:
Gone is the threat of Państwo Smoleńskie

This time five years ago:
Bike ride to Święty Krzyż

Hipster bikes, Warsaw, Summer 2013

The style's still here; the New Orthodoxy for the Fashionably Hip on Two Wheels. How should your bicycle look if you wish to draw admiring glances from the less-trendy? The bikes below look similar at first glance, but here's a guide to distinguish the faux from the hip.

Above: Pink front rim, blue rear rim, matching saddle and grips. The frame is from Pan Heniek's scrapyard; note the forgivingly raked front forks, relaxed angles and the long wheelbase, characterised by the space between crank and rear wheel. The diagonal drop-outs suggest the bike once had dérailleur gears. In other words, the frame's an old-school original, but not one intended for single-speed track-bike use. Lack of visible braking system a desperate attempt at gaining street credibility. As fixie as they come, road-bike pedal straps. A certain charm - but not the real deal.

Above: This is more like it - straight front forks, tighter, rear triangle, rearward facing drop-outs suggest this frame was designed for a fixie. Flip-flop hub is visible (cogs on either side); front and rear brakes a concession towards safety; handlebars are not fashionably narrow. This plus a matching saddle-and-grip combo and matching rims and tyres are a sure sign the rider's a conservative at heart, albeit within a modern aesthetic. Padlock weighs as much as the entire frame.

Above: Here's a nice one! No old-fashioned toe-straps on the pedals, but wide foot straps. Pukka fixie frame (straight front forks, rear-facing drop-outs); brakes front and back. But what marks this bike out from the other two is the colour combination - lime-green saddle, chain (!) and front tyre, orangey-red rear tyre and handlebar grips, matching rims, matching yellow cranks, pedals and padlock (!)

Above: not a fixie (the rider's freewheeling down Al. Szucha); rather, this is a home-built single-speed made from an old racer. Note front and rear brakes, inner chainring (entirely redundant!) and non-matching wheels and rims. Resprayed lime green - and why not!

Above: no compromises in this fixie conversion. A lady's frame (damka), but that doesn't stop the hipster boys from being seen riding such a bike. Note - no brakes, flip-flop hub, no pedal straps, toe-clips or shoe-cleat fastening system. Note purity of colour - white, black, silver. Look at the chainset. And look at the cargo rack on the front. A courier's bike? One way or another, it takes no prisoners!

A thousand miles away. Hipsterism and its attendant fixie-culture is truly global, thanks no doubt to the internet. Behold, below, a fixie I snapped off London's Oxford Street earlier this month.

Very similar. Deep rims, frame-coloured spokes, straight forks, colour-coded tyres and saddle. Short wheelbase and rear-facing forks single this bike out as having left the factory destined to be ridden fixed gear. And note one other thing in common to all six bikes - Warsaw and London - there's no brand, no logo. Very Naomi Klein.

At the start of this season, my local hypermarket Auchan had three fixed-wheel bikes on display, all going for a mere 559 zlotys (£110). Made in China, cheap components, but proper fixie geometry, deep rims, flip-flop hubs, no rear brake... fire-engine red... all for less than the price of the cheapest pair of fixie wheels from a normal bike shop. I passed on this purchase, but all three were sold within a few weeks. To quote Danny the Dealer from Withnail and I: "They're selling hippy wigs in Woolworths, man".

This time last year:
On Jarosław Gowin and leadership in Polish politics
[file now under 'history, what-if']

This time two years ago:
Death of a Polish pilot

This time three years ago:
Doesn't anyone want to recycle my rubbish?

This time four years ago:
End of the school year

This time five years ago:
Midsummer scenes, Jeziorki

Cycle-friendly London

Despite the explosion of bicycles and cyclists in Warsaw, in terms of absolute numbers there are far more in London. When I left London nearly 15 years ago, I was quite a rarity - someone who cycled to work daily. Today, encouraged by politicians, cycling has become mainstream. The optimal solution for me was the Brompton fold-up bike, a gem of ingenuity that folds up to tiny proportions in less than a quarter of a minute. From home in Perivale, two miles to Ealing Broadway station, thence to Paddington by mainline train (eight minutes) and onwards another two and half miles from Paddington to Centre Point. Today - cold (+8C) and wet - I was amazed by the sheer volume of cyclists commuting through Paddington Station.

