South Park

In a recent South Park episode, South Park experiencing an increase in thier homeless population. The show brings attention to some of the the hilarity for the cause and fix of the homeless. And in the end, Kenny and his crew bring the South Park homeless to Santa Monica, and Kenny finishes the show with a skateboard jump over 3 homeless. This episode is called "Night Of The Living Homeless" (episode #1107). You can also download the whole show via iTunes.

Here is a clip from the show:


Perhaps in future episodes the South Park Crew will get bikes and experience some of the horrors of riding a bike against the people driving cars that become infected with "Road Rage" and take a ride with the Critical Mass riders or the Midnight Ridazz. (wink)(smile)

BTW, I did see some joggers in the Santa Monica scenes, but interestingly I didn't see any bicyclists. I suppose that was an oversight among the writers for South Park. Perhaps the South Park can do a remake of the show and throw in a few people on bicycles. Heck, even the Santa Monica Homeless(or almost homeless) have a large percentage that use a bicycle for their main form of transportation, in addition to their feet and the Big Blue Bus.

Recommended Links:
- Cycle Santa Monica! community forum
- Santa-Monica/West-L.A./Venice critical mass community forum

Green America

If you liked watching the Nova program titled "Saved by the Sun", you may also like watching another new show being screened on Discovery Channel titled "Green: The New Red, White, and Blue". See the press release

Here is the Press Release:

Discovery Channel's GREEN: THE NEW RED, WHITE AND BLUE Brings Viewers Inside America's Energy Revolution Monday April 16, 12:28 pm ET
-- 90-Minute Special Hosted by Award Winning Author and Journalist Thomas L. Friedman --

SILVER SPRING, Md., April 16 /PRNewswire/ -- Award winning author and journalist Thomas L. Friedman travels the globe to unravel the tangled web of where Americans get energy, and reveals what viewers can do about their carbon footprint. Friedman visits the front lines of an energy revolution that is just taking shape, and reveals what is at stake for not only America but the world. The world premiere special GREEN: THE NEW RED, WHITE AND BLUE airs Saturday, April 21 at 9:00 PM (ET/PT) on Discovery Channel.

In GREEN: THE NEW RED, WHITE AND BLUE, Friedman, author of The World is Flat, sets out to discover how the greening of America could change the way we live. The United States is at the beginning of a surge toward green energy, powered by the sun, wind, water and even grass, but it will not be enough. The key is clean carbon-free energy, on a huge scale. Friedman explores many sources of carbon-free energy, including some that might sound counter- intuitive, such as coal and nuclear energy.

Visiting companies that are making a difference, such as Google, Wal-Mart and Texas Instruments, Friedman shares the energy-saving methods they are taking. Google is using hydro-electric power created by a dam while Wal-Mart is cutting by a third what each store spends on energy and doubling the fuel efficiency of its trucking fleet. Friedman also, Friedman explores ways that the Green family can help the environment with the cars they drive investigating ways that automobile manufacturers are experimenting with hybrid electricity-powered cars.

GREEN: THE NEW RED, WHITE AND BLUE examines ways American families can change the world and have the same effect as global giants like Wal-Mart.

GREEN: THE NEW RED, WHITE AND BLUE is produced for the Discovery Channel by Optomen Productions. Beth Hoppe is executive producer for Optomen and Julian Hobbs executive produced for Discovery Channel.

Discovery Communications, Inc. is the number-one nonfiction media company reaching more than 1.5 billion people in over 170 countries. Through TV and digital media, Discovery's 100-plus worldwide networks include Discovery Channel, TLC, Travel Channel, Animal Planet and Discovery Health. DCI is owned by Discovery Holding Company (Nasdaq: DISCA; DISCB), Cox Communications Inc., Advance/Newhouse Communications and John S. Hendricks, Discovery's founder and chairman. For more information please visit http://www.discovery.com

OEA

Did president Bush appoint his new Oil Addiction Czar to lead the charge on the "War On Oil Addiction"? Is the "OEA" (Oil Enforcement Agency) the new arm of the US government's fight to stomp out "oil addiction"? Are agents of this shadowy agency stage raids on Ford and other automotive dealerships across the USA for violatoins of law and the US mandate to fight oil addiction(see: America is Addicted to Oil)?

See videos below of a documentary on this new stealth agency.





Some tools that OEA uses to do their job include bicycles, tall bikes, electric scooters. The rest of their tools are classified and not accessable to the public.

Recommended Links:
- Cycle Santa Monica! community forum
- Santa-Monica/West-L.A./Venice community forum

Related posts:
- US Green Corps

Budapest Bikes

Reports (video and text) from the critical mass community in Hungary (see blog report and video)(in English)
that they had a record turn out at the last critical mass ride there(Budapest, Hungary). And, interestingly, they have much support from the local government, apparently, by providing police escort, and space to gather and socialize.

