Winter in Vienna generally means gray. A lot of gray sky. It's cloudy and foggy. If at least it would snow! But it very rarely does. What to do?
I survive this time of the year by wearing some colorful clothes. An additional benefit of this brightening up is that it also increases visibility. Today I set off with Paula for a short gift shopping trip. Since it's cold one has to wear proper protection anyhow. My choice of the day was a blue and red woolen combination. Feels much warmer already, doesn't it? What are you favorite winter cycling clothes?
It's already a few months back that I visited Dresden, capital of Saxony in the East of Germany. I arrived by an overnight train, pretty early and the place was still sleepy. Still, quite a few people were already up and bright on their way on bike everywhere.
Of course, one of the first things I noticed were rental bikes and out came my camera.
One rainy day a couple of weeks back I decided to overcome my shyness and went to the city center pretending to be a tourist. With my tiny pink Asian camera, I took photos of interesting bikes. Here's a few pics taken that day that are concerning commercial use of bikes.
You have to get an official permission for
outdoor advertising, and pay quite a lot of
money. Some creative small entrepreneurs
have figured out that it is allowed to lock
bikes almost everywhere...
I do all my grocery shopping on foot, because it's easier after work and very close to home. Thus I almost thought that I would not be able to complete the "Carry a load on your bike -- groceries, etc." task of the LGRAB Summer Games.
Well, it so happened that I had to go shopping for other purposes. I'm rather lazy when it comes to housework, and although our new couch is pretty nice it gets dusty quite easily. What to do?
For a while know I was tinkering with the idea of buying a fancy throw-over. Today I finally grabbed my "new look" bike bag and Paula and headed off to the 20th district with a mission.
I must admit, I do own a fancy and also expensive bicycle, but it's not that important. Of course, my Paula is a hell of a nice ride, but for simply getting from A to B I can do with almost anything. For example, I still use my old mountain bike for many trips, especially when the road conditions are not so good. Does one really need many gears and fancy equipment?
Well, all our bikes are nothing compared to bicycles in India. Indian bicycles are very simple. The vast majority is exceedingly old, heavy and single speed. There are no lights nor reflectors installed. The saddle as well as the carrier are huge and seem comfy and stable, respectively. The most beautiful piece of an Indian bicycle is the big shiny bicycle bell. Fantastic!
To be honest, I did not like Delhi. It's a stressful, noisy, overpopulated and dirty city. The whole place is covered in a thick pall of smog. The streets are filled with mostly men, and a lot of them are shamelessly staring at women. Not a pleasant place to be.
Maybe my bad experience is also connected to our arrival. One of the first things that happened -- even before we reached the hotel -- was a taxi breakdown in the middle of a busy street. It was hot, dirty and uncomfy. And it seemed to take forever to get out of this straining situation.
Those of you who followed my blog already now that I ordered a pigeon blue Retrovelo Paula in December which just arrived a view weeks back. Due to lack of parking facilities in my house, it was parked in my boyfriend's apartment while it was still snowy and icy out there (in such situations I rather stick to my old mountain bike of which I know how it behaves) or I was out of town. Finally, yesterday, I took Paula for a ride around town. Here are some impressions of her first glance at Vienna (more are on my flickr album):
Last week, actually on my birthday, I received a call from the Citybiker bike shop. They let me know that my Retrovelo Paula has arrived and that I could pick it up in the next few days after they had built it together.
So finally, after a few weeks of impatient waiting, I could embosom my new steed :). Unfortunately it is rather big and does not fit in the bike room in my house (see some pictures in an earlier post). So currently it's parked in my boyfriend's apartment (on the 3rd floor, no elevator). I hope that I will find a better solution soon.
More pictures of the bike in action will follow :).
Today I just cycled to work and back. The round-trip is about 12km. Last Wednesday morning, however, I cycled about 20km extra. No, not for work. I went to the MA67 and back. The MA67 is the magistrate in Vienna responsible for parking violations. Why I went there?
About half a year ago I reported 13 cars that were parked on a bike lane, the sidewalk and in a "no parking and no stopping at anytime" zone. Right beside a school. They were parents picking up their children. One of these people filed a protest and I had to go to the MA67 for a witness report and to hand in a photographic proof.
Illegal parking on bike lanes is often just considered a trivial offense
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.
There are so many nice places in Vienna that I never bother mentioning them -- simply because I hardly ever go there, but also because I am so used to them, that I do not consider them so special. However, it's always nice, to take a walk around the center (it's a pedestrian zone) or other parks. Filigree has once mentioned the Augarten as her favorite park in Vienna. Now here's one rather touristy place that is also very enjoyable:
Palace and Gardens of Schönbrunn
The Schönbrunn palace (with an umlaut written as "Schoenbrunn") is the former residence of the Habsburg monarchs and the whole area very very pompous, both the palace and the surrounding gardens. If you're interested in the historical background I recommend to visit the offical website of the Schönbrunn palace or Wikipedia (and Vienna :)).
Soon after the end of the monarchy the population of Vienna discovered the park as an attractive recreational area, which it is still. In December 1996 the Schönbrunn Palace was put on the list of UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Sites.