Above: the bike park at Paddington. Hundreds of bikes left here overnight - they are generally inexpensive bikes of non-nickable character. In the morning, their owners will pick them up for the last leg of their journey to the office. 

Left: Cycle hire points, by Transport for London* (TfL), have popped up all over the place. I counted three between my hotel in Bayswater and Paddington Station. First half-hour is free, pop your credit card into the slot to release the bike. I shall experiment with this form of transport before my week is up in London! (Kraków already has these and central Warsaw will be getting them too).

Right: I saw more Bromptons in and around Paddington this evening than I see bikes of all kinds in Warsaw. Dozens of them. They are not cheap, but they are excellent (my own Brompton is over 20 years old and has now been taken off to Łódź by Moni. I must say, I'd love another - titanium parts and single speed for maximum lightness. When I bought mine, they were available in black only; today, I saw a huge variety of colours - but the same classic design. The Brompton costs more than two Dahons (the only other fold-up bike seen in appreciable numbers), but in London the home-grown folder is the only way to go. As iconic as the red bus or black taxi.

Left: Only in London. To those who've never seen Bromptons in their thousands, this TfL notice at North Greenwich tube station must appear puzzling. A Brompton, once folded, is no bigger than a small suitcase, unfolded, pushed through the automatic barriers can cause chaos when they slam shut trapping the rear wheels between them. If you had a Dahon folder, it would a) take you hours to fold and unfold and b) even if you did manage to fold it, you'd be hard pressed to heave the thing through the barriers.

Above: fixies - they're also to be seen in London, although there's so many normal bikes out there they become a bit of rarity. This one, with white aero rims, matching crankset and saddle, has a track frame with reverse rear drop outs and flat bars, just slightly narrowed. Brakes front and rear testify to the rider's common sense.

Cycling has become a hot political topic in the mayoral elections that take place on Thursday 3 May, with current Conservative mayor Boris Johnson a keen cyclist and his Labour opponent Ken Livingstone (former mayor of London) someone who did much to boost cycling in London. Check out how well organised the London Cycling Campaign is in terms of political mobilisation in advance of the election.

I hope that it will take less than 15 years to get cycling so well rooted in Warsaw commuters' minds.

* TfL used to be London Transport (pron. Lana Chainspaw) until 2000, when 'passengers' became 'customers' and a 'target-focused modal delivery approach based on the ongoing optimisation of key performance indicators' replaced 'good service'.

This time last year:
End of the azure week

Hardcore fixies, Warsaw

Well look at this one, chained to railings near Pl. Zbawiciela. No brakes, no mudguards, no front fork rake. The front wheel (trendily mis-matching the rear) has but 20 spokes, crossing over each other but once (rather than three times, as in standard tangentially-spoked wheels). This is going to be an unforgiving ride.

But look at how short the wheelbase is; the seatpost is bent to allow the rear wheel to be positioned further forward. Like in a cycle polo mount. The rear-facing rear dropouts suggest a frame built for fixed drive. These bikes are getting more and more extreme; this is the most extreme I've seen in Warsaw to date! And the snow has only just receded! I've been told by reader Chris that this is a Polish designed-and-built bike, the Torro, for track and traffic. See the website of TenFour bikes here.

Another Torro frame can be seen on the third bike down (the white one) in this set of fixie photos from last summer. Compare its geometry with the more conventional bike below...

Above: almost out of the box - a 2008 Kross Unforgiven Limited Edition parked outside my office. This bike came out of the factory as a fixie. Another Polish designed-and-built bike (the Kross bicycle company is a great success story).

Right: I say 'almost out of the box' because of its non-standard stubby bars. Narrow bars make for nippier handling through traffic, but there comes a point (when they are narrower than the rider's shoulders) when they become ludicrous. Why not dispense with bars altogether and merely stick your thumbs into the hole in the stem?