And I like the picture on the Hungarian critical mass website, which depicts a male and female adult holding their bicycles over their head and a little kid by the sides with a small bicycle. (see pic to the right)

Pimp My Ride

The "Pimp My Ride" tv show did an Earth Day Special. In that show the pimp a 1965 Chevy Impala from a gas guzzling car to a high power, turbo charged diesel engine. They pimped the interior with with new upolstery, featuring hemp cloth from "Environmental Textiles", and carpets made from recycled plastic bottles. They also included a year worth of biodiesel for the guy to cruise with.

What I think my have been a nice added touch would have been to added a stylish bicycle rack and a pimped out schwin beach cruiser retrofited with a electric assist hub motor (see: hybrid Bike video), and a lithium Ion battery pack that gets charged through the cars generator system.

And ofcource the bike would be pimped with matching candy apple color paint job with matching white racing stripes and accents, such as hand grips and seat. Hey! And one not throw on an XtraCycle to that Schwin beach cruiser and add a stylish rear seat that also has a hemp cloth seat cover. NICE!

Also, Arnold Schwartznegger did an introduction for this show and had a few walk on bits when the guys showed him the car.

Here are a couple clips from the show.

Recommended Links:
- Cycle Santa Monica! community forum
- SoCal Biodiesel community forum
- Air Powered Vehicles community forum
- Santa-Monica/West-L.A./Venice critical mass community forum

FlyAway

(see MTA promo video below. click on pictures to enlarge.)

There is an interesting, fairly new, transit bus line, called "Flyaway", that runs from Union Station and LAX transit center. They toute that it takes less than 40 minutes during the busiest time of day, to get end to end. I suppose that it would be a much faster trip during off-peak transit hours.

What I would like to know is how bicycles are accomodated on this bus line. The buses appear to be like Amtrak and Greyhound buses, with cargo bays under the buses. And if the policies are the same as the Amtrak and Greyhound buses, then I believe, bicycles can be stowed, without being boxed or disassembled, under the buses in those cargo bays. If anyone has more specific information, let me know or post in the comments so we all can know. See the promo video below.

And BTW, this seems to make a good transit option for those trying to get to and from Union Station in downtown L.A. and the LAX transit hub. And one nice feature about this service is that it runs 24 hours a day which may make it possible to get from LAX area to Santa Monica, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. How that can be done is by taking the bus to Union Station and then hoping on either the 33, 333, 4, or 304, MTA buses, which run 24 hours a day, or to hop on the Big Blue Bus #10 from Union Station, which is the fastest way to get from downtown Los Angeles to Santa Monica, even during rush hour, at the moment. However the Big Blue Bus stop running aroung 9pm most days of the week and doesn't begin picking up until about 6-7am many days during the week.



Recommended Links:
- Flyaway Brochure - by MTA
- Los Angeles World Airports info on Flyaway service
- Flyaway service (wikipedia article)

Tesla+Bike

In this video(2nd half) an inventer has created a Bendini magnetic motor(instruction s on building Bendini motor) by attaching magets along the rim of a bicycle wheel.

Perhaps this technology will be applied to future bicycles to provide extra power to the human power.



Video description:
Video is from Google video.

"I don't like the term perpetual-motion", says Sterling D. Allan, founder of Pure Energy Systems.... whatever you might call it, the Perendev & Bedini Motors that Sterling brought to TeslaTech 2005 certainly caused a stir. Check out our conference video for close-up footage & descriptions of both motors in operation! In Sterling's words: "The Perendev motor replication was built by Douglas K. Furr, a Ph.D. Mechanical Engineer, for PerenTech(.com), of which I was founder. In Furr's expert design, each of the rotors can be infinitely adjusted in relation to the other in the off-set of drilled holes, and the holes and pins enable one to insert and take out magnets with relative ease. I suppose if someone with more patience than myself were to tinker around with the device, they might achieve eureka in which the thing begins to accelerate."

Ali Envrionment2

Ali G. talking to some people about the environment. Brilliant!

Ali Environ-mental

Ali G. is going totally "environ-mental"

I Love it!



Gives us more Ali G.!

Monorails Now

some one sent me this video and I thought you guys might appreciate it. It is an analysis on creating a network of monorails using the flood channels right of ways throughout Los Angeles County.

Monorails are cheaper to build, can be build faster, are quieter (in both low frequency, such as rumblings felt when a heavy bus or train rolls by on the street - and quieter in high freqency, which is heard in both subway trains, and in light rail trains), they are faster, and are more environmentally friendly in being adapted with less impact on the environment, they are more energy efficient than both subways, and lightrail train systems. They can be fully operated on electricity which can be aquired from renewable sources. repairs on monorails can also be accomplished faster than both subways, and light rail systems.

