Not Taking Bikes Seriously

What Cyclists Say about Pershall's Folly


Here are some unedited comments from the local bike community:
so this morning i went over to Zachary's to check it out. and i am NOT impressed. this is yet another depressing episode in the ongoing saga of "clever bike parking ideas that don't work".

Pershall's "Walk Lock Bike Post" is a cylindrical post that sinks into a tube below the sidewalk when not in use. to use it, you have to bend over or kneel down, grasp a recessed handle, lift, and rotate the cylinder by about 45 deg to lock it in position. the post has no protruding attachment points for locks. instead, it has a smallish slot thru the top end of the post, which is apparently supposed to accommodate U-locks.

this design has many shortcomings. in the deployed position:

in the undeployed position:

the article cited the invention's advantages for merchants and delivery people, but oddly enough did not cite any benefits for bicyclists. the article quoted a positive comment from a maintenance worker, but oddly enough did not quote any bicyclists. but i guess that is not too odd considering it is the Sentinel.

this rack was designed from the wrong criteria. bike parking should be designed to facilitate and encourage bicycling. primary consideration should should given to the needs of bicyclists --- not to the desires of store owners or delivery people or streetscape aestheticians.

in terms of functionality, Pershall's "Walk Lock Bike Post" is in every regard inferior to the simple "eared" bike post and to the inverted-U rack. why am i not surprised to learn that Pershall is a member of the downtown commission, a body that is famous for its loathing of bikes?

it is doubly depressing that this pilot project apparently got approval from Public Works as well as City Parks and Rec. any experienced bicyclist could spot the design flaws in a minute. how did such a rotten design get past the prototype stage without getting feedback from the potential users? there is no excuse for deploying something this bad.

Pershall says he's been developing this thing for three years. but he must have spent two and a half of those years trying to think of ways to make it annoying. this thing is not ready for prime time, to say the least. what's worse, he even says he wants to market it to other cities. i sure hope these "other cities" have smarter people in charge than we do.

this is beginning to bug me. why is it that bike parking is the scapegoat for "streetscape clutter"? if they want to do something about clutter, why don't they make parking meters that disappear when not in use, and have to be hoisted out by motorists when they park? why is it considered acceptable to sacrifice the convenience of bicyclists, but not motorists, in the name of reducing clutter? if they want to talk about clutter, let's talk about all the traffic signs that are essentially for the benefit of motorists. if they want to reduce clutter, how about demolishing some of those monstrous parking garages? and of course, the cars themselves are a major form of clutter, whether parked or in cruise mode.

the Sentinel article begins, ``Bye-bye cumbersome bike racks. Thanks to one local resident, a new, streamlined breed of racks is poised to replace the old ones currently crowding Santa Cruz sidewalks.'' AUGH!!! i LIKE the inverted-U's that "currently crowd the sidewalks". it would be a travesty to replace them with this walk-lock abomination. the article goes on to say, ``For the next three to six months, both Pershall and the city will be monitoring the racks for the amount of use they receive and any problems that could arise. Depending on the outcome, the city could consider more widespread installation.''

i hope we can stop this BAD idea from taking hold.


If the City really does monitor the use of the Pershall boondoggle, I think they will find that it is unused (because unusable), Of course, the Donwtown Commission COULD get some junk bikes and lock them to the post, to pretend that it is being used by bicyclists, but this level of subtley seems unlikely from them. The City keeps experimenting with different designs, but has yet to come up with a better one for short-term parking than the big Us on Pacific. They should be installing those all over the place.

Say what? Bike racks as streetscape clutter? What are all those parked cars - outdoor sculpture? Downtown doesn't have enough problems, so we have to invent some?

Maybe we should exploit the aesthetic angle though. Those aren't bike racks, they're public art. Just look at how their clean, spare lines add a functional punctuation to the street rhythm. August is a notoriously slow news month, let's hope this article is just another example of a desparate editor trying to fill column inches.


I visited the Pershall post this weekend at Zachary's, and I wholeheartely agree with Don. It's not an innovation, it's an insult. Of what possible use is a "bike rack" that is knee-high? And one that is greasy and slippery to boot?

I can't believe it made it off the drawing board, much less into a prototype and then an approved test installation. I admit I burst out laughing when I finally located it and pulled it out of the ground.

But as Don says, its main flaw is that it is invisible. Lack of bike parking conveys to cyclists the message that they and their bikes are not welcome in a given area. Invisible bike parking conveys the same message. The Pershall post conveys the additional message that it is better to inconvenience cyclists (search, bend over, pull, get greasy, have your bike fall over) than to have a streetscape dotted with simple, functional bike posts. It says that straightforward, utilitarian bike parking is unimportant, unsightly, to be avoided. Not a very progressive message.

Finally, in the particular case of Zachary's, if I'm not mistaken, an inverted U was *removed* a few months ago (something I used to lock my bike to was removed, I think it was a U) so that the massive newspaper vending stand could be moved from against Zachary's front wall to the curb, where the U had been. If blight is measured in mass, the newspaper stand wins hands down; perhaps Mr. Pershall could begin work on a newspaper stand that retracts into the ground.


Personally, I particularly like the prospect of crouching on a wet pavement in mid-winter, groping around in a filthy mini-mud-puddle for that slick pull-bar -- sounds delightful! Or how about the challenge of even locating the darned thing when it's covered with water? Tell me honestly, would car drivers be offered a parking system which forced them to squat on the street like monkeys, wrestling with some dirty, greasy mechanism below pavement level? Would it even be considered for one second? I think not.

Actually the location challenge would apply even in dry weather, since the stowed Gizmo is next to invisible from the street. (I gather this is the whole idea, presumably catering to a downtown merchant notion that a street choked with cars is "normal," whereas a visible bike rack is "clutter".) The first thing any cyclist does when approaching a business with shopping in mind, is to look around for the bike rack. I can just see myself peering at every square foot of pavement, hoping to spot the "floor drain"! Very nice for tourists, too, who (hopefully) will never have seen such a crazy device before and will be out there on their rented bikes looking for a normal bike rack.

Well, enough, enough; the Gizmo is hopeless on every count, unless you want to give it points as a "cyclist-discouraging" tool. I'd say that, in the local Hall of Shame for bike racks, it even outshines the "Thing at Palm Center" -- and that's stiff competition!


de@daclarke.org
De Clarke