Total Furmanation

Moving

2009-12-23T21:20:00.002-05:00

I've decided to switch to a wordpress blog host. Please update your bookmarks to:

http://totalfurmanation.wordpress.com

Thanks!

Seriously, don't get hit by a car

2009-12-21T16:46:00.007-05:00

It's been about 10 weeks since getting hit by a cop car. I've had all my injuries checked out, had my bike repaired, finally conquered crossing in that crosswalk without getting nervous. I had all the stuff for my claim to the City of Cleveland (they self-insure their police) assembled. Told the story enough times that I have it distilled down to 30 seconds. I was about ready to be finally done with it all.

Until today.

A routine dental appointment (scary enough to begin with) revealed two chips in the enamel in some molars the left hand side of my mouth. Apparently it looked like I had been hit in the chin... I haven't, but the only even remotely tramautic thing I've had happen to me since my last appointment is the bike accident, so it must be that. So now, on Wednesday, I am getting my first two fillings ever (and hopefully the last!). I have never even had a cavity. Just goes to show: you can take perfect care of your teeth but it is not going to prevent dental work!

In my post about the accident, I encouraged everyone to read Cycling Tip's post on what to do if you're involved in an accident. I'd like to add "visit the dentist" to the list. Even if you don't think you did anything to your teeth (I didn't think I did! nothing hurt!), it is a good idea for them to check your teeth out to see if you did any damage. Trust me, you don't want to spend the day before Christmas Eve getting fillings. NO FUN!

I am looking forward to the post-dental-work milkshake, though. The silver lining!! Am going to look for a place that has something other than just vanilla or chocolate shakes. Stewart's, maybe?

Greetings from the winter holiday "break"

2009-12-20T16:15:00.008-05:00

The semester may be over according the school calendar, and I might be home already, but I still have one more paper to wrap up. When a professor (who incidentally is the dean of your college) tells you take an incomplete so you can give your final paper the attention it deserves, you do not question it and you take it gratefully. So here I am, paying out the nose for internet at a Starbuck's, writing my last paper for fall 2009. It's only a 10 page memo... but one where we have to more or less solve the poverty problem in Cleveland. Gulp. I might as well tackle climate change or world hunger or peace in the Middle East or something. Technically, we're putting on our policy wonk hats to write a comprehensive community development agenda for Cleveland (which is a much less scary way of approaching this assignment). My outline is almost 2 pages already. I did my usual mind mapping stuff and am now turning it into a bona fide outline (just might be my first one ever). This should make writing this baby a breeze. If you've never mind-mapped a paper before, try it. It just might make it easier for you, especially if you're a visual person like me who doesn't necessarily think in a logical order.

I am really struggling not to turn this assignment into a "plan" à la what urban planners make. It is pretty clear I am no policy wonk!

I have learned so much this semester, but the most important that my limit is much less than my brain seems to think I can do. For next semester, my only goal (aside from the obvious ones of graduating and raising the $4k for Bike and Build) is not bite off more than I can chew.

Birdtown Flightplan: A Neighborhood Taking Off

2009-12-13T22:37:00.005-05:00

This past semester I have participated in an independent study class, working with the City of Lakewood (just to the west of Cleveland proper). Three classmates and I have created a neighborhood plan for Birdtown, a neighborhood in the southeastern corner of Lakewood. Named Birdtown for its many streets featuring names of indigenous birds, it is a low to moderate income area. It is a well-defined neighborhood, and features a recently renovated park, brand new elementary school and community gardens.

The neighborhood planning process is long; ours was abbreviated to be a semester long. We started off by researching the neighborhood. Site visits, data crunching and reading about the history helped us ascertain the current conditions in the neighborhood, its development over time and lastly, opportunities for improvement. We also held a community meeting with the dual purpose of introducing them to the planning process as well as for us to gather information from the most important people of all: the current residents.

With this information in hand, we set about dreaming up suggestions to address some of the concerns that had arisen from the research stage. Some were invented by us; others were best practices from elsewhere. We organized our proposals into three key areas: commercial, housing and transportation. Each of the proposals was assigned at least one of the following categories in a fashion similar to the "tags" found on blogs such as this one: neighborhood identity, safety, connectivity and urban design. Once our ideas were developed, we moved into the production phase.

In addition to assembling the text for a plan, we created many images to help express our proposals. We used ArcGIS to create maps, Google Sketch-up to create some three-dimensional models and Adobe Photoshop to create photographic renderings. In a neighborhood plan, the visuals are every bit as important as the text.

To create the actual plan document, we sketched some possible layouts on paper. From there, we chose the best one and created a layout in Adobe InDesign. All the text and images were assembled into a thirty page document on legal size paper, in landscape mode. We titled it: "Birdtown Flightplan: A Neighborhood Taking Off." To ease navigation through the document, it features multi-colored bars on the outer edges of the pages. It also includes a resource guide for the residents, with information on municipal resources.

The last step is to submit our plan to the residents of the Birdtown neighborhood. We are presenting it to them this coming Tuesday at another community meeting. As this is a project completed by students, we will also be presenting it to selected faculty members of the Levin College of Urban Affairs this coming Thursday.

This semester has been an incredible opportunity for a not-yet-certified planner. To actively participate in this process, to create 1/4 of the final product, to actually create a real plan that will be implemented- this is huge to me. My educational career has been full of "make-believe" projects, with my only chances at working on real projects through internships. This is the real deal, though. It has been a great window into my future career, and I'm looking forward to including the plan document into my portfolio.

Innerbelt

2009-12-10T13:31:00.002-05:00

A recent comment here points out something really important: NOACA isn't making a decision on the Innerbelt Bridge project tomorrow; ODOT is giving a status update on the project. Please don't let this discourage you from making a public comment. I think you have to get there 5-10 minutes early to sign in.

A couple of local bloggers have said that the NOACA Governing Board will be making a decision on the Innerbelt Bridge at their December 11 meeting. This is incorrect.

ODOT's presentation will be a project status update for information only. There is no resolution on the agenda. It's our understanding that ODOT won't be discussing the bike/pedestrian issue due to pending legal action.

Public comment is always welcome. You can find NOACA's public meeting comment policies on our website: www.noaca.org/pipsum.pdf

Really awesome bike links round-up, volume 1

2009-12-04T10:36:00.003-05:00

A little while ago, I promised a whole bunch of things. Interview with Amy from Kona, a round-up of bike-related links and I probably promised more frequent posting. My dearest readers, I have failed on all three fronts. So from now on, I won't promise you anything so we can maintain the low expectations I set up in the inagural post here on Total Furmanation.

But... I do want to try this bike link round-up. At least once. So here is Volume 1 (with zero promises for a Volume 2 or higher):

For all cyclists,
Tips for Happy Riding
http://www.rivbike.com/article/misc/tips_for_happy_riding

For the tech geeks,
iPhone app for Bike Commuting:
http://www.ecovelo.info/2009/12/03/bike-your-drive-for-iphone/

For the ladies, and all the men who want their ladies to ride, too:
Why More Women Don't Ride Bikes (And What We Can Do About It)
http://www.infrastructurist.com/2009/12/02/why-more-women-dont-ride-bikes-and-what-we-can-do-about-it/

For those of you not nauseated by shameless self-promotion,
My Bike & Build Profile & Donation Page
http://bikeandbuild.org/rider/3638

For Cleveland cyclists and those in favor of complete streets and equal access for cyclists (that should be EVERYBODY regardless of your current geographic locale):
Open Minds and Open Access: Bike/Ped Access on the Innerbelt Bridge:
http://www.gcbl.org/innerbelt
Please consider attending the rally, speaking at NOACA's board mtg (because I can't), or writing a letter. You can write a letter even if you don't live here... just saying. It would make my life better to be able to have another point of access to the west side of Cleveland, and that is not just limited to me. It's only fair that ODOT gives us cyclists and pedestrians equal access. You may not be a cyclist, but you've definitely been a pedestrian before, so everyone should care.

If you've a sweet bike-related link to share with me and my millions of readers (ha), shoot me an email. heather.h.furman [at] gmail.com.

Rally in support of bike and pedestrian access on new Innerbelt Bridge

2009-12-01T22:58:00.001-05:00

Location
Lincoln Park
W. 14th Street and Kenilworth Avenue
Cleveland, OH

Join the fan page for "Innerbelt access for everyone" -http://www.facebook.com/pages/Innerbelt-Bridge-access-for-everyone-including-bikes-and-pedestrians/183358026650

A rally to support pedestrian and bike access on the bridge will be held Sunday, December 6 at 2 p.m. at Lincoln Park in Tremont (W. 14th Street and Kenilworth Avenue).

Anyone interested in safe, convenient and healthy car-free access between Downtown and Tremont (and a great scenic overlook of downtown) is invited to attend. The event is free, and refreshments and entertainment will be provided. Cyclists are urged to ride their bikes, with free mechanical safety checks provided by the Ohio City Bicycle Co-op. Helmets are strongly suggested, and OCBC will have some available to borrow or purchase.

The rally will evaluate alternative walking and biking routes proposed by ODOT for the bridge and present other information about a dedicated path over the bridge. Participants will divide into groups, taking a different route from Lincoln Park to the intersection of Ontario Street and Carnegie Avenue, where a brief rally will address the issues of equity and civic interest in this nearly $1 billion project, before returning to Tremont for refreshments and discussion of strategies for further public input in this process.

After the rally, the job is not over. Please consider attending and voicing your support at a very important follow up: The December 11 meeting of the Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency (NOACA) at 10 a.m. when this local board will decide on ODOT's final proposal for funding of this project.

If you cannot make the meeting, consider sending an email, calling, or writing the Mayor's action line 216/664-2900, and the ODOT project director, Craig Hebebrand, at 216/581-2100 to let ODOT know you support biking and walking the proposed I-90/71 bridge. This huge taxpayer investment—ODOT's largest ever—will affect the places we live, work and play for the rest of our lives. Any donations to the event organizers will be used to help pay for engineering and professional services to document ODOT miscalculations of the feasibility and cost to safely accommodate pedestrians and cyclists in this project.

For more information, please stay tuned and visit http://www.gcbl.org/innerbelt

For once, the comments on a Pee Dee article made sense

2009-11-30T21:30:00.003-05:00

I work in the transportation field, and at my agency, we get a weekly inter-office newsletter. Today's included a link to an editorial from Cleveland's newspaper, the Plain Dealer. Many affectionately nickname it the Pee Dee.

The Pee Dee has an online version as well, cleveland.com. There is a comments feature on there, which allows people to post comments essentially anonymously. Needless to say, this results in a lot of ignorant and nauseating comments. I don't read cleveland.com much, but when I do, I never read the comments.

Today I broke from my tradition, and was pleasantly surprised. The editorial was a call for more funding to public transit. It was a good argument, but nothing I hadn't heard before. Someone had commented on the article more or less proposing an idea for smaller buses. It wasn't written in the nicest way, but honestly, it was a great point. How many times have you been on a bus and it's only been partially full? Perhaps this could be a cost-saving measure worth looking into. Maybe on some of the route that are more lightly used smaller buses could be used instead.

