Parking Bicycles

[whart57]

I found an old pic of a street near where I grew up that was taken in 1960. Only when I looked at it closely did I notice the bicycles and how their owners had left them while they went into the shop. I'd completely forgotten that was how we did that sixty years ago. Wheels in the gutter, one pedal pushed down against the kerb which couldn't move without turning the back wheel.

 

 

I've never seen that on a model, nor have I seen a bike parked like that for a very long time.

 

[BernardTPM]

I suspect a dying skill; mostly they just seem to be laid/chucked down on the ground unless there's a stand. I've done this style of parking before (though not for quite a while), but sometimes you get a kerb too low for it to work.

Edited November 25, 2023 by BernardTPM

[davknigh]

Not so much a dying skill but a desire not to have the bike nicked. Around far too many places a bike left standing like the one in the picture would be gone in under a minute. Even bikes double locked get stolen if they happen to have the right marque.

 

Cheers,

 

David

[Nearholmer]

1) it would probably get nicked;

 

2) if it didn’t get nicked, someone would probably push it over “for a laugh”;

 

3) if neither of those happened, a car or van would probably clip it and knock it over;

 

4) in the unlikely even of none of those happening, all would be fine.

 

It is interesting though, because looking at old photos on the Facebook local history site for the small town where I grew up, it is pretty clear that bikes weren’t pushed on pavements to get to parking spots, or even if the owner was simply pushing for a short distance up a steep hill or whatever, they were pushed in the road, in earlier years right down the middle of the road. It’s clear that as traffic speed and density has risen things have changed.

 

It’s also clear that “back in the day”pushing was much more a part of cycling than it is now. Most people cycled for practical reasons rather than exercise, the bikes were heavy, were often used to carry decent loads, and most had at best three gears, so any significant hill would see many users pushing to go up.

There is a very entertaining short book by H G Wells called “The wheels of Chance”, a combined social commentary, mild adventure/romance, and cycling tale, and since he was himself a keen cyclist in the first bike boom (1890s) and beyond, it is very sound on cycling detail. It includes a lot of pushing up hill, and walking down very steep hills. It also mentions tandems quite often, because they were surprisingly popular for touring, which was a big thing. At the time most bikes only had one speed, were “fixed wheel”, no freewheeling, so the back wheel was braked using the legs, and had a rather rubbish “spoon brake” on the front wheel, a sort of metal brake shoe like a teaspoon that pressed on the tread of the tyre, so going down steep hills was potentially pretty dangerous, especially if the surface was loose (barely any roads were “sealed” until motor cars became fairly widespread in the 1910s, and many small rural roads were still unsealed in the 1930s).

 

So, a super-accurate “period” model railway should have a lot more bikes than is common now, and show them being used differently.

 

1910s. Notice that one of the guys has leather gaiters on. There was one old boy locally, a gardener, who still dressed exactly like that to cycle to work when I was a kid in the 1960s.

 

 

 

 

Edited November 26, 2023 by Nearholmer

[whart57]

In the Netherlands bikes from at least the 1930s on had something called terug-trap which translates as back-pedal for braking. You can free wheel but if you pedal backwards you apply a small drum brake inside the backwheel axle. There are still bikes around with that today and it was certainly still standard on the ordinary go-to-the-shops sort of push bike in the 1990s. Never seen them in England though, which made the bikes my mum and dad brought over with them in 1955 somewhat unique.

[jcredfer]

23 hours ago, whart57 said:

In the Netherlands bikes from at least the 1930s on had something called terug-trap which translates as back-pedal for braking. You can free wheel but if you pedal backwards you apply a small drum brake inside the backwheel axle. There are still bikes around with that today and it was certainly still standard on the ordinary go-to-the-shops sort of push bike in the 1990s. Never seen them in England though, which made the bikes my mum and dad brought over with them in 1955 somewhat unique.