This time last year:
Oldschool Włochy

This time three years ago:
Lent and recession

This time four years ago:
Three weeks into Lent

Fixies in the snow

"Neither snow nor rain nor gloom of night shall stay these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds." *

The fixie-mounted cycle messengers get through despite the heavy snowfalls of the past two days. This one (below) parked outside our offices on ul. Nowogrodzka. Form follows function; mechanical and ideological purity. Only two compromises - a bell (with a sticker 'I ♥ my bike') and a rear mudguard. Note unraked front forks - every jolt in the road travels through the frame up the arms into the rider's body. Not for wimps.

The photo below appeared on this blog in December 2009, before the fixie became the Warsaw hipster's mode of transport of choice.

Brakes evidently more of a hindrance than help when thick snow covers urban roads. It seems (for I've not tried riding in snow on my fixie) that direct control of the driving wheel via the pedals works better than brakes, and that skinny tyres adhere better to slippery surfaces than do fat ones with gnarly tread.

* Can anyone identify which chart-topping 1981 song these lines from?

Extreme fixie

It's been over eight weeks since the clocks went back; since then I've ridden my bike to work two or three times, so respect to those who cycle all the year round. Since an ill-fated bike ride in the Las Kabacki forest in early 2002, I do not mix cycling with snow on the ground.

Cycle couriers who want to earn money in the busy run-up to the festive season (I read once that 40% of all the work done in the Northern Hemisphere happens between early September and the middle of December) keep on pedalling.

I caught this extremist fixie outside the Deloitte building on Al. Jana Pawła II; absence of any kind of braking mechanism is par for the course, but look at those handlebars! Barely an inch of metal between the stem and the index fingers! I ask whether this makes sense - the idea of shortened handlebars means it's easier to nip in between stationary or slow-moving traffic - but surely the widest part of a bicycle is the rider's hips and shoulders - there's little sense in having handlebars any narrower... Extend your arms directly ahead of you so they are parallel to one another. That's the optimal width for narrow bars. Anything narrower is a pure pose (or in Polish - lans).

This time two years ago:
Poland's worst railway station
(and it's no better two years on. Just two years shabbier.)

This time three years ago:
Last Christmas before the Recession?
(as it happened - no. This one unlikely to be either - in Poland anyway)

More hipster mounts

Above: full marks for hitting all the trendy requirements for a fashionable hipster mount - the bike in the foreground; old-school PRL-era Romet track frame perfectly restored (to name a bike 'Super' - how ironic can you get?); rear-facing rear drop-outs (so rare! yet so essential for a well-functioning fixie). No brakes (kids - don't try this unless you know what you're doing). But best of all non-matching wheels; four-spoke carbon fibre aero wheel front (with red-rimmed rubber) and trad rear wheel, white rim, yellow-walled tyre.

Below: two matching fixies... His and hers? His and his? Hers and hers? We don't know. That's the point. One in front is more radical; no brakes, tyres of different colours, drop handlebars, drivetrain accented in blue, rear-facing rear dropouts. One behind has a front brake, flat bars, white hubs.

This time last year:
Welcome to Warsaw

This time two years ago:
Just like the old days

Fixie composition in red, blue and black

This one grabbed my eye today in Powiśle; utterly old-school gas-pipe frame and seat post, sprayed sky-blue, with flip-flop fixie hub, black aero rims with black rubber that give the down-the-road impression of great big balloon tyres (but are actually skinny and fast); black crankset offset by red plackie pedals with toe-straps, red handlebar grips, red saddle and red (!) chain. Visually - very impressive. And parked up against a sky-blue street post, half a shade darker than the frame.

Ideology? Ethos? Irony? The wheels are worth a hundred times (I'm not joking) more than the junk-yard frame. Ergonomics? Performance? Just look at the rake of the front forks, the louche geometry, total lack of brakes; as home-made as this morning's breakfast... Now I'll concede that it's subtle, it's clever... But at the end of the day, is it really convincing?

Nicer to look at than to ride, I suspect...

This time last year:
What's the Polish for 'guidelines'?

This time two years ago:
A new way to work

This time three years ago:
First apple

This time four years ago:
Late summer spiders webs

Hipper than thou?

O what post-modernist irony! Cycling around Warsaw with a swastika on your hipster fixie? Warsaw - of all cities?


Note that the swastika is not at an angle and has turned-up ends and dots between the arms; clearly, then, an Indian good-luck charm. Allow Hipster Hitler to explain...

