PHILLY BIKE EXPO 2014
1Ex0hib0ito+rs alSO inside:
Custom bikes: Handmade in PhiLADELPHIA
nOVEMBER 8 & 9 PA Convention Center Hall E
tickets and info at phillybikeexpo.com
Precious Cargo: Biking with kids
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WORKING FOR THE BICYCLE COMMUNITY SINCE THE 80s
STUART LEON Bicycle Crash Law
1420 Walnut St. #404 | 215 790 9288 | stuartleon@verizon.net
2 | Philly bike expo 2014 | phillybikeexpo.com
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On A Roll
Philly Bike Expo enters its fifth year
Bicycles are in my blood. My first “job” at the age of 10 was sorting bank slips for my dad’s custom framebuilding business Bilenky Cycle Works and I never looked back. I left my post there briefly to get my degree in Recreation, Park and Tourism Sciences at Texas A&M. The Texas saying , “I wasn’t born in Texas, but I got here as fast as I could” was reversed for me, as I headed back to Pennsylvania as soon as I graduated. There was work to be done! Along with Simon Firth, Ray Hanstein, Maria Dziembowska, my dad, Stephen Bilenky, founded the Philly Bike Expo in 2010. Focusing on artisans, activEvent Director, Philly Bike Expo ists and alternatives, the Philly Bike Expo creates an environment that fosters relationships between the cycling community and the dedicated companies and organizations that are the foundation of bicycles as a lifestyle, and it was only natural that I became involved. We host the Expo to celebrate the artisans whose craft enables us to ride two-wheeled art, to applaud the activists whose tireless efforts further our cycling infrastructure and to explore cycling as a fun and efficient transportation alternative. Now in its fifth year, the Philly Bike Expo promotes the fun, function, fitness and freedom to be found on two wheels. Last year we outgrew our previous venue and moved to the Pennsylvania Convention Center where we had a record number of exhibitors and attendees. In January I traveled to Africa to ride my bike from Sudan to South Africa. I used the many hours of solo saddle time to brainstorm and figure out how I could make the Philly Bike Expo bigger and better. We’ve come up with some new ideas for 2014 and they are pretty awesome if I do say so myself. (In our new space there’s room for a test ride area, food trucks and even more clinics and seminars to learn from.) There are so many reasons to love cycling. It’s efficient and earth-friendly, a fitness activity that all ages can enjoy, a breathtaking way to see your neighborhood and the world and it brings people together, too. My hope is that the Philly Bike Expo instills (or validates!) in you the same passion for bicycles that I have in me.
BINA BILENKY
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is freedom. Freedom to do what you want, when you WHY DO YOU BIKE? “Cycling want, where you want. Its liberating. I’ve seen genuinely timid individuals speak, and ride, with tenacity.” — Brandon Andrew Formanes, Upper Darby, Pennyslvania 6 | Philly bike expo 2014 | phillybikeexpo.com
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Precision Framebuilding Components Since 1983 phillybikeexpo.com | Philly bike expo 2014 | 7
Baby On Board F Kidical Mass gives families biking in Philadelphia a boost
written by Emily Kovach
or parents in the city who can’t drive, or avoid driving as much as possible, transportation can be tricky. How do you get your brood and all their belongings to and from places outside of your neighborhood? A growing community of families in Philadelphia are answering that question by turning to bicycles.
Dena Driscoll and Marni Duffy both bike frequently, placing their kids at the front of their family cargo bikes. Driscoll, 30, a mother of a 3-year-old son and 18-month-old daughter, commutes into Center City most days from Manayunk to her son’s preschool. Duffy, 31, a
Fishtown resident, has ridden as far as Chestnut Hill with her three kids (ages 3, 6 and 8). Hauling their kids around via bike isn’t always easy, but, according to Driscoll, “If you’re in a car, you’re part of the pollution problem.” Duffy adds that for her, there’s a self-care aspect, too. “When
Most cyclists prefer to have their children in a rear bike seat but a growing number of people are keeping their children in front, as shown.