 

My father had a bike from pre-WWII times, with back pedal braking and it was still in the garage, in 1956.  It also had unusual handlebars, which could probably be best described as semi-drop bars; sort of halfway between modern straight bars and full drop bars.  It must have been sold then, as it didn't appear when we moved to Devon.

 

Edited November 27, 2023 by jcredfer

[John Isherwood]

I'm pleased to see that this thread is NOT about burying deceased wives!😄

 

Sorry, blame Billy Connelly.

CJI.

Edited November 26, 2023 by cctransuk

[Nearholmer]

Back-pedal brakes were used in Britain, but I don’t think they were ever a big thing, I think the same thing is called a “coaster brake” in the USA, and was still used until recently on children’s bikes (it may still be, although I have a feeling it’s outlawed because in the event of chain failure or ‘unshipping’ of the chain, the main brake is gone too).

 

JC

 

Were the bars upside down north road bars, which were popular until the 1950s? Like this?

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 26, 2023 by Nearholmer

[BernardTPM]

1 hour ago, whart57 said:

In the Netherlands bikes from at least the 1930s on had something called terug-trap which translates as back-pedal for braking. You can free wheel but if you pedal backwards you apply a small drum brake inside the backwheel axle. There are still bikes around with that today and it was certainly still standard on the ordinary go-to-the-shops sort of push bike in the 1990s. Never seen them in England though, which made the bikes my mum and dad brought over with them in 1955 somewhat unique.

The tandem we* had in the '60s had a back pedal brake. Did a lot of touring on that before getting my own 'proper' bike. Fixed wheel braking is the same as engine braking in cars; holding back the revolutions against gravity.

 

* my Dad's, of course, but my Mum, myself and later my younger brother all had turns on the back over the years until it was sold circa 1970.

[jcredfer]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

Back-pedal brakes were used in Britain, but I don’t think they were ever a big thing, I think the same thing is called a “coaster brake” in the USA, and was still used until recently on children’s bikes (it may still be, although I have a feeling it’s outlawed because in the event of chain failure or ‘unshipping’ of the chain, the main brake is gone too).

 

JC

 

Were the bars upside down north road bars, which were popular until the 1950s? Like this?

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think you are probably quite right, with Father's having the UK more drooped version similar to your picture. looking at it, it looks like it might be an improvement to the straight bars I currently have.  Maybe the Old Boy, was wiser than his sons gave him credit for.  {Ok, just joking, misquoting a Mark Twain observation about his Father, ours was a very wise and kind gent.}

 

[whart57]

3 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Back-pedal brakes were used in Britain, but I don’t think they were ever a big thing, I think the same thing is called a “coaster brake” in the USA, and was still used until recently on children’s bikes (it may still be, although I have a feeling it’s outlawed because in the event of chain failure or ‘unshipping’ of the chain, the main brake is gone too).

 

JC

 

Were the bars upside down north road bars, which were popular until the 1950s? Like this?

 

 

 

 

 

You didn't pose that specially for us did you?

[Vistisen]

4 hours ago, whart57 said:

In the Netherlands bikes from at least the 1930s on had something called terug-trap which translates as back-pedal for braking. You can free wheel but if you pedal backwards you apply a small drum brake inside the backwheel axle. There are still bikes around with that today and it was certainly still standard on the ordinary go-to-the-shops sort of push bike in the 1990s. Never seen them in England though, which made the bikes my mum and dad brought over with them in 1955 somewhat unique.

The same thing is true in Denmark.  The lack of brakingpower is quite frightening. They only make sense in countries where they are separate cyclelanes. Since bikes with only this type of brake have the same stopping distance as a supertanker. Even more worrying when you consider they can be used for transporting quite heavy loads:

[John Isherwood]

2 minutes ago, Vistisen said:

Even more worrying when you consider they can be used for transporting quite heavy loads:

 

........ or, increasingly on the school run, one's precious offspring in a container resembling a wheelbarrow!

 

CJI.

