Press

Flowers Love and Rage

They ranged in age from ten to 60, and they lived in every corner of the city, from St. Albans to Williamsburg, but all 14 of them have this in common: during 2006 they died while riding bicycles.

"Ride with us," announced Time's Up, a two-decade-old advocacy group, in their description of the 2nd Annual Bicyclist Memorial Ride this past Sunday. "Please bring flowers, love, and rage."

Heavy lifting as cyclists honor those killed on the road in ’06

Bicycle solidarity was on eloquent display last Sunday as hundreds rode in the Second Annual Memorial Ride to honor the 14 riders killed on city streets last year.

Two separate rides started out early in the morning in Queens and the Bronx, stopping at a dozen sites before meeting up mid-afternoon in the Village. At each stop, friends and colleagues poignantly spoke of their loss in words usually reserved for close family members.

Risi Kondor, a computer science student at Columbia, rode even though he didn’t know any of the fallen cyclists.

In Defense of Ghost Bikes

Aaron's piece questioning the memorialization of bike fatalities reminds us that cycle advocacy is rife with paradoxes. Drawing attention to cycling deaths and injuries can be powerful politically and symbolically but may also scare off would-be riders. Moreover, cycling is safer for all when there are more cyclists.

Manhattan: Memorial Bike Ride

Cyclists gathered yesterday to honor those who died while riding their bicycles in 2006, visiting each of 14 sites where riders are known to have been killed.

After the journey ended in Downtown Manhattan next to the Memorial for Unknown Cyclists, speakers called for safer streets, harsher penalties for reckless motorists and improved crash reporting by city agencies. Cycling deaths reported in 2006 dropped by 10 from the year before, but organizers said they were concerned that the official tally might be inaccurate.

Journey's End

YOU may have noticed scenes like these around the city. These photographs depict “ghost bikes,” memorials to bicyclists who have died in collisions with cars and trucks on New York streets.

Ghost bikes are typically old bicycles painted white and placed where bicyclists have died. Plaques identify the dead. The memorials are the work of Time’s Up!, an advocacy group, and Visual Resistance, a group of Brooklyn artists and activists. Inspired by similar campaigns in St. Louis and Pittsburgh, the two organizations have erected more than 20 such memorials.

Ghost Riders: 21 Cyclists Killed Last Year in NYC

Their deaths seem so sadly ignoble. Crushed by a garbage carter. Plowed under by an ice cream delivery truck. Slammed from behind by a speeding SUV.

Twenty-one cyclists were killed in traffic accidents in New York City in 2005, up from 15 in 2004, and 13 in 2003. That made 2005 the most deadly year for bicyclists since 1999, when a record 35 died.

Yet rather than going after dangerous drivers, the NYPD spends its time spying on bike activists and sending undercovers to infiltrate Critical Mass rides and vigils for dead cyclists.

On Roads Where They Fell, Bicyclists Are Remembered

The day after Andrew Ross Morgan was killed when his bicycle and a furniture truck collided at a Manhattan intersection, a bouquet of lilies stood nearby in a metal coffee can; a scrap of paper on a lamppost bore his name and the abbreviation R.I.P. Soon, those memorials were joined by another.

Roadside Displays Focus On Plight Of Bicyclists

Bicycling enthusiasts locked 15 mangled bikes to street lamps and sign posts in the area where riders were struck by cars.

When Patrick Van Der Tuin saw another cyclist hit by a vehicle while riding in a bike lane on Holly Hills Boulevard a few weeks ago, it was the final straw.