Every Day Adventurers

Living in apartments allows you to see other humans’ living habits a bit closer than you’d usually like to experience. I live in a quad-plex in Oakland, in a neighborhood that’s gentrifying and has seen worse days.

Oakland, and the Bay Area in general, have always been on the cusp of the next Green/sustainable revolution. In the past two, three years we’ve gotten a cool curbside composting program going (although I’d rather see the stuff get trucked to the Oakland Port where giant digestors could capture all those high energy vapors of composting instead of letting it waft into the air as they drive it tens of miles away to rot in open fields contributing green house gases to the atmosphere) and our recycling is thorough and impressive (Berkeley just upped their investment with new bins).

I also take pride in limiting my impact on our shared environment. I don’t own a car, I ride my bikes (Xtracycle Big Dummy included), I compost all our food and paper wastes, recycle, take short showers and grow some of our own food. So it pains me to see my neighbors tossing perfectly good recyclables into the trash, or food that could easily be composted in the trash or old clothes that just need a simple wash getting dumped instead of donated. That last one just happened, and in a big way.

We have large Murphy bed closests in our building. Suffice it to say, they hold a lot of junk (mine is full of bike parts and stuff). My neighbor’s daughter was cleaning out her closet, which seemed to have been collecting things since middle school (she’s 18 now). Bag after bag was filled with clothes, shoes, books, pencils, pens, etc. All about to be trashed! Had I not had the (un)pleasure of looking at the garbage from our kitchen window, all that stuff would’ve ended up in the landfill. We have thousands of people who can use the items she was tossing out. Our economy is still shedding jobs, unemployment is through the roof, and coming from parents who lived on food stamps during Reganomics, I’m sensitive to such non-chalance.

So, I dug through her stuff, salvaging what could be donated. I encountered her as she was taking out even more items(!) and explained that almost all the stuff she was tossing could be donated. I also took the opportunity to explain that recyclables belong in the recycling container. I still need to talk with her mother and her about the needs for all of us to take more responsibility for our waste and pull as much of it as we can out of the waste stream and return, reuse, recycle it.

Here’s my load, about 80 lbs of shoes, shirts, pants, jackets, books and other odd ends that I pedaled over to the East Bay Depot Center for Creative Reuse on Telegraph and a local thrift store.

Loads of Donation Items Being Reused Instead of Dumped

Every little bit counts. :)

longer is morebadasser

Contest time again, this time with a bit morebadasserness!

We know that Xtracycles help shift people’s perceptions of interdependence, freedom and excitement. We know that they help engage their riders with their locality, improve health and increase smiles (all scientifically founded, at least we’re pretty sure).

But what we don’t hear much of lately is how badasser it makes you feel! With that emptiness in mind, we are calling on those that can emulate the concept of morebadasser in video format to noodle on and create a short (15-30sec) video of why Xtracycles are the kings at badasserness.

What’s in it for you? Other than web notoriety of the badassest kind, we’ll feature the top three winning videos on our home page, the top three contestants will receive a sick Morebadasser baseball cap and we’ll toss in a $50 online store gift certificate!

So, to recap for those lost in the dreams of badasserdom:

• Make a video depicting why you think your Xtracycle has made you morebadasser
• Keep it to 30 seconds or less
• Upload it to vimeo.com (basic accounts are free)
• Email info@xtracycle.com the link to your video, your full name, location and one sentence description of your video (and any other interesting tidbits related to the making of your vid)

Deadline for Entries is April 20th, 2011 get out there and make some badasserness a reality!

Ride On,
The Xtracycle Crew

PS Want to be lazy but still rock the cap? Buy one here.

Jennifer Dederich, co-owner of Portland Pedal Power, talks about using the Xtracycle Heavy Duty (HD) FreeRadical for her bicycle powered delivery service and business promotion.

The HD can handle 350 lbs of cargo, mounts to most 26″ mountain bicycle frames, accepts rim or disc brakes and can fit a 29er rear wheel.

We’re looking forward to more tests from PPP and our other Heavy Duty FreeRadical cargo bike testers, the Stomparillaz!

Video and Editing done by Jon Garcia of Lake Productions with camera work by Lauren Pollock.

Check out some prototype photos on XtracycleGallery.com

Read the Riding the Spine review of their HD FreeRad.

Riding an Xtracycle is a magical thing.

Sure, it’s practical, helps you exercise, invigorate your life and find an independence you may have thought never existed, but Marya hits the nail on the head with her initial impression of using and riding an Xtracycle:

A couple weeks later, Marya was sold. “This way of getting places just gives you something back”, she proclaimed. “When I drive I feel like I’m wasting my life away.” After just two weeks of pedaling my intellectually superior spouse was able to articulate what I had not after seven years. She also reported that when my son rides on the back of the Xtracycle, he likes to sing. “He’s my little radio”, she said. Can It get any cooler than that?

family biking and sharing the ride

Read full post at B-Town Biker Wants You To Bike More.

the family steed

As most Xtracycle owners know, doing more with your bicycle and less with your car instills a feeling of independence like no other.

Your ability to tackle the day’s requests of errands, tasks and trips by using your bicycle and your own power instead of pollution causing, money draining automobiles builds a self-reliance that only grows with time.

So, I totally relate to Michael’s enthusiasm about his wife stating, “I think I’d like to get an Xtracycle.”

While I’m happy to hear that another American is thinking about using our cargo bikes, I’m more excited because I know what a positive impact owning one will have on her life.

Irene, Michael’s wife, I’m sure already knows about the benenfits of cargo bicycle ownership, her husband rocks out on a Big Dummy already. But, just as my wife knew of the benefits and utility of my cargo bike, she didn’t quite ‘get it’ until I built up her first Xtracycle this past fall.

Normally I’m the one who hauls her, our groceries, our laundry and other tasks of substantial size because my Xtracycle is easier to access and it’s what we’re used to. However, recently I went away for a trip to see my grandparents and Alicia, my wife, was stuck with laundry duty. Instead of lugging it piecemeal to the laundromat by short bike, she utilized her FreeRadical and finished the task without hassle or inconvenience.

On our nightly reconnect by cellular, she proudly informed me that she tackled the laundry using her Xtracycle. I asked how it went and she said, “Piece of cake!” :) She’s using her Xtracycle more and feeling empowered by the capability of her steed, and I’m excited to see her sharing the same sentiments that I felt in my first months of Xtracycle ridership.

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Read Michael’s full post on why they’re going car-light and upgrading their family to a two-Xtracycle family.