I welcome your comments on the concept of building an envornmentally friendly, cost effective, rapid transit, monorail network through Los Angeles County.

Thanks,



Related Posts:
- "Where Are The Monorails?"(AltCar Expo panel-video clip)

Ali G+Nader

Ali G. and Nader doing a "priceless" job in this video interview. It is hilarious.

And I think Ali G. would have some great material going on a critical mass ride and having one of the other crtical mass riders show him how to ride a bike, telling him what critical mass is, and how to ride in it. And he could throw in some clips interviewing a police sergent on what the laws are on riding a bicycle, like wearing a helmet, taking a lane, running red lights, or some other stuff. It could make for a funny show, in the Ali G. fashion.

Ralph+Bikes

(Click on images to enlarge)

Ralph Nader was recently a guest on the Riz.Khan show on the Al Jazeera network. It was about a 20 minute interview conducted by Arlen Nido. Not ure of the spelling. It was primarily an interview regarding Ralph Nader's new book "The Seventeen Traditions". There were also many references to a new documentary on the life of Ralph Nader titled "An Unreasonable Man", the title of which is a play on the quotation by George Bernard Shaw (Irish playwright - 1856-1950)

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therfore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

And I am sure Mr. Shaw was also referring to all genders when he spoke that, such as the likes of the great women that pushed for the right for women to vote, to own property, to work outside the home, and many other things, including the right to become president of the United States of America.
See video interview below in two, ten minute parts.




What may be further of interest is that the Riz Kahn show ended with a tribute to the New York City Bicycle Messengers, and a clip from some of the wild bike messenger videos being posted on Youtube. Here is an example of one that has gotten over three quarter of a million views, titled "Bike Messengers Are On Crack":



If you have any other good videos you would like to recommend, please send to me or post in the comments so we all can know about them. Thanks!

BTW, I have seen a definite surge in the number of people riding fixed gear bikes in Santa Monica and the westside of about 400-600% in the last few months. I presume the mystique of the fixed gear, it's simplicity, it light weight, films like P.E.D.A.L., growing interest to alternatives to the high cost of gasoline and general cost of car ownership, the grass roots support structures such as the Bicycle Kitchen, and the power of the internet to communicate meaningful ideas that have resonance have had been major contributing factors. And ofcourse having some great opportunities to ride recreationally, such as in critical mass, Bicycle Happenning, and midnight ridazz rides has provided an in person forum for people to share information with each other and support, inspire, encourage, and empower others who want to do that same.

And, interestingly, I found a great tip on how to make a fixed gear cheap using "JB Weld". I will post more about that later. See you on on the stretts! And may on your fixed gear or whatever you like riding. If you have any news items or interesting info, please share. Thanks!

Magnetic

More magnetic motors... These may have application for electric assist bicycles.



Video Description:

Harry Paul Sprain magnet motor

This is the first OVERUNITY magnet motor released to the public ! It produces more mechanical power than needed electrical input power for the electromagnet. It is the video from Mr. Paul Harry Sprain. I had signed NDA for it and now he has released it to the world !

It is simular to the Takahaski design and Mr. Sprain has got a patent for it.

The electromagnet at the end of the spiral stator switches for 28 Milliseconds the field to zero flux density, so the rotor can escape the stator fields.

For the rest of the rotation circle the rotor is purely accelerated into the track. All magnets are in attraction mode, stator and rotor magnets

Magnets

This is a very interesting magnetic motor. If anyone has more info on this concept or videos of thier working models using this concept, please send info to me, or post the info and/or links to videos or other resources in the comments. Thanks.

Mission Earth

(picture to right is from cover of volume 3 of "Mission Earth". Click on image to enlarge.)


NOTE: I am looking for reports of other books you can recommend that are fitting as “Earth Day” celebration books. I would like to create a list of some of the best books that celebrate the specialness of Earth.

I would like to bring attention to an interesting novel called"Mission Earth". It brings attention to specialness of the earth and it's environment to the well being of humans and other life on earth. It is a ten part series of books. For a comprehensive description of the book, I recommend looking at the wikipedia article on it. I would also like to recommend the audio book. It seems to be produced like a movie for the ears. It is like an Old Time Radio show, except it uses more high tech recording and has no commercials. There are lots of sound effects to go with the action in the story. Note that the audio books version is about 2-3 hours for each book in the series, which works out to about 25-30 hours total.

It seems fitting to make recognition to this particular novel, not only because of it's title, but because of the story within. I especially liked the hero of this story whom takes action to save the earth and it's people from destruction from air pollution.

