Things seen tonight

Had a 8 mile round trip ride out to deliver 5 quarts of our Organic Blueberries to a life long customer tonight.

Noted the "kid bikeway" signs along Court and Back Rds which is really just a couple signs and no direction arrows or any pavement markings. Cost the city maybe 150$ for whatever signs, granted I think they were put in near 20 years ago... The shoulder is bairly standard width for a normal bike lane, let alone something like a "kid bikeway"...

One shooting star :)

Some fireworks, although not quite sure what said fireworks were for... but nice to see none the less :)

No animals seen...

Bicycle-v-Bicycle

An odd thing occurred on my way home from church today, yes I bike to church and typically put on nicer clothes for it too, not today though, prime reason was to help pick the church garden, also temperature at 11am can be a bit much for pants and dress shirt...

Anyway as I was making the turn off Route 4 to Durham (The only marked and lane painted on road bike route in Dover) onto one of the local roads I take back home, another cyclist coming along 4 was right in the middle of the intersection as I was turning. I actually had to yield for another person on a bicycle! Of course a friendly hello was in order. It was not returned, he seemed to be concentrating too much... thats ok :)

I continued on my way and a gentleman in a convertible pulled up along side and mentioned that it is not often you see a bicycle giving way to another bicycle, I agreed and waved goodbye as he slowly accelerated away.

Rest of the ride was uneventful :) Other than the fact that the bike helmet did not touch my head at all, I had the ol trusty Tilley hat on which was almost too much considering the heat.

Every once in a bit I make the choice that the helmet does not need to be on, for either part or rarely all of the trip. The safety part of using it is debatable for an experienced cyclist with a bike that will not be falling apart any time soon, however the setting example and showing I am a good citizen part is important and that is the main reason why I wear it 90%+ of the time.

Have a happy rest of your Sunday

Green Home Tourist

I got this link in my email last week. This is a nifty little resource for the folks in New England to find nearby homes or buildings that use various renewable technologies. This database is funded by RGGI (Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative), which in another note is barely surviving here in NH thanks to those in power in both houses.

Check out the database Here

Walkable Streets Economy Boosting Potential - This Big City

A good article from the UK on some recent research on how street improvements help increase home and property values along that same street. With research like this there might be an increased opportunity to develop other funding sources for Main Street revitalizations. Of course as goes good street improvements, goes the desirability to walk and the bicycle, which is key.

Take a read over at thisbigcity.net

Research study link, Here.

Some more Butter

In a continuation of my butter making endeavor; I took some images while making some this evening.

Enjoy :)

Ingredients:

Brookford farm fresh raw cream*

Buttermilk is to the right, this batch was processed in a blender, and then hand mixed to butter with...

My trusty 1980's GE mixer made in the USA ($5 from the thrift store!). I really like this mixer, it is just strong enough that it mixes quickly, however it is also not too strong as to over mix the butter. With this mixer, it basically will stop mixing once the butter is formed; it is not quite strong enough to continue. There is a risk if the mixer is too strong, that the buttermilk can be mixed back in with the butter; which is not good.

Volia!

This butter is ~2 cups and will be used for cookies tomorrow night :)

*A note on the cream, because I was leaving for Spain after I bought 2 pints, and knew they would not keep, I froze it. Now the big tricks to freezing cream, I used a metal cooking pot (I don't like plastic) it is also easier to clean and holds firm in the freezer. Also make sure to unthaw in the refrigerator, and do not rush it. Two Pints took about 2 days to unthaw, and then I let it sit on the counter for thirty minutes or so. It appears goopy and thick when you take it out of the container to mix it, do not worry the cream has separated a bit and will be fine as either butter or whip cream.

Livable Manchester (NH)

I came across this site from some connections with Commute Green NH (facebook link). It is called LibableMHT and focuses on some thoughts and lessons which could make Manchester, NH a better community for all. I have not had too much time to browse the posts in depth, but they do have a nice potential streetcar setup which looks really spiffy for sure.

I encourage you to check them out, it is really nice to see something like this develop in good ol NH.

Website Link Here

Still Moving Forward

Yes I am still here, yes I am still working. I graduated in January and am now part time employed with the City of Cambridge, MA as an outreach coordinator for a transportation mode shift encouragement program.

