19.5% increase in Bicycle sales

[happyslug]

Bicycle stores have been getting a new type of customer recently: former car commuters.

They've wiped the cobwebs from their dusty 10-speeds and they come in looking for accessories and a tuneup. They wander the aisles and marvel at how far bikes have come since the classic Schwinn Cruiser....

Bike suppliers are racing to keep up with the demand. By August, year-to-date bicycle shipments had risen 19.5 percent from the same period in 2004, according to the National Bike Suppliers Association.

At the bike-industry trade show in Las Vegas last month, the showroom floor displays emphasized the practical side of the sport -- racks, saddlebags, lights, locks and cold-weather gear, Mr. Clements said. Manufacturers are beginning to produce more bikes with these features built in.....

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05289/588905.stm

[BiggJawn]

1. Good...

When "The Precious Juice" goes back below $2, I'll pick up some new iron (or charcoal) cheap when all those bikes hit the thrift stores or yard sales....

Same thing happened back in the 70's.
People bopught bikes, and when the shock of high gas prices subsided and Winter started creeping in, the bikes got parked.

[Skinner]

2. Good tip.

:thumbsup:

[happyslug]

3. But the rails to Trail system was not in yet

First I do not think Gasoline will drop below $2 a gallon unless there is a substantial drop in gasoline usage in the US (i.e. a very bad depression or Military defeat in Iraq or most likely both).

Now Bush will continue to fight in Iraq until he can not. The Iraqis can not drive us out like a conventional army, but does not need to. The Iraqis just have to keep the pressure on and if you have a major disruption in oil shipments the price of oil will skyrocket. The US Military can NOT reduce its use of fuel while fighting in Iraq thus that usage will continue. Most Americans are limited in their use of fuel (Through using bicycle may reduce such usage) thus hard for Americans to drop oil usage. The same with Europe and Japan, but both have high gasoline taxes and as such have driven most low end users out of buying oil decades ago (unlike America where you have a sizable part of low income people using cars to get to work). China and India have increased their use of Oil, but not at the bottom end but the middle i.e. to produce electricity for factories, to haul goods and to power high end private cars (as opposed to low end private cars for working people). Fuel usage by low income people in China and India are thus limited (Through Industry and high income people have drastically increased their use of oil).

Thus, except for the third world and the American poor, most users of oil can and will pay much more for oil than it is costing now. I suspect most of the above (China, India, Japan and Europe) are willing to pay up to $20 a gallon before the price by itself causes them to stop buying oil (I believe the tipping price for the above is more like $10 a gallon but most will stop while before Gasoline gets to $20 a gallon).

As to the Third world, most people use oil for cooking NOT transportation and thus will be unable to stop using oil (now you may see some reduction by a return to Wood as a fuel source AND the various Solar Ovens, but both can only supplement Oil stoves not replace them today). Even in the Third World the high price of fuel will NOT stop most transport. For example during WWI and WWII Germany had a severe shortage of oil but continued to use trucks till the end of the War even as the German army became more and more horse dependent do to the fuel shortage. Trucks were that much of a significant improvement over horse drawn wagons on longer trips.

Thus the biggest group of people whose use of oil is price sensitive are low income Americans. Even Low Income will use oil till about Four to Five Dollars per gallon. But at that price low incomes can no longer drive to their work and must quit or find another way to get to work (and most can not for none is available in suburbia where the jobs are). When these people stop buying Gasoline the upward pressure on oil will stop and than drop, but notice the price. Can the economy continue at that price for Gasoline? Can the US still support the war in Iraq at that price? I do not think so, thus I see both a decline in fuel for the Army in Iraq while the price goes to $5 a gallon and than both the low income people of the US and the US Army stop buying Oil at the same time sending the price for downward spiral.

Thus the price may drop to $2 a gallon but than shoot back up as usage increases do to the lower price. Thus starts a zig-Zag price up than down (With this pattern repeating over and over disrupting the Economy over and over again).

