CityCyclingEdinburgh was launched on the 27th of October 2009 as "an experiment".
IT’S TRUE!
CCE is 15years old!
Well done to ALL posters
It soon became useful and entertaining. There are regular posters, people who add useful info occasionally and plenty more who drop by to watch. That's fine. If you want to add news/comments it's easy to register and become a member.
RULES No personal insults. No swearing.
...and then the days start getting brighter.
How many of the commuters on here are still doing it and how many have hung up their shorts for the season?
Cold toes are and the odd fishtailing moments are making it a tad scarier, but still the hot shower and cup of coffee that greets me (well, that I make myself) once I've arrived almost makes it worth it.
Apart from petrol seriously back over a pound, what else drives you all out in the dark?
Cycling in the winter has never bothered me, I just enjoy it too much.
So long as cycling to work takes half the time and saves a bundle of cash, I'll always do it. I just can't imagine sitting in traffic on the bridges for 15 minutes when it takes about 30 seconds to ride past!
@Stepdoh
Various questions there.
Clothing/warmth
Ice/snow
Some people seems to suffer 'bad circulation'/cold feet. (Any medical people on here??)
Keeping them dry is certainly important. More crucial, probably, are warm/functioning hands. Good gloves are vital.
For me one 'accessory' that doesn't seem to count as 'cycle wear' is a scarf. Keeps neck warm/dry and can be wrapped round face when it's cold like yesterday. Not that Edinburgh gets really cold (often).
Ice/snow is another matter. I love snow - and riding on it. Slush, mmm.
Worst thing is ungritted side roads where motorists who don't know how to drive have spun the intersections into ice sheets.
Ultimate horror is probably frozen slush - acts a bit like tram lines...
I'm in line with Dave (above). It takes me about 40 min by bike to get to nursery (20 min) and then work (10 min), but much longer by bus - up to twice as long in the evening. And I get exercise, which I would otherwise have no time for. Not sure how much I save money-wise, but it is certainly easier and more enjoyable (most of the time).
I'm not a 'copenhagen chic' cyclist (I go out of the city anyhoo, so no-one sees me :) ) so it's Roubaix-ish bib-tights for me which tend to keep me toasty even if it's wet. DHB merston ones have worked well for me. Thinking of buying one of those Buff things for keeping the neck/face warm.
My feet just suffer. Must sort that with a sock upgrade :)!
My smallish passenger has a very thin fleece balaclava that fits under helmet, and can be pulled up over her chin, nose when needed (obviously sitting still she gets colder than me). We bought it from LLBean in the US (url above) and it is probably the one thing that makes our commute do-able. Luckily she also prefers it to all other hats. Strongly recommend to anyone else out there doing nursery runs.
"obviously sitting still she gets colder than me"
Yes I think that is something some parents/cyclists forget.
It's also something people in bus queues don't understand - cycling is more pleasant/warmer than hanging around!!
Too many seem to dress for the office rather than the journey - which of course makes it 'logical' for them to (want to) get a car...
Transporting children.
From a parallel thread -
http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=135&replies=18#post-771
Time to start a new one??
I'm off the bike at the moment. I came off on the ice on Friday, about 30 seconds after leaving for work, and have severely bashed my coccyx. Sitting down is murder, sitting on a saddle isn't even worth trying!
"I came off on the ice on Friday"
That's sad.
Sue the weather forecaster...
looks like no huge ice issues this week thankfully:
A balmy 8 degrees by the looks of it!
Hope you get well soon, Kirst. I fell down some stairs a few weeks ago and landed on the same bit. It was a fortnight before I could cycle over bumps in the road (so most of Edinburgh, then).
Otherwise it's business as usual for me: long periods of slicks, with outbreaks of snow and knobbly tyres. I'm still trying to find a pair of gloves in which my Raynauds-happy fingers don't turn white.
Before I discovered Buffs in the shops, in winter I used to ride wearing a thin scarf around my neck and chin. It worked well because breathing out tended to warm the material next to the skin, which in turn helped warm the air as I breathed in.
@chdot - cold feet can often be explained by tight-fitting shoes which restrict the flow of nice warm blood to your feet and toes. So slacken those laces a wee bit and you might feel an improvement!
Thanks,
Not my problem - unless really cold.
Sounds sound advice though.