I generally don't take much stock in this Pee Dee/cleveland.com comments, but today I think I found a good one.

Pre-fab housing: is it sustainable?

2009-11-20T10:13:00.006-05:00

Last night, I went to hear Sarah Rich, the editor of Dwell magazine, speak at the Cleveland Institute of Art.

She covered a lot of things related to personal and corporate responsibility, especially when it comes to the environment, all through the lens of design. She made a really great point about working on the design of systems instead of the design of products. As product envy gets us to buy certain things, system envy can perhaps get us to change our behavior.

Another item she covered about the intersection of design and sustainability was pre-fabricated housing. Dwell is a huge advocate of pre-fab housing for a variety of reasons, including the decreased energy costs as compared to building on site.

A bucolic pre-fab house.

I get that it is less energy-intensive than building on site. But, as someone who works in the transportation planning field doing freight planning, I can't help but wonder - wouldn't the huge transportation costs off-set the gains from pre-fabricating it? Each of these sections has to be transported by truck. Trucks, aside from their emissions, also put a lot more stress on pavement.

I'm also not sure of where these pre-fab factories are located. Is this is a national model, with the potential for a house to travel from one of the country to another for it to be built? Hardly counts for the local aspect of sustainability. I could see a network of pre-fab designers/factories based regionally being more eco-friendly. Then, aside from decreased transportation costs, they could design based on conditions in the region (pitched roofs for snow, etc.).

I'm not totally against pre-fab housing - I think it has fantastic potential for post-disaster areas, as well as impoverished communities - but I'm having a hard time buying that it is more sustainable. I guess I'd like to see someone run the numbers.

Powershift 2009

2009-11-11T14:34:00.002-05:00

I was asked recently to sit on a bike panel at the Powershift 2009 conference for the Ohio chapter of Powershift (or something like that). Powershift is a group that is trying to pass climate change legislation and to promote alternative energy solutions. Part of reducing our impact on the environment is exploring alternate sources of transportation, like biking. The conference, while not directly set up as such, was mostly students from universities around Ohio.

I expect I was supposed to give the planner's perspective on cycling, but it didn't quite turn out that way. Our panel was composed of the director of the Ohio City Bike Co-op here in Cleveland, the president of Cleveland Bikes! (an advocacy organization), the director of the Oberlin Bike Co-op and myself, a grad student who doesn't actually work in bike planning but works on the same team as one. I suppose my real qualification was the fact that I don't own a car. Most of the students who attended our panel were interested in creating bicycle organizations such as co-ops or rental programs on their campus. It was really heart-warming to hear students from all kinds of colleges who are interested in promoting cycling for transportation.

Not every student can have a car on campus, or could even afford one, but certainly we could get more access to bikes. Considering the costs of parking on some campuses, a small fee to rent a bike for a semester suddenly seems like an attractive economic alternative. Especially if most of your travel is local.

At the same time, it was a little sad to realize that a) I was the ONLY representative from Cleveland State University (and wouldn't have even come unless I was on that panel) and b) there are successful bike programs on some campuses, yet we are struggling to get Cleveland State to put in bike racks. I don't really see a bike cooperative or rental program really working on our campus because it's mostly commuters, but the least we can do is put in racks in visible, well-lit, prominent places for people like me and many classmates who do cycle to school. We're an urban school with a stellar school of urban affairs. Promoting biking should be a natural fit.

An open letter to midterms and my readers

2009-10-19T19:51:00.004-04:00

Dear midterms,

I know I'm 2/3rds done with you, but I'd like to talk.

First, what is up with you being so difficult this year? And time-consuming? I was not aware take-home exams would actually take that much more time than a paper or studying. Quelle surprise pour moi!

Secondly, can you stop making my classmates so panicky? I'd probably be done with you faster if I didn't have to take time to assuage fellow classmates' concerns.

Okay, that's it. Thanks for reading, dearest midterms. I know that you will be nothing but kind and friendly to me from here on out.

xoxo,

Furman

Dear readers,

Stay tuned for Amy's interview, post Kona. Also, am thinking about adding a weekly bike/urban/cool links post, distilling the best Twitter/Planetizen/etc. has to offer.

xoxo,

Furman

all which isn't singing is mere talking

2009-10-14T14:31:00.003-04:00

Today is mine and e e cummings' birthdays, hence the title. Today would be celebratory that I've managed to make it thus far in my life but I've work, meetings, errands and school all day. Fun, games, presents and cake shall have to be saved for another day.

Nah, scratch the presents part. Want to give me the best gift of all? A donation to Bike and Build in my name. (go here >> www.bikeandbuild.org/donate) It's eco-friendly (no wasteful wrapping paper), would make me very happy, and would make people all across the country happy for helping to support affordable housing construction. You can do something to help end poverty with a gift like this. Donate $1, donate $10.14, donate $24, donate $4000.

It's corny what they say about every penny counting, but it's true. Think how cheap a nail is. Just around a penny each. You can afford a nail, right? Now think about how that nail is going to help hold together a warm, safe, comfortable house for someone who may have never lived in anything but substandard housing. You don't have to do this for me. Do it for them.

Extra shiny forks: Update after the crash

2009-10-11T19:27:00.005-04:00

It is due time for an update after my lil run-in with the hood of a cop car on Thursday morning. I'll start with the boring part (me) and get on to the exciting part (my bike).

The bruises are coming along quite nicely. For someone who very rarely bruises, this is weird to look at my legs and see purplish-blueish-yellowish splotches all over. The only cuts I had were tiny ones from my big ring, and those are almost healed. I now understand the point of chainguards! My neck is far less sore, and my abs/middle are also much less sore. So I am healing quite nicely. I have been rather cautious using crosswalks, though... haha.

Now on to Jay, my bike. Dropped it off yesterday at my LBS. Ended up needing a new fork and new bar tape, wheels to be trued, one of the fender arms needed to be straightened, and one of the brake levers was knocked a little bit loose. The new fork is lugged steel and finished in chrome, which looks very nice next to the chrome fenders. I was worried it would look garish, but it worked out okay. I'm hoping Cleveland's finest will be paying for the repairs! I think it will be a few days before I'll be riding again, and I'm already excited.

In other news, Google says it will add bicycling to it's maps, and stay tuned for an interview with Ironman World Championship (Kona, Hawaii) finisher Amy!

Getting hit: On how to get a bomb squad* cop to come to your ER room

2009-10-08T15:16:00.005-04:00

*No actual bombs, don't worry.

Continuing in the vein of ridiculousness, today I was riding my bike and got hit by, of all things, a cop car.

Yeah, a cop car.

Now before you go all militant and get angry over cops not treating cyclists fairly and all that, you should know this was an accident in the purest sense of the term. I was riding up to a crosswalk by a coffeeshop to go the CVS next door, and two cars pulled up to the stop sign. The one furthest from me was a cop car, and the two cars were staggered by a foot or two, with the cop car a little bit further back. Seeing that they were both stopped, I rolled through the crosswalk. But then the police car started going! It all happened so fast, so I don't really remember actually hitting the car. All I managed was to think "the cop car is really moving!" then the next thing I remember was rolling down the hood of the car (and thinking "i thought this only happened in movies"), then sitting on the ground. She hadn't seen me at all behind the other car. Yeah, she hit me when I had the right of way, so for legal purposes it's her fault, but she also had no idea I was there and obviously wasn't trying to hit me. She had come to a full and complete stop and just plain and simple didn't see me.

Someone grabbed my bike for me, and I was able to stand, so we got on the sidewalk. A bunch of people saw the accident, and one guy gave me his card if I needed a witness. Two more cop cars came, a fire truck with EMTs came, and then an ambulance. A little overkill, but whatever. The firemen took my bike, the EMTs took me, and the other cops did police-y type things.

The ambulance ride was pretty interesting. I was talking to the EMT, a former bike commuter here in Cleveland. Apparently he had stopped riding his bike to work because it got too unsafe. He also said that they'd been having more bike accidents recently. Not the kind of thing a bike advocate wants to hear, but important.

The ER visit was mostly routine. Some more cops came and asked me questions. Everyone would ask me, so what happened? I'd answer with "I was riding my bike when I got hit by a cop car" and I'd get a response along the lines of "wait, what? a cop car hit you?" As my knee, hip, and shin were hurting, I got a whole slew of x-rays. Got wheeled back radiology to find a bomb squad/crime scene photographer sitting outside my room (hence the title). Yeah, no joke. Apparently I'm a crime scene. So he took a few photographs and showed me the ones he had taken of Jay, my bike. Apparently the front fork is bent, along with one of the things that holds on the fenders. According to him, it looked fixable. I guess we'll see when I pick up the bike and take it the bike shop. The x-rays came back, nothing was broken! Just a lot of contusions, which I think is a fancy word for bruises, kinda like how laceration is a fancy term for a cut. Got discharged, limped over to the hospital cafeteria and got an Einstein's asiago cheese bagel because I feeling a little sorry for myself. Man, they have to be the best kind of bagel in the world. Took the bus back to my apartment and am now milking this for all its worth by sitting on my rear and being totally lazy. I'm already feeling better.

I'm incredibly lucky to have escaped from a car/bike collision with only bruises and a bike that (probably) can be fixed. That doesn't always happen, like in the case of Sylvia Bingham the other week here in Cleveland. So, on that note, I would like to request a few things of all you readers:

Wear a helmet. Even if you don't think it works (even I'm not totally sold on the claim they protect your head), it sure makes it a lot easier to deal with paperwork/authorities if you do end up being involved in an accident.
Read this post from Cycling Tips Blog on what to do if you're involved in an accident. Thank goodness I had read the post, and remembered parts of it, because the last bullet point is very true: the adrenaline masks the pain, and it's better to get it checked out right then because things don't start hurting until later.
If you're in the Cleveland area, please participate in the 17 October ride celebrating the life of Sylvia Bingham. Meet in Edgewater park at 10am, there will be guided rides to go off and participate in community service type activities. Given what I know about Sylvia, I can't think of a better way to memorialize her life than to do a cycling event that gives back to the community, and one that will raise awareness of cycling in Cleveland.

Also, since I know you're feeling sorry for poor ole Furman, please consider donating to Bike & Build for me. Shameless, I know. :P But it's going to a good cause: affordable housing!

Bike & Build 2010: Northern U.S.

2009-10-07T13:06:00.003-04:00

Ever wonder what I'm going to do after graduation next May? Well, I'm still wondering that myself (job offers that start in September are very welcome) but I do know that from June to August, I'll be biking across the country.

Wait... 3800+ miles? On a bike? Am I out of mind?

Yes, yes, and probably yes. A classmate of mine at school particpated in a Bike & Build tour during the summer of 2008, and quickly sold me on it. Bike & Build organizes cross-country cycling trips for young adults to raise money for and support affordable housing efforts. So in addition to cycling 3800+ miles, I have to raise $4000 before May to support our building efforts. I'll have donation information up soon when I figure out how that all works. Along the way, we will stop to have "build days" where we actually help construct a house. I'm not exactly a master carpenter a la Norm Abram quite yet, or heck, even a house builder like Tom Silva, but I do know how to do basic stuff like hammer a nail, sand, drill and paint, and I learn quickly.