we’re in the car, I’m miserable and the kids are miserable. I just feel so much better on the bike.” Driscoll and Duffy are active members in the Philadelphia chapter of Kidical Mass, a grassroots group that seeks to bring awareness to family cycling through group bike rides, community building and education sessions. In September, the group hosted a free daylong “The ABCs of Family Biking” workshop at Fleisher Art Memorial, and for the Philadelphia Bicycle Expo, they’ve organized a panel titled “Family Biking 101.” The panel will be informal, focus on questions from the audience and “not be preachy,” promises Duffy. Cargo bikes will also available for test rides. Family cargo bikes are attention magnets. While ubiquitous in a bike-friendly city such as Amsterdam, they’re a much rarer site on the Philadelphia streets. The most common questions that Driscoll and Duffy field revolve around cost (bikes like theirs start around $2,500), and safety. Simon Firth, an owner of Firth & Wilson Transport Cycles on 9th & Spring Garden, a shop specializing in cargo bikes, echoes the statement that the safety issue is critical. “Philadelphia is getting a lot safer to ride a bike around in,” he says. “The more people you see riding around and doing it happily, the safer it feels for everyone.” Duffy and Driscoll maintain that the best kind of safety is safety in numbers. It’s the main motivation for building a community around family cycling. “The best way to become a safer, confident family biker is to do it with more experienced people,” Driscoll says. On the group’s frequent group rides, newer family bikers can feel supported and protected by the veterans, and on Kidical Mass’ Facebook group, members post questions, share good routes, vent frustrations and promote other kid-friendly bike activities in the region. “Kids are cargo” is a common slogan in the family biking community, and it’s Kidical Mass’ goal to ensure that they’re treated as the most precious cargo of all. To learn more about Kidical Mass, visit kidicalmassphl.org .
WHY DO YOU BIKE? “[A]s corny as it sounds, [the] pure and unwavering joy that I get every time I’m on my bike. It makes me very happy and I feel healthier for it.” — Jackie VanOrden, Manayunk/Roxborough
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Stephen Bilenky works on a bike at his shop Bilenky Cycle Works.
Built to Suit W
Custom bike-making sees a resurgence in Philadelphia
written by Emily Teel
hile all bikes are good, some are extra special. At Firth & Wilson, the Spring Garden bike shop Simon Firth coowns with David Wilson, the two will happily fix a flat, adjust a derailleur or upgrade a set of handlebars. Under the name Hanford Cycles, Firth also builds custom bikes, and is one member of a growing community of craftspeople doing so here in Philadelphia. Custom bike-building, like fitting a suit, begins with a person and a specific set of measurements. While standard bikes are built to bear the weight of the heaviest potential person the manufacturer anticipates will ride them, Mark Weaver, of Weaver Cycles in Collingswood, New Jersey, says that he, and other bike builders, take into consideration a person’s height and weight, as well as the length of their torso, arms and inseam to determine frame shape and size, and the gauge of the tubing for the frame, whether it be steel, aluminum or titanium. Some materials are lighter, some heavier, but just as a suit can be made of wool or linen, “it’s all about the fit,”
according to Weaver. A bicycle that is improperly fit can cause pain or tingling, especially after long rides, so these measurements are key, and adjustments can be made to suit the rider. “It’s literally the first thing I ask after their first ride,” Weaver says. Fit also encompasses the weight of the bike. A bicycle too light for the person riding it “feels noodle-y.” Too heavy a bike yields the opposite: the ride rigid, the bike inflexible. Balance it correctly and there’s a harmony between rider and machine. Beyond the question of dimensions and materials is also one of functionality. What are the rider’s needs? Will this be a bike for racing? Or
city commuting? If it’s for racing, will it be cyclocross? On roads? Or trails? Perhaps this will be a bicycle for a cross-country ride, or for transporting children. If it’s for commuting, what kind of job does this person have? If it’s a woman, will she need to bike in a skirt? On rainy days? The answers to questions like these will determine how the bike builder begins and, within the shop, who that bike builder might be. Weaver races mountain bikes and got his start building for friends in that community, eventually expanding to include road and cyclocross bikes. Drew Guldalian, of Engin Cycles, focuses on traditional road bikes, touring bikes and mountain bikes, which he sells from his Chestnut Hill shop, Wissahickon Cyclery. Firth and Wilson focus on bikes for city riders, including those for commuting and those that could replace a family car to move children and cargo. Stephen Bilenky and his team at Bilenky Cycle Works, the most established shop in Philadelphia, do a little bit of everything, but
I love the bike paths. The paths that run from Valley Forge into the WHY DO YOU BIKE? “Honestly, city and through the city are beautiful and amazing and just a real pleasure. I always think that if more people could come to Philly and ride that path, they’d realize just how stunning of a city Philly really is.”— Selene Yeager, Emmaus, Pennsylvania 10 | Philly bike expo 2014 | phillybikeexpo.com
