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The Provos and the White Bicycles

 

 

The Bicycle Scam of Amsterdam

 

  In the middle of the Sixties the city fathers of Amsterdam, Holland, solicited suggestions from the public about how to cope with problems of downtown parking and traffic congestion.

 

  A group of theatrical surrealist anarchists who had become known as the Provos recommended blocking streets to motor vehicles entirely and furnishing the community with a great number of free public bicycles for getting from one place to another.

 

  Though city hall rejected the idea, the Provos decided to supply bicycles anyhow. Managing to scrounge up about a dozen and a half bikes, they painted them white and issued a communiqué that the white bicycles now positioned in the downtown area were for everyone's use.

 

  This violated a municipal law forbidding citizens to leave bicycles anywhere without locking them, so the police rounded up all the white bikes and impounded them.

 

  "But that law is to prevent bicycles from being stolen," the Provos objected, "and these bikes are not personal property. We want them 'stolen' and used and 'stolen' again."

 

  Although it made them look like old fools, the authorities refused to make the Provo bicycles an exception to the law.

 

  So when they finally got their bikes back, the Provos equipped them all with combination locks and then painted the combinations on the bicycles.

 

White bicycle plan: Initiated by Luud Schimmelpenninck, the white bicycle plan proposed the closing of central Amsterdam to all motorised traffic, including motorbikes, with the intent to improve public transport frequency by more than 40% and to save two millions guilders per year. Taxis were accepted as semi-public transport, but would have to be electrically powered and have a maximum speed of 25 m.p.h. The Provos planned for the municipality to buy 20,000 white bikes per year, which were to be public property and free for everybody to use. After the plans were rejected by the city authorities, the Provos decided to go ahead anyway. They painted 50 bikes white and left them on streets for public use. The police impounded the bikes, as they violated municipal law forbidding citizens to leave bikes without locking them. After the bikes had been returned to the Provos, they equipped them all with combination locks and painted the combinations on the bicycles. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provo_(movement))

Safely Locked Bike

 

 

Bicycle Diaries

Originally published on the Badi’ Blog on August 06, 2012

 

Bicycle Diaries

 

I have been thinking of little this spring and summer other than bicycles. As I was visiting a bicycle store in Westdale, I came upon a book store which had a book called "Bicycle," (http://www.amazon.com/Bicycle-History-David-V-Herlihy/dp/0300104189) a history of the invention that I regard as one of the greatest of our age. I immediately bought and devoured it.

 

 

I did not realize that the idea of paved roads and automobiles and even airplanes grew out of the first bicycle craze in the 1890's. That is, they grew out of bicycles, not the other way around. Plus, the velocipede, a running aid more than a means of transport, was around for fifty years before anybody, with only a couple of exceptions, ever thought of putting pedals on them. Both started in France, and their word for bike, "velo," reflects velocipede rather than the more recent bicycle, also originally a French word. There will be bicycles, I would be willing to bet, long after the last automobile has been dumped in a metal recycling deposit. There is much in this history of the bicycle that I found fascinating and surprising.

 

I just read another book called "Bicycle Diaries," by David Byrne, a musician in a group called Talking Heads (see: http://www.davidbyrne.com/art/books/bicycle_diaries/). When the group goes on tour, he packs a foldable bicycle as a second suitcase and, when he arrives, he rides the bike around the city in which the gig takes place. In this way, he has not only gone to most of the world's major cities, thanks to the bicycle he has actually seen and toured them first hand.

 

 

Bicycle Diaries is the product of Byrne's meditations about what he saw. Written around 2005, the start of this most recent bike boom, Byrne's book reports on what has only recently crept up on me as a new thing, that we are in what could be called the "post global warming bicycle boom." It must be at least the fifth bicycle boom during the past two centuries. This boom was just getting underway when Byrne wrote his Diaries. Only now is this boom noticeable around here.

 

One of the exceptions to the boom, he finds, is Buenos Aires. It simply does not have biking as part of its otherwise rich culture. During his week long visit he only encounters one or two natives on bicycles. His use of a bike to tour the town with is so unusual an event that his adventure is written up as a feature article in the local newspaper.