This is going to be a crazy experience. Never have I fundraised like that before. Never have I cycled more than 42 miles (dude, I was doing a sprint tri, endurance was not the goal). I will have to embrace novel things like clipless pedals, aluminum frame bikes, and brifters (I'm kinda old school, okay?). Regardless, I'm stoked for this opportunity. The nice thing about giving into the whole triathletes-must-have-blogs deal and then not giving up the blog is that I already have a great platform for a B&B blog.

Also, welcome to anyone who might have gotten here from the Bike & Build site, especially if you're a fellow NUS rider!

Friday 5: Career Choices

2009-10-01T22:52:00.011-04:00

Five questions on a Friday eve. Early for once! From the LJ one. How appropriate that this Friday's be a career-related question, just after we our college's career coordinator speak at our student organization. One surprising thing I learned: in urban planning your resume can be two pages. Who knew?

1. What did you dream of being when you were a little child? I think when I "graduated" from nursery school I said I wanted to be a mommy. Of course, pretty much every other girl in my class said the same, so I might have just been going with the flow. Heck, maybe someday (in the very, very distant future) I will become a mommy and my apparent childhood dream will be realized.
2. What did you think you might become when you were between the ages of 12-13? Architect. I used to draw blueprints for fun. Seriously, who does that? And my dollhouse was m favorite toy, and I imagined that my room was a whole city around my dollhouse (albeit a walled one). Future urban planner much?
3. What career choices did you consider as a young adult? Civil or aero engineering. Then I discovered urban planning for a high school social studies project and knew that was it.
4. Did you follow along one of the career paths you considered? Urban Planning!
5. Have you changed careers since then? Was it by choice or necessity? No, I'm in planning school now. My concentration or focus within urban planning will change. Neighborhood planning is growing on me. Economic development and urban design are still two major interests of mine. Bike/ped planning and park planning are obvious interests. Freight planning, while a subset of transportation planning (albeit a super tiny one), is a field in its infancy, and that attracts me, along with the associated economic development implications. Basically I just want to fix up a city but I'm not sure how I will be going about that.

This is not to say I haven't occasionally considered other career options like, say, nursing. But urban planning just seems right to me.

Friday 5: Actually on a Friday!

2009-09-25T11:50:00.005-04:00

First off- I had no clue that my last post would garner so much attention. Thanks for reading. I have a ton of faith in the power of social media to spread information and perspectives, even if it just me prattling on about cycling in Cleveland. Welcome to any new readers who might have stumbled upon my blog from the various people who twittered it (tweeted it?). I want do a follow-up post when I have a chance to gather my thoughts. Also- an opportunity has arose (unrelated to my post and thanks to Miss AS over at Rustwire) for me to be interviewed about living car-free in Cleveland. Until then, I'm copping out and doing a Friday 5, because they pretty much write the post for me. :)

From Friday5.org:

What are the titles of the last three books you read all of? 1) American Wife 2) Love The One You're With 3) ...can't remember. This is pathetic.
What are the titles of between three and five magazines you subscribe to or used to subscribe to? Metropolis, Planning, and Real Simple. Used to subscribe to dwell and Architectural Digest.
What’s on your night table? Pile of magazines, a book to mail to Amy (I'm working on it), fan, sewing kit, and empty glass for water.
What are the three best things that happened to you in the past seven days? Seeing everyone support Sylvia and cycling at her memorial ride. All the attention my last blog post received. Having the very first community meeting I've ever helped run go well.
What was your senior yearbook quote, and what would your yearbook quote be this year if there were such a thing? "Faith can destroy mountains, doubt can create them" by Anonymous was senior year. Now I'd be torn between "My own self, at my very best, all the time" by William H. Danforth and “The world is a playground, and life is pushing my swing” by Natalie Kocsis. Funny thing is that I am actually (well, hopefully) graduating this coming May, but I don't think the urban planning program has a yearbook... :)

I ride for... a better world.

2009-09-22T22:17:00.007-04:00

Today I participated in a memorial ride for Sylvia Bingham, the cyclist killed last week here in Cleveland. It was at the same time an incredibly heart-warming event as well as an incredibly heart-wrenching event.

Imagine 150 cyclists all wearing white riding in silence behind a police escort. Imagine 150 people placing beautiful flowers next to a ghost bike. Imagine 150 people joining in song in front of Hard Hatted Women, the agency where Sylvia worked.

Tell me that is not something powerful to see. There was hardly a dry eye today.

Let me remind you that this took place in Cleveland. I haven't really had much a chance to really bike around other cities, but from my own experience, the culture here doesn't really support cyclists. Given the rash of cyclist deaths, accidents, crashes, and near-misses in the past few weeks here in Northeast Ohio, it's enough to give one pause. Maybe it is some freak coincidence, but it very much unnerves me. Especially since I've had a few near-misses myself. Is there something about NEO recently that actively discourages cycling and makes it dangerous?

Aside from this steak of cycling accidents recently, I've had some less than positive interactions with non-cylists about cycling lately. Especially tonight. Miss JF and I were biking back from the west side (we helped run a community meeting) and were harassed by some teenagers in, of all things, a soccer mom van. Later, when Miss JF and I boarded the train with our bikes to take us back to our apartment building (we're neighbors!), we were appalled when the train driver delayed the train and called in four transit cops solely to kick another guy with his bike off the train. We weren't in the least bit making a scene, but apparently there is a two bike limit on RTA trains in Cleveland. I have a bunch of issues with this rule, the least of which is that is not posted anywhere. Okay, fine, have a stupid rule, but don't expect compliance unless people actually know about it. If you want to be instantly nauseated, read some of the comments on the Plain Dealer article about Sylvia's death. It's so disheartening to experience a culture actively trying to discourage me from cycling.

That being said, the cyclists themselves to me so far have come across as really great people. Yeah, I see people salmoning and riding at night without lights and messengers cutting through traffic without helmets on, but for the most part, the cyclists I've interacted with have been really great. Today, for example, a complete stranger and his girlfriend stopped in the middle of their ride to help me change a flat tire. And the simple fact that 150 people came to ride in Sylvia's honor, even though I'm sure many, myself included, did not know her. This might be indicitive of cyclists in general but regardless, it means a lot especially here.

I do my best to promote and support cycling, especially cycling as transportation. Recreational and sport cycling is great, too. I think the culture here is pretty supportive of that. I see a slew of roadies out in the Chagrin River Valley when I bike there on weekends to get my fill of nature. People are pretty deferential to the cyclists out there, too. Cycling as transportation, on the other hand, is far less accepted here. I'm car-free in a city that doesn't support it. Bike facilities are few and far between and not well connected to each other. People yell nasty things out their car windows at me. I navigate potholes and broken glass daily. Near-misses unfortunately are a part of my life, no matter how many rules I follow (or don't follow). I often am the only cyclist I see in any given stretch of road.

Sylvia wanted to make shirts that said "I ride for ___" and people could write in what they rode for. Today I rode for Sylvia. But tomorrow and from here on out, I'm riding for a better world. The one Sylvia envisioned, so I am told. I see cycling as freedom, as sustainability, and as an income-independent mode of transportation. I did not choose to be car-free, but I have unexpectedly ended up a major proponent. I'm not saying I'm never going to own a car, I'm saying I think people shouldn't knock this whole living sans-automobile thing. At the very least, they should respect it as a choice for others, and make it easier for those who don't even have that choice.

Utility cycling isn't just for the well-to-do with expensive bikes, it's a tool for poverty, too. Being unable to afford a car, and often not sure whether I'll be able to make ends meet at the end of the month, I can understand a little how important cycling can be to people of all incomes. Watch this video from Streetfilms profiling a bike parking facility outside of Sao Paulo. Aside from the mind boggling number of bikes, pay attention to the social, legal, and bike education component. Every once in a while something knocks you on your ass with its genius. It's not aimed at middle-class, bike-to-your-white-collar-office-job cyclists, like I feel is the case in what little bike planning Cleveland really does. This is for everyone. Cleveland has a lot of poverty. Anyone else making this connection?

Cleveland, you have a great opportunity to be world class here. You want to be a city of choice? Well I chose to bike. I'm not the only one. You want to attract the creative class? Well they like to bike. Make it easier for them. You want to be sustainable? Promote cycling as a mode of transportation. You want to be a green city on a blue lake? It won't be that until it's bike-friendly. You want people to like me to stay after I graduate? Put in the infrastructure for me to live without a car. You want to do something about poverty? Give them (us) a way to get to work safely and quickly on bike. You want to have a depressingly inadequate and grossly overpriced public transit system? Fine. Let us get around by bike instead.

Biking as transportation isn't for everyone. I know that. But it is for a lot of people. And so I will ride for a better world, one where cycling is used at its fullest potential to do good in this world.

I ride for... Sylvia

2009-09-19T18:15:00.000-04:00

Last week a young woman cycling to work was killed in a hit and run accident. Please see the Plain Dealer article for the whole story. In short, Sylvia Bingham was a Yale graduate working in Cleveland for the Hard Hatted Women organization who was on her way to work when she was struck and killed. I didn't know her at all, but I was very unnerved by her accident and after learning about her, I am realizing we lost a truly great person from the world.

If you happen to live in Cleveland then please come to her memorial ride this coming Tuesday. More details are here and here. We are meeting at West 11th & Fairfield in Tremont at 7:30am. There has been a request to wear a white shirt.

Thanks, and ride safe.

Friday 5: Body Image

2009-09-19T16:40:00.006-04:00

A day late, again. This time I have a good excuse: I was staffing a conference entitled From Rust Belt to Artist Belt on the west side of the CLE all day and spent the evening at a gallery opening. Look at me, being all artsy and hipster-ish. Anyways, this week's came from LJ's Friday 5 instead.

1. If there was one thing about your body you could change, what would it be? That it wouldn't fall apart all the time. I mean, seriously, is it possible for me to make it through a semester without an injury or illness?
2. Would you rather lose 10lbs or 10 points off your IQ? 10lbs, I guess, b/c I need every ounce of intelligence my brain can eke out.
3. When you look in the mirror, are you happy with what you see? Not today, I look like I haven't gotten much sleep lately. Oh wait, I haven't. Silly conference taking over my life. :)
4. Have you ever dyed your hair? Never!
5. How often do you weigh yourself? Maybe once a month? I guess I pay attention more to how I feel and less to a number.

Metrosexuals: People who really, really like buildings

2009-09-13T20:19:00.004-04:00

A short post, just to share the glory of the twitter I got earlier from Nick:

@hhf3 I have decided that you are officially a Metrosexual. http://survivingtheworld.net/Lesson51.html

That is all. Happy Sunday evening, everyone.