they’ve received international recognition for their tandem bikes, including the Viewpoint, a semi-recumbent tandem designed to be shared by riders of differing abilities, including those with special needs. A custom bike is a reflection of an individual rider. Bilenky has been building custom bikes in Philadelphia since 1983, starting just as the West Coast mountain bike was in its formative years and was inspired by the classic European builders—in the ’70s, he had seen these traditions embodied in the work of Chestnut Hill’s Hill Cycle, Germantown’s Lambert Cycles and Drexel Hill’s Harry Havnoonian. The mountain bike “revolution” shook the established bike industry, resulting in a resurgence of bicycle manufacturing innovation and spawning new companies, materials and methods. Bilenky synthesized his early inspirations with the emerging technologies to create a wide-ranging portfolio of specialty commuting, racing, touring, tandem and cargo bikes. “We’ve been at this long before the current sustainable, locally made movement,” says Bilenky. “It’s gratifying to see the shift away from disposable bikes stamped out in Asian factories.” Now, according to Bilenky, bike-making is experiencing a resurgence. “In the hand-built world … the U.S. is now Mecca.” Alongside local-sourcing of clothes and edibles, the interest in artisan manufacturing has bolstered bike builders. A bike is “an item for more sustainable transport,” says Bilenky, but craftsmanship means that “now people look at it as something desirable in itself.” The result has been a nationwide explosion of interest and innovation in bike-building. Oregon and California have been home to much bike-building, but Bilenky’s efforts and tenacity placed Philadelphia in the national spotlight. Not only has his shop turned out awardwinning custom bikes for decades for national and international clients; they’ve also helped build the bike community in Philadelphia. An active supporter of West Philadelphia-based bike education nonprofit, Neighborhood Bike Works and the Philadelphia Bike Messengers Association, the shop also hosts the Junkyard Cyclocross every December. In 2010, Bilenky and his daughter, Bina, hosted the first annual Philadelphia Bike Expo to showcase the work of local and national small manufacturers of bikes and bike gear. The Expo has run every fall since. Bilenky Cycle Works has built countless bikes, but Bilenky says, “I’ve also built frame builders,” one of whom is Firth, who worked for Bilenky for more than a decade. Recognizing that the city was taking active strides to support a welcoming environment for cyclists, Firth and Wilson opened their shop to supply Philadelphians with tools to support a
bike-based lifestyle. Now, the pair are working to create a cargo bike of their own design, but they face a dilemma that underscores a duality in the bike-building world. If they manufacture their design overseas, they’ll be able to retail the finished product for about $1,500, but if they manufacture it in-house using local labor, they’ll have to retail the bike for three times as much. “It’s unfortunate, because it would mean that most people wouldn’t be able to afford it,” Firth says. Bilenky knows this dilemma well: “On one hand, you want your brand to be bigger, to do more bikes, but if the cost of living is x and production is y, well, somewhere they don’t add up,” In addition, each recognizes that there’s something special about maintaining control of the process, a control that Guldalian would never want to relinquish. “I think of myself more as micro-manufacturing, building specialized tools to make specialized products,” he says. A meticulous machine guy whose contemporaries like to do things by hand, it might come as a surprise that Guldalian opened Wissahickon Cyclery in 1995 as a 23-year-old with no professional bicycle experience. He spent the next 10 years building relationships with his customers at the Chestnut Hill shop before beginning his bike-building business, Engin Cycles. Selftaught, Guldalian relied on those relationships when he started building. He asked 20 of his regular customers to front money for materials, which he used to build prototypes, asking that his patrons ride them and offer feedback, treating their initial investment as a credit to be put toward their own custom bike. “I had made 35 before I took a penny from anybody,” he says. “At least the first 100 bikes that I sold, I intimately knew the people who were going to buy them." Now, balancing his time between the shop and the store, Guldalian builds a complete bike every two weeks, even painting them himself, and he has a wait list of about seven months. “I want every one of those bikes to be the best bike I can make,” he says. Weaver, another self-taught bike-builder, embraces a bit of an artist’s sentimentality: “I just really like seeing my bicycles out there. … Somebody posted a photo of three or four of them together and I thought, ‘Wow, those are all mine, they all have my hand on them.’ It felt really good.” Bike-building balances these worlds of craftsmanship and artistry with utility. “A bike is a personal tool, [and] an approachable thing,” Bilenky says. “You might not be able to get a Ferrari, but most people could afford a pretty high-performance bike.”