Map of the palace (the yellow thing in the South) and parks at Schönbrunn
According to Christoph Chorherr's blog entry from April 2009 (a Green politician) there are about 1 Million bicycles in Vienna but only 18.000 bike racks available. This is of course far to few and explains
a) why many bikes get stolen (locking the bike frame to a fixed object is essential) and b) why so many bikes are locked to street lamps, traffic signs, fences etc.
Well, this number is old. Recently I have seen many new bike racks, especially in the city center. The city of Vienna builds bike racks in two different types, both of which are pretty safe if one uses them correctly (see how to secure bicycles).
The most common type of bike racks in Vienna and many European cities. Do you have such public bike racks too? Or does your city build other ones?
But it's not just the sufficient number of bike racks that is important, it's also the accessibility that plays a key role. I don't mind walking 500m from the bike rack to my destination if I leave my bike for a few hours (e.g. if I go to the cinema, theater, dinner or so), but if I just have to buy a milk or post a letter (which takes less than 5min) I want to be able to park my bike right outside of the shop.
This is something that is certainly missing in Vienna. There are very very few shops with bike racks, even in major shopping streets like Mariahilfer Straße bike racks are rare. There is, however, one positive example that sticks out:
Bike racks at U6 Floridsdorf: subway and train station and a big shopping mall are right beside the racks, which are even canopied!
Talking about it, other important spots for bike racks are of course public transport stations, especially train and subway stations. Vienna lacks many bike racks in these places as well as in front of schools and universities. But the city builds many new racks these days and is certainly improving, something that I can only appreciate :).
Still, the best and most bike racks ain't help if they are occupied by someone else. So I kindly ask all moped and motorbike riders: please park your vehicles somewhere else and don't block the few racks that are available for safe bike parking.
I hope you're not getting bored with me talking about Budapest so much, 'cause I still have something interesting to share with you concerning theworkshop about urban mobility Sonja and I attended (winner of an EU youth exchange project).
This time, however, it's not about infrastructure or activities. This time it's about the results, most of which are available as videos. I think this is also interesting for people outside of Budapest and Europe as most problems in urban planning (due to car-centric planning) are quite similar worldwide. Note that all this work was done within ten days only, and even less working days!
First, students (mostly in the fields of architecture, civil engineering, geography and spatial planning) as well as filmmakers worked together to analyze the transport problems in a given project area in the center of Budapest. View all observations from different groups, or in particular ...
... a video about the accessibility of public transport ...
... the noise problem ...
... the lack of bike racks in important places ...
... the power of (parked) cars and white lines.
Do you agree? Can you find similar problems in your town? Do you think some of them are solvable? If yes, how? Brainwashing our society does not count, by the way ;-). Difficult, isn't it?
Well, we tried to solve some of these problems anyhow. Possible solutions or let's say suggestions are collected as final results. Among others you can for example ...
... follow a curious man on a walk through Budapest ...
... see how you can become an everyday life star ...
While most people agree that some kind of shopping is possible by bike, not everybody wants to do all shopping by bike. I also don't, to be honest. I transport my groceries (including party supply) by bike. I do my clothes and shoe shopping by bike, and I even transport electrical equipment by bike (e.g., computers, printers, espresso machines, dishes).
But what about refrigerators and closets, someone might ask. Well, small furniture I transport by bike, medium pieces by public transport (taxi or renting a car is also an option if the latter isn't available) and for big stuff I hire a professional transport company anyhow as this is the most convenient and cheapest way to do. Well, there are not many people who move house by car and I rather avoid such experiences after having it done myself.
Due to a conference I was pretty busy this week and I always arrived home late at night. That made me appreciate cycling at night again. I really enjoy it!
Why?
Well, many reasons:
it's very calm and peaceful
there's not much traffic
the cars that are around overtake with a great distance to the side
and they see me (during the day, for example, I'm often overlooked when I approach a junction from a one-way street that is open for cyclists in both directions)
cycling at night is safe, much safer than using public transport or walking
and it's pretty fast too (as most traffic lights are switched off)
Well, it's simply fun. And apparently Anna from BCN thinks so too.
What do you like (or not like) about cycling at night? Any blissful experiences that you want to share?
Yes, I know. We are not really famous for stylish bicycles in Austria -- neither the bike produces nor most of the riders seem to have heard much about elegancy. But hey, we use our ugly trekking bikes to get around! I could think of worse things :-).
A few weeks ago I came across some -- as it seemed to me -- quickly knocked together mud- and chain guards. Well, actually it's a very creative and easy way to create something that answers the purpose. Functionality first, loveliness later. Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder anyhow. Personally I consider DIY to be quite fancy.
In Vienna Floridsdorf there exists a car-free estate since almost 10 years. Due to the absurd parking regulations here, they had to get a special permit to be able to build less car parks and safe that money for something more useful. Earlier I've posted a video by the Greens about this particular project (German with English subtitles) which explains very well how it works and what it looks like.
Car-free estate in Floridsdorf, Vienna, Austria
Recently I stumbled again across Christoph Chorherr's blog and read that they did an evaluation among the residents to find out what they think about their estate and community. The main results are summerized in these three files (in German): short version (2 pages), medium version (5 pages) and full version (96 pages).