 

European cities, on the other hand, have bikes engrained in their culture, but not in the way we do here. There, you commute and shop with a bike, and install carriers on front and rear. He remarks that they not only dress in ordinary street clothes when they ride, they actually look elegant. In North America, biking is more a sport and recreational activity. For a long time, bikes sold here did not accommodate mounts on which carriers can be placed -- including one bike that I recently bought. That, however, is starting to change.

 

 

As I write, I sit by our bay window over Lock Street here in Dunnville and look out at the street. Since spring arrived, from early morning to late in the evening, bicyclists ride by every few minutes. Not as often as the roaring cars, but surprisingly often. When we travelled to Quebec City in May, and I found myself taking photographs of bicyclists far more than the usual tourist attractions. I will share the pictures with you soon enough.

 

I told my elderly neighbour about my new interest in bicycles, and she reminisced about the days in the Nineteen Eighties when she owned a flower shop in town. Her late husband never had a license or owned a car, but you do not need to in this part of town, since all the conveniences are within easy walking distance. She became known to locals as "the lady on the bicycle." It was such a rare thing to ride a bike back then that this vague descriptive sufficed. Now you would have to say something like, "You know, the lady on the green [product placement expunged] beach cruiser."

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Bicycle with giant chainring

Here is a picture from a recent history of bicycles, called "Bike".

The caption reads: "Bicycle police in Stanford, Connecticut, in about 1910. The large gears on these bicycles suggest that these policemen were serious about chasing down offenders, though it would have taken some effort to work up speed."

This picture prompted me to seek out a bike with similar chainrings, but I have had no luck so far. I bought a mountain bike with what seemed like really tiny chainrings compared to these. The mechanic advised me to try it out before putting on road bike chainrings. I did try it out this summer, and yes, smaller chainrings are good for off road. But compared to these police bikes, even road bike chainrings are small.

Then I remembered another old bike I saw somewhere. I remembered that I have in my library an old Sears Roebuck calendar for Fall, 1900. Here is its illustration of the Acme Prince.

And look at the size of those chainrings! Just like those police bikes. This, by the way, was right at the end of the bike boom, when they could not give bicycles away. Not ten years before, a bike could not be had for less than a hundred dollars. Here is the text of the caption below the above  drawing.

"This handsome up-to-date bicycle is built with a diamond flush joint frame, 22, 24, or 26-Inch as desired. High grade steel connections, heavy nickel plate fork crown, heavy nickel plate drop or upturned handle bar. Well-made 28 inch wheels with good strong rims and swaged steel spokes, equipped with our own high grade season guaranteed Soroco single tube pneumatic tires, high grade, heavy nickel plated barrel hubs, with ball bearings ball retainers, good grade. heavy nickel plate ball bearing and ball retaining pedals, late new style one piece crank hanger. Handsome nickel plated sprockets, the bearings are all made from fine tool steel, are all ball bearing, accurately true to gauge. We use a good quality of chain. Gear 68 to 84 inches, as desired. We furnish a high grade, full padded saddle, finish the wheel in either black, green or maroon as desired, with all usual parts nickel plated, and at our special $14.75 price it comes complete with tool bag, pump, wrench, oiler and repair kit."

Needless to say, you could not get a bag or a pump for $14.75 now, much less a whole bike. You get a hint at the size of the chainring when it says it can have "68 to 84 (gear) inches." By comparison, my Czechoslovakian "Rapido" single speed, coaster brake bike, which I use for short trips about town, has 70 gear inches, which I find is fine for going slow (running the dog) or fairly fast.

My father, growing up in Hamilton in the 1920's, tells the story of how all the bikes in the neighbourhood were single speeds. Somehow, he got a hold of one with an unusually small rear sprocket. He took a long time to get up to speed, but once he did he left his buddies behind. Probably, it had the 84 gear inches mentioned in this catalogue.

There follows in this catalogue the women's version of this bike, also with oversized chainrings, appropriately called the Princess.

Is this as large a chainring as the ones on those police bikes? I do not know. Surely there is a way to calculate it. Maybe some readers will have comments on this question.