[Nearholmer]

38 minutes ago, whart57 said:

You didn't pose that specially for us did you?

It’s a picture on Flickr, not mine, that I linked to, but I did rather like the pedal-balancing. Whenever I try something like that, the bike falls over as soon as I turn round.

 

 

Edited November 26, 2023 by Nearholmer

[Michael Hodgson]

14 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

It’s also clear that “back in the day”pushing was much more a part of cycling than it is now. Most people cycled for practical reasons rather than exercise, the bikes were heavy, were often used to carry decent loads, and most had at best three gears, so any significant hill would see many users pushing to go up.

 

 

It's no accident that we call them push-bikes!

[whart57]

13 hours ago, Vistisen said:

The lack of braking power is quite frightening. They only make sense in countries where they are separate cycle lanes.

 

Actually it's the fact the countries are flat. The braking power of a back pedal bike is quite adequate for normal cycling, and unlike the fiercer cable brakes of British bikes you don't normally lock the back wheel in a dodgy skid, which can have you off on a wet road. Where a back pedal brake is not good is on long downhill stretches, then you need a bit stronger braking. But there's not many of them either in the Netherlands or Denmark.

[fulton]

2 minutes ago, whart57 said:

 

Actually it's the fact the countries are flat. The braking power of a back pedal bike is quite adequate for normal cycling, and unlike the fiercer cable brakes of British bikes you don't normally lock the back wheel in a dodgy skid, which can have you off on a wet road. Where a back pedal brake is not good is on long downhill stretches, then you need a bit stronger braking.

Back pedalling brakes are still the standard in Germany, I bought a bike there recently, all the "normal" bikes had back pedal, I find going down hill I can exert more force with my feet, as you say less chance of locking the back wheel up, the only problem I find is you have to push away to start, rather than moving the pedals to the ideal starting place, also most bikes come with hub dynamos and lights as standard, not extras, the stores we visited in Dusseldorf all had indoor tracks to try the bikes out, but on balance I prefer two hand brakes.

[whart57]

17 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

It’s a picture on Flickr, not mine, that I linked to, but I did rather like the pedal-balancing. Whenever I try something like that, the bike falls over as soon as I turn round.

 

 

 

I think modern bikes are simply too light and don't hold the back wheel down well enough.

[Compound2632]

On 25/11/2023 at 20:21, whart57 said:

 Wheels in the gutter, one pedal pushed down against the kerb which couldn't move without turning the back wheel.

 

I used to park the bike like that, more recently than 60 years ago - in my cycling years, the 1980s and early 90s chiefly. I can't really think though what the circumstances would have been; I'm sure I didn't leave it unattended like that.

[Michael Hodgson]

41 minutes ago, whart57 said:

 

I think modern bikes are simply too light and don't hold the back wheel down well enough.

Eat more chips.  There'll be enough weight on the back wheel then.

[stewartingram]

In the centre of Cambridge there was a Woollies and an M&S store, with a large frontage, Opposite side of the road was the main set of bus stops going north. Southbound buses entered from a one-way street from the west to pass the stores, swinging round the corner to do so. Everyone parked there bikes on the kerb outside the stores. There was one driver who had a reputation....especially if a northbound bus was at its stop.

....He used to clip every bike in the row as he swung round the corner.....

[whart57]

1 hour ago, Michael Hodgson said:

Eat more chips.  There'll be enough weight on the back wheel then.

 

Yeah, but if lardy boy is in the saddle he won't need to park the bike though, will he?

[Nearholmer]

Outside the chip shop?

[CEINEWYDD]

Billy Connolly used to tell a great joke about parking a bike, but I am sure I will get banned to submitting that, so you will have use your imagination!! 

[John Isherwood]

3 minutes ago, CEINEWYDD said:

Billy Connolly used to tell a great joke about parking a bike, but I am sure I will get banned to submitting that, so you will have use your imagination!! 

 

Already alluded to above.

 

CJI.

Edited December 18, 2023 by cctransuk