I still have a bunch of stuff going on, the least of which is enjoying 3 hours of train time a day :) as I commute into Boston.

I am also in the planning stages for Commute Green NH (which is part of the work done by Path NH in a month or so. We will be having a commuter/user breakfast at the Dover Rail terminal on May 20th.

I am also involved in the basic planning stages to set up a Bicycle and Pedestrian committee for the city of Dover (which is the fastest growing in the state and just reached 30,000 last census).

I continue to take infrastructure pictures, and muse on topics, I work on the computer a whole lot for my job so I do try to limit it when I am at home, but I will make every attempt to at least get something going once a week and then build from there.

For now I leave you with a wonderful video from David and Mark over at A View From The Cycle Path on how the dutch would update the NACTO bicycle guidelines.

Blog post link Here

An old, new Breezer

(click for larger image)

From Plattsburgh late February 2010. A Breezer in a box!

Bought from the great guys at Harris Cyclery in January of last year.

Dover, NH Parking Meter Map

This is another one of my fun Google map projects.
I came across the new map of parking meters (or Kiosks really) from the parking bureau website. This is the map that they give to the public for folks to find the parking meters.(caution pdf)

First off, the city website is a mess, but that is beside the point, at least the information is there. (unlike the city of Plattsburgh site...).

Second, the map is actually oriented North (amazing right!) which is good, but there is no legend included that would tell a viewer the difference between black and red markers. (Actually it turns out the red markers are the recently launched, Jan 18th, and the black were ones already operating during the fall, I decided not to differentiate between them, once I know more of the planned expansion locations I will add them differently. Of course you had to click on the faq to find that, and see the original map with legend(pg2), which had a Western orientation...)

Thirdly, there is very little information on the businesses or other orientating information, other than road names, you are unable to move around and get your bearing if you are not a resident, and that is really the key point.

Now these are actually relatively minor issues compared to some maps I have seen (the ward map, a complete mess until you zoom way in; my version of it can be found Here); the kiosks are close enough together and visible enough that finding one on the ground should not pose a problem though.

(click through for Google maps link)

The point of the matter is though, that I created the above map using Google (Google Earth, and then uploaded to maps), it took about an hour to do it, including creating the custom marker icon, and now we have a map that is interactive, somebody can search for businesses, or figure out where they are, they can go into streetview and see what the area looks like (meters won't show up though, too recent) they can create trips and better plan for a visit to the city.

The map as the city created it is designed for residents (and even then it may be confusing). That is not a bad thing, but it could have easily been designed for anybody.

The city really needs to get its act in gear and start making use of Google maps and the huge potential that is being missed. The planning department uses Google maps to create maps of locations on their agenda for the next meeting, a very good and useful idea!
I think the city as a whole though can, and must do better!

Communities need to stop thinking like it's 1980, data is all stand-alone, and if somebody wants something they will call or go down to city hall to get it. There are so many more opportunities for the city to really sell its presence and what’s happening; online. These are fairly simple to implement and would go a long way toward providing accessibility to city resources and services.

Simply providing city resource maps through Google would be an enormous step.

Bicycle training, how the Dutch do it: Video from Mark Wagenbuur

Some winter Dutch Envy for you, an older Video from Mark Wagenbuur over in the Netherlands on bicycle training for school children. He has a great deal of wonderful videos on his profile, I highly recommend you check out more from him. David Hembrow also posts latest videos and commentary on topics using the video's at his blog as well (which is where I got this).

David's write up on it is much better, and I highly recommend you take a read of his post before or after watching it.

This is how the Dutch do training for cyclists, focusing on the test before the start of high school or equivalent. Its pretty amazing to see how they do it, and what is required of the students taking the test.

When our driving tests are to "go out around the block and park" and you get your license, I am not sure we could actually ever do anything as rigorous as this anytime soon. I think we need to get our driving tests down to something a bit more challenging before we ever embark on something like this, however integrating traffic into the curriculum from an early age is certainly a very good idea

enjoy! (OMG where are the helmets, they could die, or fall over, or hurt themselves!!! ok I am done now ;) )