Friday 5: Bottles, a day late

2009-09-12T10:59:00.002-04:00

http://www.friday5.org/

1. When did you last drink something out of a glass bottle?
The wine I had last night came from a glass bottle, but I definitely did not drink it from the bottle!
2. Whose energy would you like to bottle for those future listless days?
One of my classmates is very high energy.
3. How many plastic bottles are there in your shower, and what's in them?
A whole bunch, my roommate & I share a shower, and we're both girls, so we each have like multiples of everything.
4. Who in your life could be described as lightning in a bottle?
Not familiar with the phrase.
5. You're playing Spin-the-Bottle with your sixth-grade classmates. When it's your turn, to whom do you want the bottle pointing?
Is this in the present, or back then? Actually, it doesn't matter. None of them!

Considering bike commuting?

2009-09-05T21:32:00.004-04:00

I could wax poetic all day about the benefits and joys of bike commuting, but let's pretend you already are "sold" on the concept. Just to clarify, we're talking about utility cycling or transportation cycling, not recreational or sporting.

It's not the world's easiest thing to pick up, but once one does it enough times, it becomes rote. Until one gets there, thought, it's quite a bit of trial and error. A cursory Google search will probably yield many different opinions and solutions for bike commuting. Because this is my own blog, and I'm allowed to say whatever I want, I'm going to throw my two cents in. Oh, the glory of having a personal soapbox, er, blog.

The basics:

A bike.
A way to to carry your gear.
Bike-appropriate clothing.
Misc. accoutrements to make the ride easier and more comfortable.

Let's start at the top: the bike. The key ingredient to this being a bike commute and not some other form. I'll probably cover the rest in future installments.

If you already have a bike, you're probably golden. But depending on what type it is, the conditions you face, and how long your commute is, you might be searching for a different bike.

Short commutes will accommodate pretty much any type of bicycle, but for really long commutes, you might want to consider a bike more suited to long distance, like a touring bike.

If you're facing rough road conditions like potholes and whatnot, I'd highly recommend a steel frame bike. They might be heavier, but they absorb much more than other materials.

Might be biking the rain? Aluminum rims wheels are the way to go (and probably my next upgrade to Jay).

Got a flat commute? A fixed gear or a single speed might be an option for you.

Hilly commute? Definitely a geared bike.

The bottom line is to find a bike that fits you, is comfortable, and that you look forward to riding. Bike commuting should be fun!

Friday 5: More Less

2009-09-04T10:54:00.002-04:00

The Friday 5 is a meme where one answers the same five questions as everyone else who is participating. Please see http://www.friday5.org/ for one example, but there are other ones as well. Maybe this will be a regular feature on my blog, maybe it won't!

1.) In what way this week were you reckless? Riding my bicycle at night, apparently. Despite being decked out like a Christmas Tree with blinky lights, a giant black SUV almost plowed me over. But I think they may have been doing it on purpose to antagonize me.
2.) In what way this week were you shameless? Well, I shamelessly plugged for our student chapter of the American Planning Association. We had 46 people at our first meeting... meaning we have about 50-odd members. Last year, we had maybe 35-40 members?
3.) In what way this week were you fearless? I managed to lead the whole meeting for APA, despite being terrified of public speaking.
4.) In what way this week were you thoughtless? A myriad of tiny things, but I did get irritated with someone because I didn't know that the letter had been sent. (I hurt my hip, and to get outside of my network health care coverage, I need to have a letter from the doctor to the health insurance company. Ridiculous, I know.)
5.) In what way this week were you doubtless? I'm not even sure what they mean by doubtless. How is it different than fearless?

Sidelined: Starting the aging process young

2009-08-30T18:12:00.007-04:00

Remember a few posts ago when I decided I was interested I was interested in running a half-mary? Well, I guess I won't be after all. I've been having a weird hip problem recently; the past few days it's kinda blown up and now it hurts to walk or sit. Ridiculous. I must be the youngest person I know to have a bum hip! I'm off to the school health clinic tomorrow to see what's up. Being a poor graduate student on a very limited budget and one without a car (I have to walk a lot), this could get iffy. But, it is what it is, and I have to play the hand I was dealt. Needless to say, I'm a little sad to give up the half-mary goal. The registration is due tomorrow and I just don't know whether I'll be okay to run in October.

Today, despite the achy hip, my roommate and I went to a Fleet Feet store. All I have to say is: wow. After measuring my feet, looking at my walking gait, a quick discussion of what I do for running, and a glance at my old shoes, the salesman brought out 3 pairs of shoes, all of which fit perfectly and were comfortable. I'm sure they have some kind of formula or something, but to me it was like magic. Buying running shoes by oneself is a daunting process. Apparently, my last pair of shoes (which I purchased on advice from Amy) were pretty good, but I needed even just a little bit more support. The ones I ended up getting were Brooks Adrenaline GTS 9 in a cool slate blue and white color scheme. Interestingly enough, I had gone up half a size since last summer. Guess all the standing at my old retail job combined with all this running had an effect! My shoes also came with one of those metal waterbottles so trendy right now. I am so excited to run in my new kicks. But, alas, no dice until my hip stops hurting.

Get lost: On how to turn a 40 minute run into an 1:45 one

2009-08-29T13:54:00.004-04:00

I'd like to share an amusing anecdote from this past week. I had roped my friend into going for a run with me Tuesday night. On the half-mary schedule was a 40 minute moderate run (after switching the schedule around). He living about equi-distant as me from this little bridge over one of the lakes in Shaker Heights, we decided to meet up there around 7pm. To keep things simple, we decided to do 20 minutes up the road on the northern side of the park (aptly named North Park), then turn around and head back.

So we cruise up North Park, up around the second lake, and followed what we thought was North Park straight across an intersection. We keep running until we hit 20 minutes. As there were a ton of people mowing their lawns on North Park, we decided to walk a little bit, as I'm allergic to grass and it was bothering my asthma. So as we are walking down the street, all of a sudden we come to the intersection of North Park and another street. Whaa? Weren't we on North Park? Numerous attempts to head back in the correct direction all ended up looping us around to the same location. Once we finally thought we were going in the right direction, we then realized we were actually headed in the exact wrong direction. This time, however, we found ourselves on a major road in Shaker Heights, this one a straight road with no weird turns! Finally, an hour and forty five minutes later we got back. Crazy! Silly Van Sweringen brothers and their loopy plan for Shaker.

Good-bye summer, hello insanity

2009-08-23T19:54:00.002-04:00

Tomorrow is the first day of class, and I'm already double-booked. This semester is going to be absolutely off the hook:

20 hrs/wk at graduate assistantship
Full course load, including a time-intensive independent study creating a neighborhood plan for Birdtown in Lakewood (which is kinda a haul to get to).
10 hrs/wk other projects
Downtown Cleveland Alliance City Advocate program
President of CSU/APA, our student chapter of the American Planning Association
Half-mary training
Applications for whatever the heck I end up doing after graduation

So, please forgive me if I post infrequently. I'll do the best I can, but merely staying afloat would be a success in itself. :)

Half mary

2009-08-22T13:28:00.006-04:00

I think I've found my next goal: a half marathon. Why a half mary? When thoughts like "13.1" and "half-mary" and "remember that time you ran 12 miles?" keep popping into one's head, at some point, one has to listen. I haven't officially signed up for anything yet, nor I am solid on whether I even want to do it, but there's a nice race about halfway between Cleveland and Akron in some parkland in October that sounds very tempting. The race would be about six weeks away, but I am confident I could at least finish. Plus I think I've roped a friend into doing it as well!

Having no real idea on how to train for a 13.1 mile race, I consulted the Half Marathon Special article in the August '09 Runner's World. I have a very nice co-worker who lets me read her copies after she is finished with it! In the magazine, there's a beginner's half marathon plan. It seems quite doable, if we start with week 4 on this coming Monday, and with a few modifications. Namely, to sub out one of the XT workouts or the Monday run with interval training of some type. Surges, tempo runs, fartleks, etc., on the track. I am reserving at least one XT workout for swimming!

I did the 7 mile conversational pace run from week 3 today. Lesson learned: fuel properly BEFORE a run. I bonked a mere 20 minutes into the run and had to eat my emergency gel and walk a little. That managed to reverse it because about 10 minutes later I felt perfectly fine and finished the rest of the run without a problem except for stumbling after tripping over an uneven sidewalk slab. My inner-ring suburb is old enough to have slate sidewalks, which don't always lie perfectly flat!

On this steel horse I ride: Jay, my Peugeot

2009-08-14T17:57:00.005-04:00

I have a penchant for naming my bikes. First, there was Mike the Bike, the one that started it all. Purchased early on in my college years at a garage sale, Mike was a late 1970s silver Panasonic road bike. We got it and a smaller sister bike, a tiny mixte, for $5. If you're going to purchase a bike as an around-campus beater, $2.50 is a pretty good price. Minus nearly every cable breaking on Mike at some point or another, he was a great bike until I crashed it this past October. Totalling one's bike while riding slowly around a corner on dry, smooth pavement on a sunny Friday afternoon is all kinds of embarrassing and sad, let me tell you. I still have Mike, he's sitting in my room with parts hanging off and a parking ticket sticker on it.

As I don't own a car, and the public transit system is only so convenient, I needed another bike. I headed down to our local bike co-op and bought the only bike I could afford: Ross the Diamond Cruiser. An early precursor to the mountain bike, it has two inch wide tires, a black frame, and shiny cruiser-style handlebars. Yeah, it's definitely a unique bike. Ross now has a basket and is used for short, errand type trips, except I hardly ever take any, so mostly he sits and collects dust. When I realized I wasn't riding much because my bike wasn't appropriate to the kind of riding I enjoy most, it was time to shop for a new bike.

Still being a poor graduate student, and one with little time, I trolled craigslist for weeks until I found it: a 1981 Peugeot PH8 steel frame touring bike in electric blue. The beautiful color, the chrome fenders and rack, the integrated headlight/taillight with a bottle generator, downtube friction shifters, and the road bike geometry were perfect. So, I reserved a CityWheels car and drove to a local suburb to test drive my future ride. Got there too early, and went to a local park to kill time, where I saw a blue jay. Some kind of fate, clearly, because the bike was perfect for me and I bought it. I named it Jay - a French name for a French bike, a blue bird's name for a blue bike, an elegant character's name (Jay Gatsby) for an elegant bike. Jay is great because it's a nice commuting bike what with having a rack and all, and it is a light and fast enough bike to do double duty as a road bike. He's had a few upgrades: all new cables, new handlebar tape, new saddle, new city tires (fatter than road tires, but hella more durable), rack bag, bento box, all to make it a comfortable ride. So, here's to many more miles with Jay, my steel horse. :)

Finishing my educational career

2009-08-11T20:53:00.002-04:00

"Educational career" is my way of elevating school to something other than, well, school. The fall semester is nearly here. Gulp. At least this time, though, it's my last first day of school, my last fall semester, my last year. In less than a year, I'll break my streak of 21 years of formal education in some form or another. But enough waxing poetic, and on to the nitty gritty: the course schedule.