What does this have on Bicycles? I see Bicycles becoming more and more used even during times of low gasoline price (For it will go up again). Thus these bicycles will NOT be for sale except as the bicycles are replaced by better ones.

[BiggJawn]

4. Rails to Trails is primarily for pleasure rides here.

The network is very sketchy here in the midwest, typically going from Noplace to Nowhere.

I'm not a big fan of trails anyway. Oh, they're OK if you want to go out and piddle at a walking pace with a date, but for "serious" travel they're worse than getting out there and mixing it up with the SUV's.

I don't share your enthusiasm for this present "Bike Boom". I see it as being driven by several factors, including panic at the sudden spike and gouge at the pump, and "Lance Fever". Bike sales went up during the summer, when it's nice and warm and sunny. Well, it's mid October now, and the sun dopesn't come up until 7 and is gone before 6. And it got to 39 last night.
When these eager new bike commuters find that it really SUCKS getting drenched on the way in from a nice, bracing November rain/sleet shower, and their boss starts in with the not-so-subtle hints about hygeine and sweat, and/or looking like a drowned rat,and say, didja know your lips are BLUE? And they're tired of hitting the potholes that they don't see in the beam of their little Cateye headlights, they'll park the bikes. The hassle won't be worth it. Then in about 4-5 years, we'll see a flood of almost new bike in the thrift stores and yard sales.

Why, just tonight I heard some post-Yuppie bloviating about how he figures that his SUV doesn't eat into his portfolio as much as a new McMansion closer to his job would.

Already they're rationalizing Business as Usual.

I don't know what us po folk are gonna do. Guess we'll listen to O'Reilly slathering on about how it's our own damn fault.

[happyslug]

5. Here in the Appalachians Mountains they are well liked.

But that because the Trails do go from place to place. I had a sister who once moved to Detroit to work for GM. She was on the GM test track and they showed her how to avoid an accident using the berms and side of the roads (i.e. you see a car coming to you, how to get out of its way using the berm and sides of the road). She told them that was good, but she was from Western Pennsylvania and the berm rarely are more than 6 inches and on the side of the roads you have either a hillside or a cliff-side (People In Western Pennsylvania tend to call any steep incline along the road going above them as a "hillside" and any steep incline along the road as a "Cliff-side". More convention than law.). Thus she told them in Western PA you only have one choice, leave the other car hit you. Given these narrow roads people liked the Rails to Trails.

Another factor in Western Pennsylvania has a lot of left over old rail beds from Coal mining days. The mines are now mined out but the right of ways still exists. The best example of this in the Montour Trail in the South Hills of Pittsburgh. In the 1790s the single richest mineral deposit ever found was found in what is now Mt Washington section of the City of Pittsburgh. The mineral was the "Pittsburgh Seam" of coal the reached from Downtown Pittsburgh to Green County. This started to be mined soon afterward. This coal was found to be good for Steel making and th primary reason Pittsburgh became the Steel capital of the World in the late 1800s (This coal is still mined for steel making, but today shipped overseas more than use domestically, in fact Western Pennsylvania imports coal from the West to generate Electricity while coal from the Pittsburgh Seam is shipped overseas, gives you an idea how valuable the coal is for steel making).