So far I haven't read all of the full version myself, but here are the parameters and main things they found out:
244 flats (11.400 m²) but instead of 244 car parks only 25 [according to the Viennese building law the rate "car park:flat" of 1:1 can only be reduced to 1:10 with a special permit]
build between 1997 and 1999
concept: people that move in have to resign from owning a car (that's even stated in the rental agreement), ecological measures and green areas, no decrease of building costs (which would have been possible because of the fewer car parks) but rededication of the capital
right before moving in about 24% did own a car
for 53% it was very important and for 21% important to live in a car-free estate when moving in
car-sharing is available but only used by 28% for shopping, about 1/3 of the residents don't use this service at all
88% already owned a bicycle before moving in, 7% bought one later
the bicycle is used up to 10 times more than in an average car-free (!) household in Vienna [about 1/3 of Viennese households are car-free]
56% of the people living there use a bicycle to get to work or school
per household they calculated bike storage for 2.5 bicycles which turned out to be far-off (they actually need storage for 1.5 bicycles per person!)
the residents are very happy with their estate, which mostly results from joint projects that were carried out from the money that wasn't spend on parking lots: public areas, saunas, gardens, kindergarten, gym, garage etc.
the communication among neighbors and other residents works well (something which elsewhere is basically nonexistent)
Actually I've applied for a flat in that estate one year back, but it's basically impossible to get hold of such sought-after living space. In view of that overwhelming demand the Greens are planning a similar project called Bikecity at an old train station in the north-west of the city. Hope that will work out.
For more reading you can find some information on car-free living on the "Wohnen plus Mobilität" website in German and English (it contains general information and various prototypes in Germany and Austria). Moreover there is a German website on autofrei wohnen and here's an English pendant on carfree cities (with an excellent link list). More on car-free housing estates in Europe e.g. in "Car-free housing in European cities" by Jan Scheurer. Well, the internet is full of information about car-free habitation :-).
Conclusion: car-free is carefree, so enjoy a car(e)free life if somehow possible!
In Vienna there is an old regulation that requires new houses to have a certain minimum amount of places to park cars (e.g., for each flat at least one parking space). Whenever old houses are rebuild or get extensions that law has to be applied as well. This time it hits a vintage bike store in Mariahilf, one of the central districts of Vienna and a busy shopping area. Since the house gets a roof extension, the bike shop has to be removed in order to build a garage. From next week onwards the Radlager will be history. By the way, there already is a nearby car park that is never full, but law is law. A very sad story. This parking regulation actually goes back to 1939 and Hitler's plan of a car-centric society – and yes, it is still called Reichsgaragenordnung and in use (and not only in Germany and Austria). Even nowadays most politicians don't yet see the need to abolish this law.
Good-bye lovely bike store. Hello car park :-(.
Apparently, and that is sad too, there is no quite as powerful regulation for bicycle parking. Although new houses need to have a “sufficiently big” room for bicycle and buggy parking (see §119 (5) of the Viennese building law) the “sufficiently big” is yet undetermined and a very elastic term. While the car parks that have to be built are mostly empty, the rooms for bicycle parking (if existent) are hardly ever big enough.
Just that you get an idea – these pictures show how “sufficiently big” was interpreted in the house I live in (18 flats). Do the math yourself to see how many people have to store their bikes and buggies elsewhere. And yes, that stupid column in the center prevents from easy pulling in and out (note that the door opens inwards too). In fact, one can only store two bicycles for everyday use in there, the rest is trapped.
Sufficient bike parking?Left: an older picture before the big "muck out", Right: after the "muck out"
Old houses don't even need to have a dedicated area to park bicycles and it's often forbidden to leave the bikes in the staircase or inner courtyard. Most people living in one of those (and most houses in Vienna are in fact old) just have to drag the bikes upstairs and store them inside the flat. Elevators are of course rare too, so that is really a pain.
Please guys, wake up. Here's something going completely wrong!
---
UPDATE
There's an interesting article in Die Zeit called "Fahren, um zu parken" (driving to park) from 1995 dealing with some of our homemade problems I mentioned above. And here's another German text called "Verkehrssytem und Wirtschaftsstrukturen" (transportation system and economic structures) by the Austrian traffic planner Hermann Knoflacher, who I already introduced in an earlier post. If you know English literature dealing with parking problems, please post it ;-).
Yes, I must admit it. I'm a bike spotter. I love looking at bikes. I scan my surrounding in view of cool parked and ridden bicycles. It's not about new and high-tech bikes though. That would be really boring, wouldn't it? No, I love to look at customized bikes. And glamorous accessories. Whoever accompanies me around town will occasionally hear an astonishing "Oh, look at that gorgeous [...] bike over there", "Wow, what a lovely basket/bell/saddlebag ..." and so on. I will try to take at least some pictures of such discoveries and post them with a "customized" label.
I already showed you a picture of a decoupage bicycle some time back. Today I present the red white-dotted Puch bicycle. I saw it once at the west train station and then again a few times in front of the math department. Another time I saw a girl riding a different, more modern, glaring red bike -- but again with white dots.