I have one last required class before our capstone class in the spring. It's some kind of real estate market analysis. I could see this class being really useful, especially since I will probably get my real estate license if I end up in economic development. This leaves room for two electives. I could pick a concentration, and take all my classes in a certain field, but I'd rather take what interests me and gives me the broadest education. With that in mind, I registered for Sacred Landmarks. It's a historic preservation class that meets alternating Saturdays. I'm guessing (or hoping) Saturdays were chosen because there are field trips. Having done the 9-5 class on alternating Saturdays this past spring, let me tell you, one really needs field trips and other activities to break it up. The last class currently is Distressed People, Distressed Places. I had this professor back in the spring, and realized he apparently has a penchant for unique class names. A highly engaging professor whose lectures I enjoyed, but really, what is up with the strange names? Our introduction to economic development class this past spring was titled Urban Spatial Structures. So I'm not entirely sure what this new class is going to be about, but sometimes you just want to stick with the good professors. If that elective doesn't work out, I'll probably take environmental planning, which really interests me, but it is on a slightly less convenient evening for me.

School starts in less than two weeks. The one thing I am excited about is that it is nearly over. I have only two more classes after this fall to take in the spring, and then: GRADUATION! But within these two weeks, I must write the essay for my summer internship course credit, and get a million things pulled together for the professional organization of which I am president. I'll get through it. *May 15, 2010* is going to be my mantra.

I came, I tri-ed, I "conquered" ... now what?

2009-08-10T17:48:00.003-04:00

It's been an interesting week since the race. Had caffeine in some fashion nearly ever day, two yoga classes, bike commuted once, swam 35 minutes, and danced my behind off at a wedding. That's it, though. I hadn't intended to take a week off, but that's essentially what happened. A nice respite from trying to do the 3/2/1 (runs/bikes/swim per week) - that felt pretty confining towards the end. Routine is nice and all, but I did routine starings at the black line of a pool for 13 years and I was interested in some variety and flexibility. Thought triathlon training would provide that - and it did to some extent - but I still felt constricted. Regardless, I don't have anything to train for (yet), so now working out will probably feel rather pointless. There's something to be said for simple fitness maintenance, but then again, there's a lot to be said for having a date written down on the calendar as a goal.

I tossed around the idea of doing a half-mary; after all, I did a 12 mile run unintentionally earlier this spring (long story). Almost signed up for one with my friend until we got some serious sticker shock at the entry fees. As I don't have a car, I'm pretty limited in where I can go for a race, so if a friend is interested in one and they have a car, I always look into it. Tossed around the idea of trying to beat my PR in the 5k, which seems the most likely option right now, but I think I need to convince a different friend to do it for pacing purposes. Tossed around the idea of the Stockade-athon (a 15k race in my hometown), but it is on a weekend too close to Thanksgiving and not worth an entire trip home. I'll do it someday, it's on the list of 100 Things The Furmanator Should Do Before She Bites The Dust.

I'm also considering taking a month off running. Focusing on my yoga. Building my cycling endurance, as I plan on applying to Bike & Build for next summer. I noticed today during yoga that after a week of not running, my hamstrings and hip flexors responded much faster to the stretches. I had my best downward dogs yet, and I even did a half-moon pose! I also am considering joining a local water polo club, but my skills are a little rusty, so we'll see.

I guess the point of this entry was to say that even though I finished the triathlon, I'll keep the blog going. I may only have 1-2 readers, but it's nice to have a record of life and thoughts. I also have some (potentially provocative) things to say regarding urban planning and Cleveland. Can't quite shut me up yet. :)

Cleveland Triathlon: Results

2009-08-03T13:26:00.006-04:00

Thanks to Amy, who managed to find the results online a whole two days ahead of schedule:

Swim: 10:54 (includes T1), swimming about 1:30-1:36/100m (very approx... and slow)
Bike: 1:02:08, riding about 15.5 mph.
T2: 1:12
Run: 25:58, holding around an 8:23 mile.
Total: 1:40:11, or 6/18 in my age group, or 100/288 (or 100/292 if you count the 4 DNFs).

With improvements to my cycling speed (through training and through equipment upgrades), and increases in my running endurance, I could see an Olympic distance triathlon in my future.

Cleveland Triathlon: Sprint Distance RR

2009-08-02T12:12:00.006-04:00

Aw, my very first race report. Apparently race reports should be long, drawn-out, epic tales of trials and tribulations, so hopefully mine will not disappoint. It certainly qualifies as long. My inaugural triathlon went REALLY well. I was going to wait to post until I got my final time and my splits and such, but it appears they won't be posted until Wednesday. From the unofficial results sheet posted, I finished around 1:40 and was sixth in my age group. Considering my goal time was to finish under two hours, I was really happy with my result. Okay, let's break it down:

[Jay, my 1981 Peugeot PH8 touring bike, all ready for his first (and hopefully only) triathlon. Hopefully my next triathlon will be done on a racing bike, not a touring bike. Also, my macbook's Photo Booth flips the photo around in case you're confused.]

Pre-race: I didn't sleep as well as I would have liked last night, but when the alarm went off at 4:26 am (ugh) I actually felt ready to go. Quick shower to warm up, ate some breakfast, pumped up the tires, and got on the 5:26 train downtown. Got to the transition area to discover that arriving early was not really necessary as there were only two racks for my "wave" (note: not heat, like in swimming). Laid everything out, including a pile of "just in case" clothes. Met up with my two friends who were also doing the race (one a first timer just like me) and lined up for the swim.

Swim: GROSS. They had us tread water before the start and I kept hitting nasty seaweed (lakeweed?). The start was really disorganized. We were kind of just milling around and all of a sudden they started us. I was expecting to get lined up like the previous two heats had been, so I was kinda chilling in the middle of the pack, instead of out front like I had intended. I spent the first few minutes of the swim trying to get past people, and finally got my own "space" after the first buoy. After the second buoy, started catching up to the stragglers from the heat in front of us, which resulted in me coming to a complete stop at least 3x. I had intended to try to "win" the swim for my heat, but I was also have trouble sighting, so I had to stay behind the lead girls. The water was disgusting and I was so happy to get out of there that I forgot getting out onto a dock is not the same as a pool and fell back in. :) It was hilarious to be helped out by these two volunteers!

T1: Once up the slippery ramp, I was able to jog into the transition area. Decided to just bike in the outfit I had on (two piece swim top and tri shorts), since it wasn't raining. Note to self: bring a small towel to dry feet off. I kinda rubbed them around on the floor towel then shoved my shoes on. Jogged the bike up to the mount line and I was off.

Bike: I ate a gel as soon as I got on the bike, good thing I managed to ooze it all over my face and the photographer caught it... haha. Starting off the cycling portion all sticky was interesting. Riding on the shoreway was actually quite nice. It is surprisingly hilly. Bike commuting of the Giant Hill of Doom (Cedar Road, Edgehill, Stokes/Fairhill) was probably the best thing I could do training-wise. The only time I was really able to pass people was going up the inclines. Of course, since I don't weigh much, have wide tires, and don't have aero-bars, I kept getting passed on the way down. I also managed to either break my front derailleur or screw up my shifter (I rock downtube friction shifters. Be jealous.) since I wasn't able to shift into the big ring. My only hope on downhills is to be able to shift high enough to pedal downhill, but no such luck today. I tried to tuck myself into the most aero position I could do to compensate. Nutrition-wise, I ate the Gu Chomps, which are like big gummy bears, but ridiculously sticky. The course was actually quite scenic. You pass right by downtown and the lakefront and see all the cool lofts and industrial sites and such. Going by on a bike at ~12-15mph gives one a much better opportunity to sightsee than driving on the shoreway at ~55-65mph.

T2: I don't have cycling shoes (yet), so I was able to have a really fast transition. Jogged my bike in only to discover our rack had been knocked over. This is probably the only time having a kickstand on my bike turned out to be an advantage. :) Switched helmet to a visor (thanks, Anthony Travels!), put my race belt number on, and was off.

Run: Coming out of transition straight into a hill was not fun, but there was an aid station to distract me. I got two cups of water, one to sip from, one to dump over my hands in an attempt to de-sticky myself. Only somewhat successful. I felt really good on the run and just tried to maintain a constant pace, and I ended up next to a middle-aged man running the exact same pace. We pretty much ran side by side for about 2 out of the 3.1 miles. The course was okay until I hit some headwind on Lakeside Ave. Cruising downhill around the Browns stadium was fun, but the last little run around the harbor and under the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame was hard. I saw a girl in my age group pass me, and I tried to catch up, but didn't quite have it in me. Finishing was fun. Not only did they announce my bib number, but they announced my name and said that I had a good race. They might have been tipped off by me pumping my arms over the finish line (the photographer was there!) but I like to think they were just amazed at my triathlon prowess. ;)

I'll post my official times when I get them. Right now I'd like to thank my roommate JS for the awesome poster on my bedroom door and the wild goose chase to find a cycling jacket yesterday (only to not need it today, ha), my friend DN for cheering loud enough that I could actually hear and for the ride back, my friends DP and MS for also doing the race, everyone who commented on facebook and twitter wishing me luck, my family for saying they wished they could be here today, BH for providing foundational advice on triathlons back in the fall, and most especially, Amy for providing advice, inspiration, and the chance to witness a rockstar Ironman performance. I'd also like to thank whoever invented showers because man, that one felt good.

Pre-race preparations

2009-08-01T20:47:00.002-04:00

I had a million things to do today to get ready for this race:

One last micro-workout (15 mins on bike, 15 mins jog with one 20 yard surge to make sure my legs were still there).
Pick up the race packet (train trip downtown and then sat through course director's meeting)
Fill inhaler prescription
Find a cycling jacket (weather forecast is looking iffy) and bar end plugs. Ended up buying a bento box, too (best idea EVER).
Buy some duct tape to make sure bar end plugs stay in, this will be my third set for this roll of bar tape!!
Buy Immodium. I'm feeling fine, but you never know what will happen during a race...
Strip down all the commuter accoutrements off my bike. Not that they add a lot of weight or anything, but my touring bike with its fenders and headlights already looks a little silly for a triathlon. Leaving a bell on won't help. :)
Pack the saddle and bento bags.
Assemble a new pair of goggles (note to self: don't leave goggles at the gym).
Pack all the other stuff for the race. Thank goodness I brought my old Speedo backpack, because that thing is HUGE. Good thing it's almost full. I just want to make sure I have everything, because I'm not sure what the weather is going to do.

I also had some other miscellaneous errands unrelated to the triathlon like dropping a dress to be repaired at the tailor's and buying a gift for my friend who watched my plants while I was away. Thank goodness, because I feel like if I had time to sit and think I'd start pscyhing myself out.

I can't believe it's here. I've had the goal of completing a triathlon for over a year now, and have been training for it since this past fall. I don't know if I will enjoy or what I will do next (though I have some ideas), but nonetheless, tomorrow is a day to enjoy. Even if it starts at 7:10am by swimming through that nasty water.

Planning a Triathlon: Nutrition Strategy

2009-07-31T22:32:00.007-04:00

I can't help it; there's a reason why I am studying urban planning. I love plans. City plans, race plans, Friday evening plans: all are great in my book. As the Cleveland Triathlon rapidly approaches (race is on Sunday!), it's time to plan it out. And just as a good city plan involves many facets (transportation, housing, environment, etc.), so must a triathlon plan.

First off is the nutrition. This may only be a sprint triathlon, and I may have been a distance swimmer, but a 19 minute 1650 (I swam DIII for a reason, okay?!) as my longest race is now seeming nice and short next to what might be up to a two hour long race for me. After consulting Amy, this is how it is going to go:

Clif bar and/or Larabar for breakfast and some fruit (banana?) and soymilk
1 gel, post-swim
Drink a 1:1 mixture of Gatorade and water during bike
Eat Gu Chomps during bike
Depending on how feel, 1 gel before run
Drink water at the run aid station

Post-race? Something tasty and hopefully not sweet! I'm reading this over and it's all sugar, sugar, sugar.

runCLE: Exploring downtown through running

2009-07-29T21:26:00.005-04:00

Background: I signed up a few weeks ago to be a City Advocate for the Downtown Cleveland Alliance (DCA), who is the downtown improvement corporation for the business improvement district downtown. Phew, that's a lot of mumbo-jumbo, eh? Well, a business improvement district is a special area that decides to get together, tax themselves an extra amount, and use those monies to provide services to that area. Those services can include street cleaning, safety ambassadors, marketing, etc., and the downtown improvement corporation administers the whole shebang. In an effort to court young professionals, the DCA set up an innovative program where you can sign up to a "City Advocate" where one does about 20 actions of varying levels to promote downtown. You can find more information here, as well as a new way to stalk your favorite Furmanator. The carrot being dangled in front of us is a potential position on the board for the DCA... clutch, eh? My end goal is not to be on the board; rather, it is to promote downtowns because I believe in them, in any city. Having watched my home city turn itself around, I know Cleveland's can, too. I might not be a wealthy developer or heck, even a planner for the city, but I can do my little part. Always leave a place better than when you got there, right?

My first idea is to start a running group downtown. This idea stems from a few sources. After a discussion with the City of Cleveland's bike planner, I discovered the Cleveland Clinic has a lunchtime cycling group where they meet once a week to bike around. I had also recently done a search looking for a running club/tri club practices/master's swim team based either in the Heights area of Cleveland (where I live) or downtown (where I work and attend school). It was a fruitless search. I'm still training mostly on my own. I did find a swim team, but then my work schedule changed completely. All the group runs or practices were far out in the suburbs. Donuts, anyone? I also see a lot of people running downtown during the lunch hour. Something clicked between these three influences, and of it my brainchild was born: runCLE. (This name is not set in stone, but my "clever" side seems to be still on vacation).

At first I thought it would be as easy as saying "downtown runners, meet in front of Tower City at noon on Wednesdays and we'll run together." Ha. The practical side of me realized people run at different paces, I'd need to lay out routes (and at what distances?) ahead of time, and how on earth do I get runners to show up? An email to the group of fellow City Advocates illuminated another problem: the post-run shower. I'm a spoiled brat at my internship: we have a shower/locker area in our office. This is clearly not the case at most places. Luckily, someone came up with a brilliant idea to combat the shower problem, we just have to flesh it out first.

As for the routes... that might be an easy problem to solve. I explore cities through running; hence, I'd like the routes to feature Cleveland landmarks. I also make maps for a living, so mapping won't be too hard. Plus I could always utilize mapmyrun.com or Google Maps. An excellent suggestion was to end the runs at non-sit-down lunch places (Subway versus Applebees) where runners can grab a quick bite before heading back to the office.

As for different pace groups... that's where the maps come in. We can take a minute or two to sort out pace groups before starting, and give small maps out (think photocopied quarter sheets of paper).

As for getting the word out... social networking! Facebook, twitter, the DCA blog, a new blog for the running group, press releases, word of mouth. Emails to those suburb-based running and multisport clubs (some of their employees have got to work downtown!).

So here's to runCLE, and here's to hoping I didn't bite off more than I can chew.

I'm back and Amy is going to Kona

2009-07-28T19:03:00.002-04:00

Apologies for the lack of posts recently; I was traveling the past ten days. Things like "email" and "blogging" fell by the wayside in favor of "going to the pool" and "spectating at Ironman Lake Placid." All in all, it was a really great trip, and of course: too short.

The early portion of the week was spent at home with my family. Got to go to the pool several times, officiate a swim meet (and disqualify someone who started swimming freestyle in the backstroke... silly), tour a swank retirement home for my grandmother, get brunch with a high school friend, and shirk all my duties as president of the American Planning Association chapter at my graduate school.

Also got a few decent workouts in during the trip. For some reason, swimming at the pool makes me feel really, really slow. I grew up swimming there, surely I should be used to all the jets and the very shallow shallow end, but still, felt slow in the water. I must have been compensating for the jets pushing me around because my elbows started to hurt, meaning my technique was off. Not a good feeling, but it is nice to swim outdoors. Ran a bit, too. One 30 minute run easy, one track workout, and one semi-tempo run while in Lake Placid. Also while in Lake Placid, I got to swim the Ironman course (the race is done with 2 1.2 mile loops). Once I got my stroke together (not used to sighting), I felt AMAZING in the water. I only intended to swim about 20 minutes, but ended up swimming the whole 1.2 miles. I suspect it took me around 30-35 minutes. Passed just about everyone else swimming (they were all in wetsuits) except for one guy who swam next to me for maybe a quarter of a mile before *finally* pulling in front of me. While I know everyone was swimming easy pace to prepare for the actual race, I wasn't swimming very hard either (except for about 20 yards to sort out my stroke), so I feel super confident for the swim portion of the triathlon next weekend. I was also proud of myself for not panicking much in the water (I did for about 10 seconds when I started swimming due to seeing plants underwater, but once I couldn't see anything, I was fine). I cannot remember ever doing a lake/river/ocean swim before without fighting off a panic attack at some point during it. I read Swimming to Antarctica earlier this year, and actually had to put down the book at one point because reading the author's descriptions of her open water swims made me panicky. Not sure what changed between now and then, but I'm not questioning it. I am now hoping to dominate the swim during the Cleveland Triathlon (less than a week!!!) since it is unlikely I could dominate the other two disciplines.

I'll write about Lake Placid more later, but I'll give you this spoiler now... okay it's not really a spoiler since Amy is probably the lone reader of this blog... but AMY IS GOING TO KONA. Yes, the world championships for Ironman. Not only does Amy finish her first Ironman, she beats her goal time by 20-odd minutes, PRs her marathon time, gets second in her age group, and scores a spot to Kona through the roll-down (first place girl already qualified this year). I kid you not. This girl is baller. Read her blog here. Hopefully she'll post her race report soon, and hopefully I'll get around to writing about my side of things: support, sherpa, and security!

Bringing the sunshine home

2009-07-20T13:39:00.002-04:00

I arrived home Saturday afternoon around 2pm, after a somewhat strange train ride. Basically, I got kicked out my seat quite rudely by some Amish. Maybe I am mistaken, but aren't they supposed to be known for their friendliness? Except for that, I was lucky to be able to mostly keep to myself. I had downloaded some excellent world music albums from Amazon (seriously, check out their extensive free music offerings), and read most of The Shack, until the deep religious themes got too overwhelming. The last bit of the trip is incredibly scenic along the Mohawk River with its mostly pristine shores and old towns and all the locks.

Apparently the weather here in NY this summer has been rainy, rainy, and... rainy. So far it appears I brought the sunshine with me, as it has been warm and sunny since I arrived. Here's to hoping I can bring it with me to Lake Placid for Amy's Ironman. Even us volunteers were miserable in that pouring rain last year, let alone the athletes.

This just in: All registered

2009-07-14T14:18:00.005-04:00

I finally put the plastic down and ponied up for the Cleveland Triathlon this morning. Experienced a bit of sticker shock... but I did have to pay extra to join USAT for the day. Anyways, no backing out now. Time to put my head down, keep training, taper a teensy bit, and be on the starting line by the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame at 7:25am on Aug 2 ready to race.

That being said, training between now and the race is going to be interesting. I have an incredibly bizarre schedule now that we started the driving portion of my internship. Basically we spend about 6-7 hours in a car spread out over three time periods (morning rush, midday off peak, and evening rush) in one day. This is repeated 3x: Tuesday-Thursday. I end up working about 10-11 hour days. I can squeeze in a tiny workout, but there's just not a long enough break between driving shifts. It is... less than fun, but it's only for this summer. I am also traveling home sans bicycle for a 10 day stay in the great upstate New York. Guess I'll just have to focus on running and swimming!

The last weekend I am at home - the one of July 26 - is my friend Amy's first Ironman in Lake Placid! We volunteered at it last year so I've seen it before, but I'm excited to see her race. Someone to look for out on the course! Look for a blur on a Felt bike, that's probably Amy.

When I go back to Cleveland it'll be only a few days before the tri!

Landscape Urbanism @ MOCA

2009-07-13T16:39:00.002-04:00

The nifty thing about a blog is that I can defy chronological order. Linear time? Nah! I've been meaning to post about a landscape urbanism lecture I attended last Friday (and, separately, a happy hour about advancing Cleveland last Thursday). Apologies for the tardiness- it has taken me a little longer to pull my thoughts together on this.

The Landscape Urbanism::After the Post-Industrial City lecture was sponsored by the Museum of Contemporary Art - Cleveland and the architecture/design school at Kent State University. It featured an architect and a landscape architect, both from Milan, Italy. I had a bit of a hard time understand their accents so I assume I missed out on a lot of good stuff, but their imagery and basic concepts were excellent.

Essentially, they had been charged with creating a master plan for Milan. Oh, the opportunity! They focused especially on the "greening" of a post-industrial city. Sounds familiar? There's a reason why they were invited to Cleveland! Their basic concept was the "green ray." Eight greenways radiated out from the city center with the goal of making the city more permeable and more connected to the parks. I now am envisioning green rays radiating westerly, southerly, and easterly out from Voinovich park next to the Rock Hall for Cleveland... e.g., Euclid Ave but even greener.

Other gems I gleaned: design the landscape THEN the architecture; utilize microprojects; the goal is "not to project - to protect" (no more sprawl); make the inner city *new* so that it draws people back (can't offer the old one still); informal planning flowing into formal strategy; and marketing/branding of one's vision. To speak more about the last 'gem' there, they hired retirees to travel the proposed routes for their green ray project and to record their experiences in a diary. The diaries were complied and then published. What an innovative way to do the traditional 'site visit' with fresh eyes and to simultaneously build support!

Good old-fashioned ingenuity: Cleveland's Ingenuity Festival

2009-07-12T00:27:00.005-04:00

I went to undergrad and grad school in the same city, two different schools. Very, very different schools. It's been interesting switching from a dynamic, private research university to a large, public urban university. Rarely do those worlds intersect. Today, at Cleveland's Ingenuity Fest, I am pleased to report they actually combined in a nice synergy.