Anyway, the Pittsburgh Seam started to be mined in the 1790s, increased in the early 1800s and by the early 1900s was being mined around the border of Allegheny County (Pittsburgh is the County seal of Allegheny County) and Washington County (The county between Allegheny and Greene County). To get to these mines the Montour Railroad was built (First in the 1880s and then rebuilt to haul heavier loads in the 1920s). The mines started to close down before WWII but enough mines kept open to keep the Montour Railroad in business till the early 1980s when it closed down (It was kept open by several side tracks into Washington County that kept the railroad in business long after the mines along the main line had closed down). Anyway the last owner of the Montour Railroad liked rails to trails when he first read about it and helped form the Montour Rails to Trails council to convert the old Railroad to a Trail. He was able to do so for when the railroad was built the Railroad did NOT just buy a right of way through someone's property but instead purchased the land the railroad (and now Trail) is on outright (i.e. The Montour trail do NOT own a Right of Way, they OWN the land the Trail is on). Now unlike a lot of other Rails to Trails, the Montour Trail goes right through the suburbs built up since WWII. The Suburbs had NOT followed the railroad which went on a semicircle through but around the City of Pittsburgh but along roads built to connect the Suburbs to Pittsburgh. Thus the trial in convenient, easy to get to and a quick trip off the trail to various section of the South Hills. Now the South Hills Roads tend to be narrow but passable so the Trail is both used to connect people and leave people travel a good distance.

Now, another coal line that has been converted to a rails to Trail is the old Chesapeake and Ohio Line which is now the "Great Allegheny Passage". At the present time you can go from McKeesport Pa (an old city on Allegheny county) to Myersdale Pa (An old Borough in Somerset County) a distance of 102 miles (and from McKeesport connect to the Montour Trail). Whenever the Trail to the Mt Savage Tunnel is finished (Scheduled for "late 2005" and it is late 2005 but not yet open to my information) you be able to go to DC from McKeesport on the Trail or a distance of 318 miles (And if you use River road along the Monongahela River get to Pittsburgh from McKeesport on a fairly level road).

The route is a lot flatter than any other route through the Appalachians:


Furthermore you can use the Panhandle trail (another abandoned Railroad) to get to Weirton West Virginia via the Montour trail:
http://www.panhandletrail.org/Welcome.htm

Please notes parts of the Montour and Panhandle trails are NOT finished yet, these need new bridges and tunnel rehabilitation scheduled within the next one to two years.

Closer to my home town of Johnstown, the Ghost Town Trail, Hoodlebug Trail and the West Penn Trail are joining up to bypass US 22 as a major road connecting the County Seats of Blair County (Hollidaysburg), Cambria County (Ebensburg) and Indiana Counties (Borough of Indiana). These Trails are NOT as old as the Great Allegheny Passage but future plans include expansion to Greensburg (County Seat of Westmoreland County) and connection with the Great Allegheny Passage and thus Pittsburgh and indirectly Washington DC.

My point here is do to the topography and history of Mining of Western Pa you have a lot of Rails to Trail projects and they are popular given the state of the roads and the topography of the roads. In flatter areas I see less needs for Rails to Trails, but in my area they are a huge plus.

The Great Allegheny Passage:
http://www.atatrail.org/


Mileage:
http://www.atatrail.org/mileage_chart.cfm

Map of Indiana County Parks showing the Hoodlebug, Ghost town and West Penn Trails:
http://www.indianacountyparks.org/photos/maps/regionaltrailmap.pdf
http://www.indianacountyparks.org/parks/tun/tun.html

[Fovea]

6. If you live in Missouri

the KATY trail will get you pretty much across the state.
From KC to Chicago you can carry an upright bike on Amtrak unboxed, though i have had problems with bents in the past.

That, plus the trail is an east-west cycling/pedestrian causeway.
On the trail lies small to moderate sized cities like Sedalia, Boonville, Columbia, Jefferson, Hermann, and St. Charles.

The anti-public property freaks still are trying to kill it, but they are meeting immense political resistance, and in fact, this issue will be one of the main things to bring down Gov. Matt Blunt.

Another long trail is being created from Springfield MO, up through KC, and eventually to Omaha, via St. Joe. These Volkspads are the future of regional tourism, and will grow as Passenger rail grows. I predict a 500-1000% increase in passenger rail in the next 10 years in the US.

These trails work as attractions for tourism, fitness facilities, and still wind up linking trip generators. They cannot replace road cycling, but they have some real positive aspects for Missouri.