I just received my Jan/Feb 2008 issue of Bicycling magazine, which includes a section on commuting. It references the website for SmartTrips, a Colorado based commuter advocacy group. The site has a calculator you can use to see how much money you save, calories you burn, and pollution you reduce by leaving your car at home! Visit http://www.smarttrips.org/transportation/savingsCalculator.aspx. A cool tool, though the fuel savings is based on old gas prices (.73/gallon from June 2006).

My hospital stay a few months ago resulted in the neurologist invoking a three month driving restriction. My wife thinks I had a seizure. My doctor says it sounds like vasovagal syncope. Regardless, there is no Illinois law restricting driving following such an episode. So doctors tend to follow the laws of neighboring states. It could have been longer. Michigan has a 6 month waiting period. In Wisconsin the wait is 3 months.

I had a followup with the neurologist last week and another EEG. Assuming all’s well, it will be three months next Thursday.

I’ve been bumming rides and biking to work the past three months. So out of curiosity I tallied up my commuter miles and calculated my fuel savings.

484.69 miles

I have to admit, I’m a little discouraged after calculating gas and dollar savings.

My car gets 18mpg. My bicycle commuting has saved 26.93 gallons of gas. At about $3.10/gallon, that’s only $83.48. Almost two fillups

Granted, it’s been fun, I feel great, my recreational riding feels stronger and I’m staying in shape due to the 25 mile round trip commute. I have to get around anyway, and I want to ride my bike. I do plan to continue bike commuting, weather and work schedules permitting, event after returning to driving. So if that’s the goal, then the gas and money savings, however small, is a nice side benefit.

My MacBook Pro contains an accelerometer. It detects motion, like if the computer is knocked off a table and falls to the floor, and locks the hard drive in order to minimize damage to the computer. It turns out there is a similar mechanism in the human body, called the Vegas Nerve, which I discovered this summer.

I woke up early on June 20 for my regular Wednesday mountain bike group ride. I felt nauseous and went to the bathroom to heave. Next thing I know my wife is standing over me, screaming at me to wake up. There I am on all fours and she’s screaming at me to wake up. I went by ambulance to the hospital where I stayed for three days while they ran every kind of test. Two EEG’s, MRI, MRA, heart telemetry, all kinds of blood and urine tests. None turned up anything conclusive. My brother had epilepsy as a teenager, so of course the doctors focus on that and decide, since they can’t figure it out, to cover their ass and say I can’t drive for three months.

As it turns out, for me as an avid bicyclist, a driving restriction is no big deal. I had been talking for months about trying to find a bike friendly commuter route to my office and this was the perfect excuse. I have two routes, one along the Rock River, the other along Perryville Road on the East side of Rockford. Both are mostly paved bike path with some neighborhood streets. It’s about a 12.5 mile commute each way, which makes for a respectable 25 mile ride about three days a week.

My three month driving restriction ends on September 20. I checked the logs from my Garmin Motionbased for the past 90 days since I started commuting. I’ve logged over 750 miles, of which 375 have been back and forth to the office.

Riding has been great. I’ve fitted my old Specialized Expedition with a rear rack and a set of bags. Fully loaded with a change of clothes, tool kit, lock and other stuff, the bike weighs close to 50 lbs, but I feel stronger on the mountain bike and road bike after pushing the commuter to work for a few days.

Of course the drawback has been that the tv show has suffered. I apologize for not releasing a show in the past several months. I have a couple of great segments from a tour at the SRAM HQ and a how-to piece. If you’d like to submit any of your own video of rides you’ve done, interviews, or coverage of a bike event in your area, I’d be happy to include it on TrailTapes.

Meantime, thanks for the comments. I’m working to get another episode out shortly and get back on track.

A few posts ago (http://www.trailtapes.com/archives/122) I mentioned the Bicycle Commuter Act that was before the US Congress. It has since been re-introduced as H.R. 1498 in the House and S. 858 in the Senate. The legislation would provide bicyclists with a similar tax benefit to that currently enjoyed by transit users and car parkers, through voluntary, employer-run programs. You can learn more about it from the League of American Bicyclists.

I sent a letter to my Senator, Barack Obama, asking for his support of S. 858 and received this reply:

Dear Chris,

Thank you for contacting me regarding S. 858, the Bicycle Commuters Benefits Act of 2007, which expands the tax incentive now available for public transit and drivers also to bicycle commuters. I believe the Bicycle Commuters Benefits Ace is sound policy and thus I have added my name as a cosponsor of this bill.

The benefits of commuting by bicycle is almost an endless list — reducing harmful emissions, reducing congestion, reducing petroleum consumption, promoting personal health — but our public policies have evolved to where smart and sustainable transportation uses are discouraged. Roads are designed without pedestrian or bike paths, office and shopping parks are designed around the automobile, and even the best transit systems may be incompatible with bike use. It is time to revisit all federal policies to better accommodate the energy and environmental health priorities of the 21st century.

Again, thank you for writing. Please stay in touch.

Sincerely,

Barack Obama

United States Senator

Returning for a seventh year, the 2007 Bicycle Film Festival (BFF) is kicking off its annual tour, stopping in an unprecedented 15 cities internationally. Putting an even greater focus this year its campaign to promote a clean lifestyle – breathing cleaner air and living in a better environment – the BFF will begin its tour in New York with films at the Anthology Film Archives (32 Second Ave.) during the city’s “Bike Month” and a free, all-solar powered, outdoor rock show in conjunction with Solar One (www.solar1.org). “We are thrilled to bring the BFF back to the cities that have welcomed us for so many years, and feel fortunate that we are in the position to expand to include new audiences,” said Brendt Barbur, Bicycle Film Festival director and founder. “We hope that the BFF opens people up to using bikes as a form of alternative transportation, ultimately helping our environment and reducing air pollution. Each time we begin in a new city, I can’t help but be inspired by the growth in enthusiasm for bicycle riding.”

The days of the festival are filled with films, parades, block parties and art shows – all bike themed. Each day of the festival includes various programs grouping together like films, from mountain biking to BMX, and from fun shorts to the messenger program. The films that will be shown were hand selected from hundreds of submissions that came from over 15 countries. The film selections for 2007 came from filmmakers including the Neistat Brothers (www.neistat.com), Lucas Brunelle (www.lucasbrunelle.com) and Daniel Leeb (www.cinecycle.com), among others, as well as a feature documentary from Billy Savage that features mountain biking icon Gary Fisher titled Klunkerz (www.klunkerz.com). Savage’s Klunkerz, a documentary on the history of mountain biking from its roots in Marin County, has been said to shine a light on the sport sparking worldwide interest just as Stacy Peralta had done with his skateboarding documentary Dog Town and Z Boys. All BFF related events include free bicycle valet parking – (there has never been a stolen valet parked bike). The Bicycle Film Festival has grown so much in popularity, selling out shows in New York and San Francisco, that it has grown in 2007 to reach audiences in 15 cities: