Radfahren in Wien -- a review of Vienna's new bicycle guide

"Radfahren in Wien" (Cycling in Vienna) is an extensive handbook with a lot of useful information about cycling. Although it is strongly related to Vienna, I can highly recommend it for a general German-speaking audience (in particular, if situated in Austria). This is, because it is an exhausting and wittily written, smart and neatly designed handbook on almost anything you ever wanted to know about cycling.

"Radfahren in Wien" by Alec Hager and Johannes Pepelnik

Insurance issues

A few days back my bike and a branch from a nearby tree on the Guertel bike path "collided". The branch got stuck in my chain and blocked it. Nothing bad happened, but I had to fiddle it out and missed a green traffic light. Still, it made me think about my safety.

"Twisted Branches" by TexasEagle

Do you have special bike insurances? Are you insured in case of an accident? Is your bike insured against theft? Overall, do you feel safe and secured when riding a bicycle?

All the crap they sell...

Last August a young man got killed in Salo (40 km from Turku) because of a crappy front fork. He was cycling to work, and the fork gave in. His head hit the pavement and he died. The fork was like this:

The Swiss approach to cycling

Before Christmas I spend a day in Zürich, Switzerland. To be fair -- I did not go there by bike (but by night train from Vienna) and I did not even cycle there. But I have lived in Zürich for a while in 2008 and commuted by bike every day back then. Thus I'm not a complete greenhorn when I talk about cycling there :).

I could write a lot about Zürich's bike infrastructure because there are many things I like about it. However, I already mentioned a few things I like earlier (see "Commuting in Zürich"), so I'm going to tackle different topics today.

Early morning view from the ETH terrace in Zürich

Patience pays off

A few months back Maff's old city bike broke down because an ownerless dog ran into his back wheel when he was cycling along the Danube bike path. Although he would have liked to have a new bike immediately, he decided to pick a more substantial and well- equipped bike this time. He choose the Fahrradmanufaktur T-300 in emerald green. Fahrradmanufaktur is a fancy bike producer from Germany. I haven't heard much about them beforehand, but they seem to build a lot of high quality city bikes and I can see more and more of their bikes on the road these days.

I don't know all the details, but the T-300 has an 8-speed gear hub (Shimano Nexus), a hub dynamo (which can be used in on/off/auto mode) and hydraulic caliper brakes. It comes with all essential accessories like fenders, carrier, chain guard, bell and even a small bicycle pump. It doesn't need reflectors on the spokes as there are built-in reflector bands on the tires (which nowadays is almost standard). If I'm not mistaken Maff only paid 700€ for this marvelous bike!

Unfortunately, at the Cooperative Fahrrad in Vienna and even at the Fahrradmanufaktur, they didn't have that bike in his size ready, so he had to use his cyclocross (a Kona "Jake the Snake", in emerald green too) in the meantime.

Well, but patience pays off! Look at that catch!

Maff and the Fahrradmanufaktur T-300 on the way back to Linz (by bike and by train)

By the way, the people at the Cooperative Fahrrad are very competent and have almost everything a cyclist can possibly want (including folding bikes, tandems and even penny-farthing bikes!). What I also like is that the young sales clerk keeps telling me that I have a cool bag. I guess I should introduce you to my messenger bag some time in the future, too ;-).

Shit happens.

Today I had an accident. Not a bad one, but it hurts a bit and I will have several bruises. My friend Anna from Barcelona once said that the bicycle infrastructure there isn't very good and that she would like to have more bike lanes. I thought I will do a pro and contra list one day to show her that less bike lanes can be an advantage too. I won't do that now. But this is going to be a contra bike lanes argument..

Well, as every morning I rode my bike on the bike lane (in German "Mehrzweckstreifen" - the one with the broken line that trucks are allowed to ride over) to the university. Actually I like that bike lane although I already had an accident there in 2007 (a car driver overlooked me and cut me off), but at a different spot. I like it cause there's always a traffic jam that I can pass easily on the bike lane. And the progressive signal system is set up in a way that I have green lights in a row. It is the only street in Vienna that I know where they favor cyclists. Well, I was constantly going around 18-20 km/h which isn't fast, but also not slow. The cars on the left were sitting in a traffic jam. And suddenly there appeared an old lady in front of me that I didn't see before cause the cars blocked my view. She was on a crosswalk, but run a red light. Probably she only saw the standing cars but didn't look out for other road users. So she suddenly appeared in front of me, I shouted and braked hard. She turned her face in my direction but stopped in the middle of the bike lane rather than continue walking. I couldn't maneuver around her cause there was a car to my left and a scaffold to my right. In the last moment I pushed my front wheel to the left so that it didn't hit her frontal. But of course I lost my balance and we both fell. I helped her to get up. She was really confused. I asked her whether something hurts and if I should call an ambulance or accompany her to a doctor. She said it's ok and wanted to walk away. I think she felt ashamed cause it was her fault. I wanted to give her at least my details in case that she suffers from the accident later (I know that this happens), but she didn't want them.

Usually in Austria you only have to report an accident if people got hurt. So at first I thought it was not necessary. But then I kind of felt responsible cause I was on the "stronger" vehicle and reported it to the police. Unfortunately the old lady is gone. I don't worry to much about my injuries, cause they are not severe (although they hurt). But my front wheel is warped and I probably have to get it fixed from my own money.

I just hope that the old lady will not run red lights in the future and watch out for cyclists too. And hopefully she will not tell bad stories about bicycle rodwys. I still feel a bit sorry though. I don't want to hurt people, even not accidentally.

What's the contra bike lanes argument:

• Most pedestrians are not aware of bike lanes and that there are actually cyclists driving there independently of the car lane - they ignore them, trust their ear (you can hear cars, but not bicycles!) and don't look.