This time last year:
Polish military helicopters on display

This time two years ago:
Rare visitor to Okęcie

This time four years ago:
Burnt by the sun

And the Lord spaketh unto the tribe of Hipsters...

Wheresoever Couriers shall deliver Artwork, and wheresoever skinny lattes shall be sipped, there shalt Thou find Fixies.

This week's Wprost contains an article about Polish hipsters, Dyskretne promieniowanie lansem (soooooo 2008, and behind a sad little paywall) covering all aspects of hipster life, fashion, music, etc. Trendiest places? PKP Powiśle and Plan B. Trendiest form of transport? Bicycle. Not just any bicycle - as well as the amsterdamka (Dutch gas-pipe roadsters, with lady's frame)... najmodniejsze w tym sezonie ostre koło - rower bez przerzutek i hamulców (OK, może być ewentualnie przedni hamulec) - "most fashionable this season - a fixed-wheel bike ['fixie'] - a bike without gears or brakes (OK, maybe front brakes)"

This season??? My dear Aleksandra Krzyżaniak-Gumowska! How out-of-touch you are! The fixie has been a hipster accoutrement since the late '90s, bicycle couriers being at the forefront of popularising this type.

Above: Trying too hard. White tyres? Matching saddle and grips? Minimalist front brake cable? Le Vélo de Merci? Pretentious? Moi?

Ah! This is it - purity. A real track frame (rear-facing drop-outs), rear aero-rim with matching chainwheel, Criterion geometry, Brooks leather saddle - I doubt if this is a hipster's bike. The owner knows what's going on.

Hmmm. Again, trying too hard. No front brake. No helmet. On your head be it (literally). The white-black-red scheme - isn't it just a bit too - factory?

Links:
Australian Honda Jazz advert, featuring hipsters and fixies
Hipster Hitler never invaded Switzerland
My own fixie here, here and here

This time last year:
Exit polls can get it wrong

This time two years ago:
In search of good Polish beer

This time three years ago:
In the Solstice garden

Reconfigured

My fixed wheel bike is proving a useful part of my commute solution. I cycle 1.5 km from home to W-wa Jeziorki station (avoiding the muddy paths, just asphalt roads). Although the rush-hour trains are packed solid, later trains (after half past eight) offer enough space to board the compartment with the bike-hanging hooks (see this post). It's then 30 minutes to W-wa Powiśle, and then 1.6km to the office. On the return journey, I get off the train one stop early, at W-wa Dawidy, for 2.5km ride home along ul. Kórnicka and Trombity, both are quiet in the evening. The half kilometre along ul. Baletowa is not too bad (and safer than Karczunkowska) - my train going over the level crossing gives me time to get a solid head-start on all the traffic. So - total riding distance a mere 7.3km a day, but timed right, I can do home-to-office in 50 minutes.

The bike has been reconfigured with a more laid-back handlebars, giving a more comfortable riding position. I think I'll change back to the original one (built for speed and lightness). The front wheel has been rebuilt using a spare hub and a rim from an old wheel.

Why fixed? It's light, simple, nothing much to go wrong.

Fixed Wheeling around Jeziorki

My garage special was taken for a spin locally today. It is a singlespeed; this bike runs fixed wheel (Polish: ostre koło). There's no freewheel - if the bike's moving, your legs are turning with the wheels. You cannot coast*. Quite something. I lowered the saddle and let Eddie have a go. He was scared by the experience - it's unsettling at first.

Not a bike to take into heavy traffic without experience; it requires a long shake-down to get used to what you can - and can't do on it. It is light (9.5kg - no gear mechs or shifters, no rear brakes) therefore responsive. Once it gets going, the momentum propels you along. You become as one with the bike; to slow your cadence, you need to work against the wheel's motion. A front brake helps (riding brakeless is for the truly hardcore section of the fixie cycling community!). It's also a bike for these times, a counter-blast to the capitalist consumption model.

Fixed-wheel is cycling at its purest. It is addictive; after one ride, I had to go for another, and another, ignoring my expensive and well-featured Cannondale Caffeine. Man and machine in harmony with nature, rushing onwards with the wind. But as the road gently inclined, and the headwind strengthened, my right thumb instinctively reached for the shifter; it was not there. I simply had to pedal harder.