I went down with some undergrad friends and met up with one of my graduate school friends there. Located in Playhouse Square, the festival featured live music, interactive technology displays, art exhibits, and your standard fair fare. I love the idea of an ingenuity fest: show off cool innovations that were locally driven. My undergraduate university was one of the main sponsors of the event, yet it took place adjacent to my graduate school.

The neatest innovations I saw were map-related. One was an interactive LCD screen table with a map on it. You could touch the map and it would pop up a little window that had some information about a video shot at that location and a button to vote for it. After the current video on the movie screen was finished, the video with the greatest number of votes was played next. Interestingly, we discovered one of the videos was shot at a bonfire that two of my friends were at! I could see a lot of use for urban planning with the touch screen mapping. How about a special map created for a master plan that citizens could play around with to learn more about it and build support for it? The other neat mapping invention was this rotating map table. You could rotate it one way and it would zoom in; spin it the other way and it zoom back out. Tilt it forward, it would pan up, and so on and so forth. The detail of the aerial shots was incredible. It was a very easy and fun way to play around with aerial imagery on maps.

Other cool things: use of empty storefronts as temporary exhibition spaces, Amy Casey's paintings, bands playing in back alleys, playing Atari video games for the first time, going to AJ Rocco's afterwards and hearing local musician Charlie Mosbrook play (a folk musician and triathlete!), and best of all: A TESLA COIL PLAYING PACHELBEL'S CANON IN D. No joke. And to top it off, it set the styrofoam robot scenery on fire. Never a dull moment.

No foot down commute: Success!

2009-07-11T08:50:00.003-04:00

On the list of achievements in my life, this is pretty much around the bottom, but I managed my first "no foot down" commute on Friday morning. That's right- the entire bike commute done without stopping.

Considering there are 7 stoplights before I even get to the main part of my commute (which has too many stoplights to count), this is kind of exciting. Obviously I rolled through a few stoplights, but safely and always watching for traffic. I wasn't even aware of the concept of "no foot down" commute until I read this strip from local bicycle comic, Yehuda Moon and the Kickstand Cyclery. It's a lovely comic about this guy Yehuda who works at a bike shop. Even better: the suburb I currently live in is featured!

I had been incredibly close to achieving the "no foot down" commute on Wednesday morning, but was foiled a few blocks from my destination by some lost travelers in a mini-van. They pulled up next to me in crisp white shirts and ties, and in a deep Southern drawl, asked me where the Salvation Army was. I was so surprised that I stopped (therefore putting the foot down and voiding the quest) and gave them directions. You never know what you are going to see in Cleveland.

Inspiration, when you least expect it

2009-07-07T15:09:00.004-04:00

Immediately after lunch today, I got a message from a friend of mine who was a team leader on a Bike & Build trip last summer. Apparently one of his riders from last summer was leading a group on the Northern U.S. route this summer, and their group was riding through Cleveland today and were a little bit lost. I grabbed a spare bike map from our bike planner, hit the pavement, and met some of the riders in front of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. We ended up going to get lunch and I did my best to satisfy their request for cheeseburgers. Apparently after riding 60 miles in the morning, nothing sounds better than a cheeseburger!

The four riders I ate with (mind you, this was my second lunch of the day) were really cool. I know "cool" is one of those generic, somewhat-meaningless-by-this-point terms (along the lines of "nice"), but really, there isn't a better way to describe them. It was really inspiring to hear their stories and their tales of the trip so far. I had been considering applying for the trip for next summer after talking with my friend; meeting with these riders just reaffirmed my decision. Screw the traditional backpacking across Europe trip, I want to bike across the country!

Get lost: When 2 turns into 3.5

2009-07-06T15:00:00.000-04:00

In honor of our country's birthday, the powers-that-be deemed we get Friday off at work. The prospect of an entire day off begged the question: what to do? The weather finally cooperated, so I decided to spend some quality time with Jay, my 1981 Peugeot PH8 touring bike. I intended to ride for 2 hours, maybe 2.5.

Well, apparently my subconscious had other plans for me, because as I was toodling around the Chagrin River Valley area, I managed to take a wrong turn. Me! The one who studies maps of the area all day at work! I ended up riding another 1.5 hours due to my wrong turn for a total of 3.5 hours of riding. I even had to stop for directions (and re-fueling by that point). When I had some weird premonition to bring cash with me (I normally don't encounter any convenience stores or the like), I should have known something was up. As Amy pointed out, apparently I made up for all my days off due to rain this week!

Live free or drive. Sorta.

2009-07-02T11:51:00.005-04:00

I miss my bike, Jay. Where did it go? you might be wondering. Nowhere.

That's the point. It's been an awfully rainy week here by the shores of Lake Erie, and I haven't been able to bike commute. I have fenders on Jay and water-proof bags, but I haven't a waterproof cycling jacket nor a hat with a brim for under my helmet. I also have an enormous hill to descend on the way there that requires quite a bit of braking of which my steel-rimmed wheels are not up to par. So, for the past few days I've been riding the train downtown. I love the train, don't get me wrong, and I love the occasional "day off" from the saddle, but three days of cold rain?!

So there Jay sits, in my living room, getting a little dusty, while every morning I scrounge up 8 quarters for transit fare. I'm a huge proponent of public transit, but at the same time, I appreciate the flexibility of not having to line up my life according to the train & bus schedules & routes. Being unable to afford a car, this leaves me with my bike(s), which is fine most of the time. For odd trips that require a car, I have a membership to a car-share program. I am realizing, however, that cycling is my favorite mode of transportation. It's not ideal for everything, obviously, but I've made it work quite well for commuting (with cooperating weather, of course). I love the freedom and the perspective. Missing my bike is proof. I'm not anti-car, I'm pro-bike.

The mare in the night

2009-06-30T14:39:00.004-04:00

This past weekend I spent quite some time looking over the Cleveland Triathlon's website, including the course map and photos from last year. Probably - nay, definitely - a bad idea. I like to race in blissful ignorance. Not to say I'm not prepared - I always have a race plan - but not knowing what's ahead allows me to race at my best. I didn't like knowing what the sets were going to be in swim practice; I don't like mapping a course out for myself for my long rides or runs. I can always deal with what comes as it comes.

I am a bit nervous already for the race. Maybe because I've never done transitions before, never swum in Lake Erie before, and never rode with so many cyclists on the same road before. Knowing the course, seeing the pictures didn't help. I've started having pseudo-nightmares about the race. A remarkably realistic dream on Sunday night involved me missing my heat by 10 minutes. Another involved my bike being stolen out of the transition area (weirdly, it was indoors and it was storming during the race). I have never dreamt about a race before. Even in the 13 years of competitive swimming, even knowing I had a tough race ahead of me (like swimming the 1650 for the first time), it never happened. I guess I always felt prepared enough. Having a coach and a race plan and a team help. Here I'm on my own.

Breaking news and breaking records

2009-06-28T13:41:00.011-04:00

The breaking news is that we have officially determined what triathlon and what length we're doing. After speaking with my one buddy last night, we decided on the sprint distance of the Cleveland Triathlon (my heat goes off at 7:25am on 2 Aug) as it minimizes the amount of time we have to spend in the disgusting waters by the E 9th Street Pier. I think I can handle the 10 or so minutes to swim a half mile in the flat water. Here's to hoping I don't finish having grown an extra limb or a third eye or something. The 16 mile bike course is entirely on the Shoreway... a highway! The 5k run is also mostly on the Shoreway as well. The race is a little over a month away. It's time to start working on some speed instead of endurance.

I broke two personal records this weekend. Saturday I went for a 3 hour bike ride (I'm pseudo-following a tri training regime I found on my computer... where it came from nobody knows!). I hit a couple rather large hills, and as I pretty much slow to a crawl up hills, my overall speed wasn't that fast. Despite that, though, I rode 37.5 miles, which I'm 99.999% sure is the longest I've ridden. I only stopped 3x- once for my normal food break, once to relieve myself, and once because I dropped my chain. I was pretty proud of myself afterwards.

The other record was broken this morning. I jogged over to the track in the drizzling rain to run 3 one mile repeats. I was striving to hold somewhere around a 7 minute mile pace, since I held near-ish that pace in my best 5k time (also, my very first 5k time). I went 7:04, 7:11, and then... a 6:56!! During the last one, I realized I had not run a timed mile since 8th grade when I went a 6:59. Three seconds worth of improvement since junior high may not be something to write home about, but is better than nothing.

My wishlist for my bike commute

2009-06-26T22:24:00.004-04:00

I commute to work via bike pretty much every day that it is feasible; that is, if the weather's okay and I don't have some early meeting or something going on directly after work, I'm on my bike Jay cruising in to the office. This much bike commuting is a lot of fun but there are a few things for which I wish to make it even better.

1) An iron at work. One of the trickiest things about my bike commute is figuring out not only what I am going to wear at work, but how I'm going to get it there. I have practice at this from having to go directly from swim practice to work during summers at home, but it doesn't change the fact that a lot of my clothes require ironing. Rolling or neatly folding only goes so far. Jersey dresses and anything that survives being packed well are favorites of mine, but I only have so much of that. Hence, an iron. Or a steamer. Or both! I can't claim credit for this idea, but it's on my wishlist anyways.

2) An insulated bag for the rack on my bike. Seriously, why hasn't this been invented yet?! They already look like soft-sided coolers, why not actually make one? I have a Chrome messenger bag that fits every last thing I need for the day except for a lunch. I essentially bought a rack bag solely to store my insulated lunchbox. I do not regret that purchase, but it would be nice to carry even just a little bit less weight.

3) A way to listen to music. Certainly I could wear my iPod, but I also need to be able to hear traffic. It'd be sweet if they could make a handlebar mount for one's iPod with little speakers, or perhaps wireless headphones that still allow the sound of traffic with the handlebar iPod mount.

A girl can dream, right?

Playing tourist in my own city

2009-06-25T21:04:00.005-04:00

People claim the real world sucks, but so far I have absolutely loved my taste of the 40 hrs/wk gig. Mainly because I can actually fit everything into one day, and even better- I have free time. Time that was not pressured by some overhanging concern like homework or a project was virtually unheard of in the past year with school. Actually, now that I think on it, I really never have had this much free time in Cleveland, ever. Luckily it is summer, and there are actually lots of fun things to do to pass the time. Sadly, I still need all these events to keep entertained, unlike being at home, but that's another story.

Two weekends ago was Parade the Circle. Quite the untraditional parade, it circled around Wade Oval. Forget your traditional assumptions of marching bands and people waving from floats. Instead we had stilts, costumed dancers, musicians, and all manner of artistically themed entries. It was a riot of color and music. Aside from the actual event itself, one of the highlights for me personally was the bike valet parking. Not only does the free service ensure the safety of my bike, but they gave it a quick once-over before I left. Now when was the last time your car valet checked your engine for you?