I bet tisn't blood flow that is restricted (pardon me for butting in) but a bit of air space that insulates...fat socks are de rigueur, and a plastic baggie on top of the sock, then into the shoe.
Maybe some day there will be no more plastic bags. Or they'll be edible or something...
Would you want to eat them after wearing them on your feet though Jacquie... :P
SHE would...
Fair point....
Allo Jacquie by the way!
P.s. http://jacquiephelan.com is not an ordinary cyclist.
(Or ordinary anything else.)
inordinate time-slayer, more like it. Hi Anth. Check out my 'size Naans'.
I fell on Friday as well. Luckily I could see the road was icy and was going really slowly so I wasn't hurt. I intend to keep cycling through winter. Really bad weather might send me to the bus stop though such as a combination of snow/wind or anything else that might make cycling actually dangerous and which is not curable by simply wearing the right kit.
I've looked into getting studded tyres but they are both pricy and apparently excruciatingly slow. Since falling off the recumbent isn't actually that bad, I'm sort of decided on sliding it out this winter.
PS. I get pretty cold toes on the ordinary bikes, but not on the lowracer. Presumably because the soles lead the way (not that this is a constructive comment for anyone who isn't about to make the jump!)
Toe warmers are in my letter to santa. :-)
One advantage of cycling in the winter is that I suddenly don't have any problem at work getting by bike chained to the rack closest to the changing rooms and I generally have the whole place to myself in the morning (apart from a few brave runners and the odd once-a-week type).
My work very kindly installed bike racks in the basement of the building to keep the bike out of the elements, very near to the entrance to a rather large drying room that gets even the dampest kit warm and toasty for the ride home at night (with lockable cages to deter any tea-leafs) and his 'n' hers changing / shower / locker rooms. Only is those days when the boiler has failed and it's a cold shower.
wow, that sounds like an incredibly enlightened employer kaputnik. We've got an uncovered bike rack (slightly better than leaning it against the wall) showers, and oh a drying rack in the men's loos.
When cycling through winter months it gets harder to motivate onself but some of the scenery on a frosty morning are always worth it. Have found Sealskinz sock with coolmax socks underneath feet toasty warm. In wet weather in addition I use Gortex overshoes, the combination of these is like warming your pinkies by the fireside.
Frost Bite
If you wear toe straps to secure your feet to the pedals be warned that when your feet are cold it is easier to pull them too tightly and restrict your circulation. I had a diagnosis from my doctor of frost bite when the temperature on that day of cycling was around 5 degrees centigrade.
Sorry to heat about all the falling off. There is not a lot you can do on ice except never brake and never turn would a change of tyre have helped? Shame snow tyres for bikes are so expensive in this country.
I fell off in the snow/ice last year coming off a particularly high speed bump on a backstreet behind Murrayfield. My head cracked right off the kerb scaring the bejesus out of the passersby. Fortunately, I was wearing a helmet and could just get back on and cycle off, again scaring the bejesus out of the passersby. Since this incident I generally try to remember to stick to mainroads. Last year in a blizzard I also took a detour [due to traffic jam] along the canal through Wester Hailes where various masked banditos were standing next to stuck cars flinging snowballs at them. For reasons I still don't quite understand I gave the banditos my opinion that they could not hit a barn door at 50 paces with their snowballs. They then chased me and the bike through Wester Hailes flinging snowballs towards me at regular intervals. Fortunately, my opinion was accurate and they all missed. They gave up by about Westburn and once through Baberton I got back on to the Lanark Road which was icy, snowy but also deserted due to aforementioned traffic jam. If I had just pushed up the hill towards Gillespie Crossroads I would have had a more pleasant than usual ride home. For me I need to ride every day and stopping in the winter isn't an option. And as this string says - after tomorrow them days is getting longer and brighter.
gembo - that was an epic. You did well to escape!
Ian Bell in The Sunday Herald is always entertaining....
http://www.heraldscotland.com:80/comment/ian-bell/stop-whining-winter-s-good-for-you-1.993340
Anyone else like his style?
I did speak to Big Andy from the Wester Hailes Police Station [I know him, I wasn't reporting a snowballing incident, they have enough to be dealing with] and he suggested that I only had my self to blame. I think it might have been filed under 'fratenising with the natives' Ian Bell I like, I think he writes in the guardian on a saturday too?
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