Get Into Gear
Now that you know where to get your custom bike, here’s where to find Philadelphia-based bike gear. — Emily Teel
→→ Fabric Horse: The originator of the U-lock holsters, Fabric Horse also makes utility belts, canvas bags and the best and baddest fanny packs, all from sustainable materials in Philadelphia. fabrichorse.com
→→ ALLONEWORD: Handstitched cycling caps in the kookiest and cutest of fabrics, including the option for custom work. allonewordshop.com
→→ R.E.Load: Backpack-style and cross-body messenger bags designed and made by bike messengers. Stitched start-to-finish in their Philadelphia studio, R.E.Load’s bags, frame pads, lock covers and other accessories have become an industry standard as customizable as bikes themselves. reloadbags.com
→→ Go Cycling: Philly-based apparel company selling Yards Brewery and Flying Fish Brewery jerseys, as well as those featuring our city skyline. Bonus? A portion of proceeds for Philly-themed apparel goes to Neighborhood Bike Works! gocycling.com
→→ Lone Wolf Cycling: Subtly patterned jerseys, caps, shorts and T-shirts for the discerning road rider. lonewolfcycling.com
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Paving the Way Since 2008, Philadelphia has taken strides to make its streets safer for cyclists story by Nic Esposito • photos by Mitchell Leff
I
f you wanted to have your voice heard and presence felt while bicycling in Philadelphia in 2007, then you’d most likely join the Critical Mass ride designed to disrupt automobile traffic and create a spectacle of advocacy. But in 2014, if you want to be seen and heard, Philadelphia has the Naked Bike Ride, where over 2,000 participants bare their bodies and celebrate the freedom to ride leisurely through the streets of our great city.
Mayor Michael Nutter participates in Bike to Work Day on May 17, 2012, an annual event hosted by the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia.
Needless to say, a lot has changed since Mayor Michael Nutter took office in 2008. Although he’s credited with ushering in a younger and more progressive Philadelphia, (which definitely lends to the lack of inhibition needed to ride naked through the street), this sea change in thinking surrounding bicycling has actually been the hard work of public officials, city planners, nonprofit advocates, small business owners and private citizens who all see the bike as the most appropriate, cost-effective and convenient mode of transportation for urban living. When asked what have been the greatest achievements in Philadelphia’s cycling scene since 2008, Alex Doty, Executive Director of the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia, has many examples. But his highlights are the creation of buffered bike lanes (as seen on Pine and Spruce Streets), and the creation of 750 miles of interconnected urban off-road trails known as The Circuit. As he thinks back to 2007, he notes, “The standards in bike facilities that we would have thought were impossible are now a reality in Philadelphia.” While he concedes that Philadelphia does not have sleek bike lanes with bike
traffic lights or bike parking, he adds, “Today, the number of people I see out on the street when I’m biking on the nastiest weather day are the same number as the people I would see biking on the sunniest day 10 years ago.” [»]
If you’ve ever wondered how the image of a bicycle with a directional arrow could keep a cyclist safe on the narrow streets of South Philadelphia or Fishtown, the Mayor’s Office of Transportation and Utilities has a good answer. This symbol, called a sharrow, is not only intended to alert drivers to share the road, but are also intentionally marked as directions for the safest bike riding routes through a densely populated neighborhood. Each street where these symbols appear has been researched and selected for light traffic flow and absence of a bus route. So, if you have trouble getting from your door to a buffered bike lane, just follow the arrows.
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Today, the number of people I see out on the street when I’m biking on the nastiest weather day are the same number as the people I would see biking on the sunniest day 10 years ago.
Alex Doty
Executive Director of the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia
Mayor Michael Nutter gestures April 30, 2013 as three bike-sharing providers demonstrate their products in preparation for Philadelphia’s bikeshare system.
