I need a commuter
So I was reading this New York Times story about electric bikes this morning and the thought occurred to me that when (not if, when) gas gets high enough we're going to be seeing a lot of things like this out on the roads. I mean, how hard a decision will it be to drop a grand or two on a tiny electric or gas two wheeler when you can save that much in gasoline spending in less than a year?
I don't think I'm ready for any assistance - electric, gasoline, wind-up, nuclear... - with my pedaling though. Not just yet. Seeing this got me to thinking about all the little trips I make to the grocery or the post office or the bank. I wonder how much I could save in a year getting my groceries home under my own power? Maybe enough to offset the cost of adding cargo space to one of my bikes.
The only question is: Which bike to set up as a commuter?
The Time Trial bike. It'd be good for getting that gallon of melting premium ice cream home in the summer. Unfortunately the bladed tubes might make it hard to mount panniers.
My road bike. Well sure, that'd work. I'm a little concerned that under the load of $50 worth of groceries its geometry might render it less stable than I'm comfortable with.
That leaves my Karate Monkey. I'll have to investigate whether it's suitable, but I bet I can make it work. Plus I have plenty of incentive because if I convert my Karate Monkey into a commuter bike I'll have just the right excuse to go build myself another bike.
I love it when a plan comes together.
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Lets see...
You could get one of these
And save the monkey for MTB use, but since the bike above (the Big Dummy, by Surly) is not yet available, you could always get some of these (bags and racks by Carradice). Those are some sweet bags.
Time to start studying up on what type of custom bike you are going to have built....
29er?
Is it a 29er? I can't see running them little wheels. We got way too many potholes around here. My neighborhood streets can get pretty technical. I want the big wheels that can just steamroller all but the most heinous cracks in the pavement. Plus I'm not so worried about acceleration. If the ice cream melts I'll just pull over and eat it.
Carradice? Nice. Maybe I'll stop in and pick one up while I'm there.
Scooter
Good observations. But you can get some pretty cool scooters in the 2 to 3 k dollar range. For example, Aprilia SR50 is a pretty cool looking one and it's fuel injected believe it or not.
It crossed my mind
I think scooters - the Vespa comes to mind first for me - are terrific. We'll probably see those long before we see people actually pedaling from place to place.
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