The simplicity of fixed-wheel is attractive in this age of 'features', 'convenience' and 'novelties' - all of which come at a price. (This bike was put together from bits lying around in the garage.) Since building it, I've been reading more, much more, about fixed-wheel cycling. From Beijing via Amsterdam to San Francisco (yes!), it's becoming a craze, a counter-culture hipster fad. Trendy bike manufacturers are cashing in, building bikes like this costing upwards of $1,000 that lack gears. BUT THIS IS NOT THE POINT. The point is making it yourself, making it from the clutter left over from a passed era of consumerist excess.

If you think about what a bicycle is, you marvel. If it's not moving, it falls over (unless it's propped up). A bicycle needs forward momentum to fulfil its destiny, without motion, it's lying on the floor. It was made to move. Without movement, it collapses. Unlike a car. (Hence, philosophically, a kickstand denies a bicycle its essential bicycleness.)

*You cannot coast. A useful metaphor for life.

Order from chaos

I decided to rationalise the contents of our garage - too much junk. But before throwing out old bicycle frames, wheels, bits and bobs, I did something I'd been thinking about for a couple of weeks, namely building a fixed-gear bicycle (result below).

The frame and forks were from an old Trek 800. The wheels from an old Raleigh roadster (with a fixed-gear rear hub). The front brake, handlebars, stem and seatpost came from my old Klein Pinnacle (I loved that bike! Cracked head tube put the frame out of action), and the saddle was the one from my Cannondale Caffeine F2 that I replaced with a classic Brooks B66.

Fixed-gear riding is a philosophy in itself; you'll see urban bicycle couriers adopting this type of mount. It is the lightest, simplest of bikes; there's no freewheel at the back, when the wheels turn, the pedals turn and vice-versa. You develop supple legs. You truly become one with your bike. Fixed-gear bicycles are traditionally used for winter training by cyclists; there's no gear mechanisms for the road grime to get into. When you see a cyclist riding one of these around town, you will see a cyclist with attitude and commitment.

Putting the bike together put me into a reflective state of mind; there's something about mechanical engineering that is deeply satisfying to the human soul. Working with tools. I still have a vast box of bicycle-oriented tools, bottom-bracket extractors, chain-link separators, axle spanners, etc however, I was missing a flat 10mm spanner, which I needed to adjust the brake.

I bought one at the supermarket. Less than one zloty. Big mistake. Uh... too small. Buy an 11mm spanner. Ah! Too big. But the nut is 10mm. Being from a Shimano XT brake, it is 10mm. That cheapo spanner's the wrong size. Moral: NEVER SAVE ON CHEAP TOOLS.

Today's consumerist world is about production, not craftsmanship. Churn out a much as possible, as cheaply as possible. So that repair, by a skilled craftsman is not economically viable. The craftsman is a dying breed. The watchsmith, cobbler (as opposed to 5-minute heel bar operator), locksmith, and indeed bicycle repair man, are driven from the market by goods which cost less to replace than to fix.

Here I blame Adam Smith and Henry Ford. In his famous treatise about pin manufacturers, Smith notes economic benefit of the division of labour (with workers doing separate tasks involved rather the creation of the pin, than craftsmen crafting entire pins themselves). Ford took this notion to its logical conclusion - the assembly line.

But where is the human satisfaction from stretching wire or tightening the same nut all day long? Hundreds of millions of people do this, for the money, so that billions more can enjoy a cheaper washing machine, television or car.

Yesterday, though, I had immense satisfaction from building a working bicycle out of, well, junk, and having a clean garage to show for it.

For the record, it has a 36-tooth chainring and 16-tooth sprocket, giving it a 60 inch gear (i.e. for every one revolution of the cranks, the bike moves forward 60 inches, just over a metre and half.) The combination of 27" wheels and small off-road frame alters the geometry. The rear tyre has to be deflated in order to get the wheel to fit in the rear triangle, clearances are small. But ground clearance on the cranks is greater (essential, as you cannot hold the pedals in horizontal position when going around a tight bend as you can with a freewheel hub).