These numbers are not just anecdotal. According to the Mayor’s Office of Transportation and Utilities, citing the U.S. Census, 13,000 Philadelphians bike to work daily. Philadelphia is also the only U.S. city to have two neighborhoods—South Philadelphia and Center City—to be in the nation’s top 25 best biking neighborhoods. Andrew Stober, Chief of Staff for the Mayor’s Office of Transportation and Utilities, points to the Mayor’s Greenworks Plan as a key initiative that led to these numbers. Among the many sustainability focused directives of Greenworks, specific biking highlights were building the east-to-west bike corridors on Spruce and Pine Streets, as well as lanes in North Philadelphia on Kensington Avenue and West Philadelphia on
Walnut Street, designing the Complete Streets plan, building off-road bike trails that include The Circuit and the soon-to-open Manayunk Bridge Trail, and increasing the number of bike racks on city streets to at least 2,700 since 2008. Signed as a mayoral executive order in 2009 and passed as a city ordinance by City Council in 2013, Complete Streets identifies road and sidewalk space as a “limited public good” that must be shared by myriad users including pedestrians, buses, newsstands and bikes. The plan calls for policy improvements such as balancing the needs of all users, to more technical improvements, such as timing the traffic lights to “minimize pedestrian delay and conflicts.” But more importantly, for bike advocates, the ordinance
WHY DO YOU BIKE? “It’s fast and inexpensive, and you don’t have to wait for
public transportation. Anyone can do it, and the more bike lanes and infrastructure, the more ‘regular’ people will join in.”— David Wilson, Fishtown
14 | Philly bike expo 2014 | phillybikeexpo.com
GEARING UP
calls for “[giving] full consideration to accommodation of the safety and convenience of all users of the transportation system.” When asked what he considered to be the most important initiative, Stober says, “Any one of these accomplishments are impressive on their own, but collectively, I think the biggest accomplishment is the change of thinking that we have been able to create through firmly establishing cycling as a choice mode of travel that is safe and convenient for all Philadelphians.” For a biker such as myself who has been viciously “doored,” yelled at and almost sideswiped by city drivers since 2009, I appreciate Stober and the Nutter Administration’s work, but I am still all too aware of the dangers that bikers face in the city. Ray Scheinfeld also knows this reality all to well. On the third Wednesday of May for the past 10 years, he has organized our region’s “Ride of Silence” that memorializes bicyclists killed on the roads in the Greater Philadelphia, Delaware and New Jersey area. He says that on average, 4 people die per year in the region. Last year, two Philadel-
phians died on the roads. Scheinfeld adds, “While I hope not to have to do this, I have to advocate for the safety of riders in the region.” Another advocate is the self-proclaimed “bike lawyer” Stuart Leon. He started representing bicyclists in 1986 and has been exclusively representing them since 2005. Although he also commends the increased visibility of bike lanes and signage, he also says, “So many of the crash victims I work for have been hit by motorists, even though they are bicycling in bike lanes and paying attention to the motorists and traffic conditions surrounding them.” He calls motorists’ use of smart phones a “black plague” and says that the city must write more tickets for opening a door into a cyclist or for hitting a cyclist in a bike lane. He says that he rarely ever sees those tickets in court. Planners and advocates also see the need to build on the safety issue in the next Mayoral administration. Stober cites his office’s study, other cities’ physically buffered two-way bike lanes, and the need to bring this infrastructure
Bicycling may be a priority for Mayor Michael Nutter, but he’s not the only advocate in the Nutter household. His wife, Lisa Nutter, volunteers with the Philadelphia nonprofit Gearing Up, which provides women in transition from abuse, addiction and/or incarceration with the skills, equipment and guidance to safely ride a bicycle for transportation, exercise and personal growth. Kristin Gavin, Executive Director of Gearing Up, applauds Lisa’s support. “Lisa is an avid (and strong) cyclist, who joined Gearing Up when we started in 2009. Since then, she has been a champion for us, providing ongoing insights on smart organizational development and, most importantly, sharing her passion for the joy of pedaling.” To learn more about Gearing Up, visit gearing-up.org.
to Philadelphia. Doty also touts the Bicycle Coalitions’ agenda, to be released in two months, heavily influenced by New York City’s Vision Zero Plan, which sets the ambitious and crucial two-decade goal of eliminating all traffic deaths and serious injury on New York streets. According to Doty, other cities have taken the biking bar and moved it higher. But as he views it, Philadelphia needs to keep up, because, “biking is one of those activities that shows people that a city is interesting to live in and exists on a human scale.”
phillybikeexpo.com | Philly bike expo 2014 | 15
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