This past weekend we were entertained by the Larchmere Porchfest. Based off an event in Ithaca, local residents of the Larchmere neighborhood volunteered their porches as stages for musicians. I unfortunately only managed to get to hear one band on a porch; after a long bike ride in the morning, a nap was in order for me. It was quite a novel experience to sit on a stranger's yard to listen to music, but it was really nice. The headliner bands played on Shaker Square. The quality of music was mixed, but I especially enjoyed the final band- I believe their name was goodmorning valetine.

Last night we explored the Tremont neighborhood. This hip, trendy neighborhood on the near-west side is still rather foreign to me. We visited some neat places, including a bar with a tree in it. Tremont is an interesting neighborhood because it is essentially almost entirely residential with commercial scattered about. It seems like most other neighborhoods in Cleveland tend to have a main street area or a group of blocks where the commercial activity is concentrated, but not Tremont apparently. It was neat to wander the streets and experience the area.

This upcoming weekend is what sounds like a really cool event called Made in the 216. I have no particular affinity to anything made in this particular area code, but I'm sure some of my cronies do, so we are off Saturday evening to explore the Detroit-Shoreway neighborhood, see some things made by Clevelanders, and enjoy some live music. Hopefully I will remember to bring my camera!

Nom nom, rust belt city: on cities as donuts

2009-06-23T16:50:00.003-04:00

Today, a local economic development entity likely made another donut-inducing decision about a major Fortune 500 company relocation project here in this rust belt city. Why the donuts? Not only do I want to eat a tasty fried snack to feel better, but it furthers the donut-shaped phenomenon that some cities are experiencing as the center cities become less and less relevant in favor of the exurban sprawl near highways.

This project involves a mind-boggling sum of money given to this Fortune 500 company so they can relocate from a downtown location out to a suburban office park near a freeway exit. The point of this entry is not to assess whether this move is a good idea; rather, it is to question the validity of heavily subsidizing sprawl. It also sets the precedent that any company could follow in their footsteps and ask for enormous sums of money so they, too, could move to their dream suburban campus. I get why the company wants to move to these locations- easy access, cheaper construction, etc. What I don’t understand is why an economic development supposedly committed to Cleveland is bending over backwards to assist them with moving out from the downtown.

This is a terrible precedent. More and more buildings sit empty in our downtown. More and more small businesses like flower shops and delis that support the big companies are folding up. I personally see few people during the day out on the street, even on a bright sunny day during lunch. Our downtown was declining, is still declining, and will continue to do so if we keep losing to our suburban cousins. But what do they have to offer? Fine cultural institutions? Distinctive locally owned restaurants? Historic architecture? I hardly think the movie theater at the mall or the Applebee’s in the parking lot can substitute for a world class museum of art or a bistro in an Art Deco building.

There is a general consensus in economic development (or at least what I’ve studied/experienced of it) that one of the keys to revitalizing a downtown is attracting the young professional crowd. I now count myself among that crowd. We’re mobile, educated, waiting longer to have families/settle down, and want a distinctive urban experience. We don’t want a bland office building in a sea of parking lots with unwalkable & unbikable streets. We don’t want an empty downtown devoid of life and relevance. We want a crème filled donut with frosting and sprinkles on top, not some cheap donut with powdered sugar that keeps blowing off and leaving a mess.

Nolli connections

2009-06-19T14:19:00.002-04:00

Tuesday night I had the pleasure of attending a talk given by a local author on urban design, mapping, and how cities have evolved. The author (whose name I am now conveniently blanking on) is a professor in the urban planning/design department at a local university (but not mine). I didn't glean much from the talk other the chance to see some very pretty looking historical maps and the chance to briefly see how the author had created a standard mapping schema to understand and compare hundreds of cities.

The one thing that really piqued my interest more than anything, though, was the concept of Nolli connections. A Nolli map is a special kind of map developed by a guy named Nolli (you guessed it!) to map Rome back in the 1700s. Briefly, it shows all public areas in white, and all private areas in black. It varies a bit from a traditional figure/ground or solids/voids map in that public area can include interior spaces that are open to the public, such as the Pantheon, small churches, etc. I've definitely seen the Nolli map before, and have even made a couple of my own for various projects. What I hadn't been alerted to before is a neat little feature of the Nolli map: showing interior connections. For instance, if one is in the center of a block and desiring to get to the other side, normally one has to walk down the streets to get to their final destination. However, a Nolli connection might cut through the block by walking through a church and then through a passageway out to the other side of the block. I do not think it was Nolli's express intention to show these connections, but he does provide a valuable resource.

We all have our own Nolli connections, though. They don't simply exist in Rome, and they may not be officially mapped, but they do exist. For example, at my undergraduate university, to get from morning swim practice to my 9am methods class at the opposite end of campus, I would take this much shorter route instead. I'd exit the athletic center, walk around the playing field, through the children's hospital to the atrium where I would purchase breakfast at the bagel stand, on through the regular hospital, over a walkway bridge, through a parking garage, through a parking lot, down a side street, and up a sorority house's driveway to get to the side door. Quite complicated, it did take me quite some time to learn that shortcut (and learn the official name: Nolli connection!). The nice thing was that it mostly inside, always a plus in these brutal winters, and that it was partially self-created. The hospital shortcut had been passed down from older swim team members, and I did my best to pass it on, too. The rest of that route? All mine. To the best of my knowledge, I was the only one who knew it. In a university of 10,000 students all navigating the same urban campus, sometimes it is nice to feel like one has their own space.

Head, shoulder, knees and toes, knees and toes

2009-06-18T12:24:00.007-04:00

I never seem to be far from some sort of minor ache or pain; this week has been no exception. After taking the weekend off from training due to an unusually busy schedule, I hit the bike commute hard on Monday, especially on the ride back. I took the long, scenic route, and ended up climbing quite a bit which made my knees less than happy. Ice and another day of rest took care of that one. I went swimming last night only to have my shoulder act up during my warm-up, but it went away as I swam more. Today, before heading to work, I did a "surges" track workout (a more formalized version of a fartlek and what cross country runners apparently do to better their second half of their runs). Now my heel hurts a teeny bit and all I have are silly little cutesy flats with no support! None of these aches & pains are anything more than minor, so I'm fine.

The good news is that I managed to blow through my morning bike commute with only having to stop three times at stoplights... the whole 6.5 miles! The workout had taken less time than I had budgeted, so between leaving earlier than usual and barely stopping the whole route, I got to work quite early, meaning I can leave early (or pad the week so I can work a shorter day tomorrow). Yeah! The other good news is that I managed to run the whole time with my hair in a low ponytail for the first time. I expect that I will have to do that for the triathlon (no need to waste time in T2 styling my hair!) so might as well get used to it now.

The long way home

2009-06-15T19:45:00.005-04:00

Sometimes the weather is just too beautiful to take the fastest route back to my apartment from work. Today I cycled along the lake and then up a bike path along a boulevard to get back to the area I live. This scenic route essentially doubles the length of my trip, but how often do I have time to leisurely pedal along the shore and watch the sailboats, or cruise through the cultural gardens along the bike path during the school year? The answer is never, and so I am trying my best to do all the fun things I can't normally do. Whoever said the real world stinks certainly never went to planning school. :)

The city as my classroom and design as an expression of myself

2009-06-14T19:48:00.013-04:00

"We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us." - Winston Churchill

One of the interesting things about currently studying urban planning and previously having studied architecture and art/design is that one is always surrounded by what one is studying. It is different than a lot of other careers because their field tends to be less pervasive in daily life (though one could certainly argue otherwise). It's sort of hard to leave the office/classroom behind because, in a way, the city is my office/classroom.

How so? Urban planning, in the most broad of definitions, is planning for how we use space 24/7/365. We are constantly in space, and generally in at least somewhat urbanized areas, so that's a no brainer. We are constantly around architecture due to our need for shelter. Art pervades my life less so, but design certainly does through product and industrial design and even things like typefaces. Perhaps I am more strongly affected by my surroundings than others, but regardless, I am always paying attention.

I tend to geek out over mundane things like sidewalks, curb cuts, street trees and pocket parks. I choose my running routes based on what beautiful homes and parks past which I want to run. I am always interested in how things are designed, ranging from the train that takes me downtown to things like spoon rests. It is natural, therefore, that my interest in the design of my environment extends to my virtual world as well. Having (already) grown tired of the Blogger layout, it is time to redesign my blog. I started by finding a cute background (check out the link in the upper left hand corner) and have a few ideas in mind to make this more 'me' (see intro post about narcissism and blogging). So, please bear with me while changes are being made. Who knows- you might even like the final product!

Running without an agenda

2009-06-12T20:50:00.008-04:00

"Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt." - Kurt Vonnegut

It is entirely possible that I am taking that quote out of context, but taken on its face it describes perfectly my run today. The past two days I have allowed myself some "no agenda" runs. I run without a watch, without my iPod, without any goals, without any pacing and without any set course. The only thing to do is run.

You never know if you're going to barely make it 15 minutes before wheezing or if you're going to go 12 miles on the longest run of your life. Both have happened. Today, however, I managed almost 6 and 3/4 miles. Nothing especially outstanding in mileage, but I felt amazing the whole time. I live in a beautiful suburb full of architecturally distinguished old homes on tree lined streets, with a handful of lakes and lots of green space. The golden glow of the early evening light on 1920s brick Tudor and Georgian manses certainly elevates an ordinary run to a new level. As no soreness or aches or pains bothered me, one can see how Vonnegut's quote describes it perfectly. The day before on my "no agenda" run I had to walk. Today I floated. The beauty of the "no agenda" run is that neither is a failure and neither is a success. It just is.

I think "no agenda" runs also help to remind me why I do what I do. Other than the chance to run through a well-designed community (urban planning dorkdom!), running without a purpose lets me enjoy running for running's sake. I was getting frustrated with triathlon training earlier this month/end of last month, and sometimes one just needs the chance to remember that this can be fun.

I tri; therefore I blog

2009-06-10T16:26:00.011-04:00

Why a semi-return to blogging? I have this theory that if one is a triathlete (even a fake one like me), they must blog. Think about it- do you know of any triathletes who don't have a blog? Nope.

Therefore, since I am training (and have been training) for a triathlon this summer, I must also engage in the somewhat self-indulgent activity of posting my thoughts to the web just like everyone else (when I start purchasing compression socks, someone slap me across the face). I am aware 99.99% of the world could care less what I think so I will make no pretext that this blog will somehow transcend the usual pedestrian fare out there. I'm more of a fan of the 140 character limit imposed by Twitter anyways. Eliminates a lot of the rambling. If you want to read a cool blog, or at least a blog written by a cool person, I'll be putting up a list of ones I enjoy (again: narcissism at its finest) on this page. If I get around to it, of course.

Now that we have buried any potentially high expectations for this blog, let me share some relevant information about my life, as it likely what I'll be posting about. I'm currently in graduate school in urban planning, I intern in the transportation field, I am a dedicated bike commuter (more due to poverty but lately to activism thanks to my internship), I live in a Rustbelt city along the Great Lakes and yes, I am training for a triathlon. Now go navigate your IE or Firefox or Safari to a more exciting site and find yourself something entertaining to read.