Warning Plot Spoiler (somewhat) below:

This story is about aliens... well, they are more like humans from another planet with advanced development, that come to earth to save earth from it's own destruction. They send some of the their top military officers to infiltrate the earth population to help the earth people clean the air pollution and other environmental destruct ions taking place. The infiltrators have a double agent that gets hired by the Rockacenter family, presumably a play on the "Rockefeler" family. Also, other players that seem to get mock names or Octopus Oil, (Occidental Oil), and many others that want to stop the E.T.'s from cleaning the air and by providing the earthlings with an alternative source of clean energy supply which will last millions of years.

This story plays out in the royal Officer Teller taking immediate action to clean the air. And to do so, the story takes people through some of the psychological aspects of humans which may be causing barriers in their ability to keep their environment habitable to the the human race and which allows the humans to live in peace. Officer Teller leaves a wake of what I consider a positive impact, such as his experience with rescuing a lady from rape, returning money to workers at a Mob controlled casino chain, playing with oil options which allow him to create enough money to acquire the resources he needs to create and disperse the spores which will digest the air pollution and put more oxygen into the air.

I have not read all the books in the series yet, but so far, it seems like this is my pick for Novel for Earth Day or Earth month.

And I welcome comments/feedback from those that have read this novel or about the author.

Ebike on Snow

Knoxie, one of my favorite videographers (in the world of electric assist bicycles video documenaries), has a new video illustrating/demonstrating how an electric assist recumbent ('bent) tricycle (trike) with an electric assist motor can be used for traversing over snow as a commuter vehicle.

And I think this spawns the idea for me that this KMX recumbent bicycle may make an excellent candidate for a kind of soft or hard bra in front to keep a persons legs and feet warm and dry when riding in snow, rain, sleet, etc. And additionally it could improve aerodynamics of the vehicle to increase its energy efficiency.

Also, the KMX could be fitted with a water tight bottom skid which could allow the body to bob in the snow , like a snowmobile, using the front two tires as rudders, either as they are or fitting them with mini ski's.

Additionally, that bottom skid would make it possible to have the bike into a little speed boat, for traversing rivers, or for playing in lakes and other water bodies. And the electric assist motor would allow it to go even farther. That would be an amazing amphibious vehicle that can traverse land, snow, or water. It could even fashion it with a bike trailer that is amphibious and floating for carrying solar panels to power it and carrying batteries and other cargo.



Video Description:

Took the electric KMX out for a blast in the snow, where all other forms of transport were sliding and timidly driving along the electric KMX shone.

Its superb handling and low centre of gravity combined with the electric motor make it an amazingly practical little unit. Most people had to ditch their cars on the way to or from work, I got home in 5 mins.

This electric bike is now powered by a wind generator and is a clean and sustainable form of transport in any weather, I know it wouldn't suit all of you, in that case go out and get a Lotus Tesla! :-)

We can all make a difference!

Bicycle Lift

Here is a newer video showing a more comprensive look at the bicycle lift in Trondhiem Noway, they call "Trampe".

I like the longer view of the cyclist going up the steep hill on the lift. And a look at the sign at the lift is nice. It is also nice to hear the actual sound the lift make s while in operation.

Perhaps somone will video record what it looks like while riding the lift on their bicycle going up the hill on Trampe. Perhaps they could strap a helmet cam and look around at the sights while going up the hill. If someone does or know where to view one, please let me know. Thanks!

Bus Racks

(pictures courtesy of the Seattle Bicycle Messenger Blog. Click to enlarge.)

The new bike racks we see in Santa Monica may hold 3 bikes and come with plastic parts. Holding 3 bikes will allow more bicyclists to use them at one time. And the plastic parts may help protect bikes from scratches according to the Seattle Bicycle Messenger Blog

As some of the more tenured bus/bike multi modal commuters may know, sometimes - and anytime is to many when a cyclist needs it - the bus bike racks are broken with a bent up trough that holds the wheels. And these bent troughs may either make mounting a bike in it impossible or risky of a bike falling out after being mounted. And perhaps these plastic modular trough may make for quick, efficient replacements, that are also good for the environment by using recycled plastics. The repair/replacement can be done by merely up bolting the old one and bolting in the new one. So down down may be far shorter on these precious bike racks.

Also, the new hooks on the arms appear to be designed holes in them that could be used to string a cable lock or a U-Lock through to secure the bike wheel and/or frame to make the bicycle a bit more secure from theft while mounted. This can be of special value for high priced bikes, bikes traveling through high crime areas, if a cyclists forgets thier bike on the rack, or if mounted to one of the racks in the rear of the bus (smile).

Next step... perhaps a rack for 3 bikes in the rear of the bus, for a total capacity of 6 bikes per bus? could something like that work on the Santa Monica Big Blue Bus or the MTA bus lines?

Folding E-Bike

This is a nice example of a high quality fully functional human powered bicycle with an electric assist hub motor kit on it, a Nano Electric Assist Hub Motor Kit".