TorontoCranks

I toyed with the idea of going for a drive in a car and treating other drivers in the same manner they treat or judge cyclists. It was a good plan but I decided against it. If I caused a collision doing so and anyone found out what I was doing at the time it could get me into a lot of trouble. So I had to leave it to my keen sense of observation to see how this would play out.

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Ok so I know what to do when there is a thunderstorm in almost every situation. Being in a car is considered to be one of the safe places because of its rubber tires, provided you are not touching any metal inside of it.

Now does this apply to bicycles too? I am pretty much inclined to believe that it does not. Asking because this year alone I have ridden home in more thunderstorms than I have in the last ten years combined. If a bicycle offers any protection does its location, open country field or urban road, have any bearing on the possible outcomes?

Anyone know the answers to these questions?

Thanks to Hans Moleman for the link

I have changed my route that I commute home on in order to avoid the construction on the eastern end of Gerrard St. The new route takes me by the Don Jail.

As I was riding by today I saw a cabbie and another person arguing. It quickly began apparent the cabbie was in the process of being robbed. The cabbie started yelling for someone to call police. There was one jail guard standing about 30 metres away from the taxi cab. I assumed he would find the cabbie some help if not help him himself. No, he just turned around and pretended that he did not see anything in a very purposeful fashion.

I decided to call 911 on my cell phone. Before I could get at my phone I spotted a police car with an officer inside. I went to the officer and told her what was happening. She responded that she was, “a little too busy to deal with two things at once”. I do not know what she was doing other than writing in her notebook nor did I expect her to jump out of her cruiser with gun drawn to go and help the cabbie. I did expect her to pay moment of attention to me and pick up her radio and say, “Car 54! Where are you?  There is a robbery in progress outside the Don Jail”. Probably too much bother.

I do not know what became of the cabbie. As far as I am concerned I did my civic duty.

Alright I am done with all of this shit to vilify Igor. If he is guilty of what he is accused of then he deserves to serve the time he is sentenced to.

There are media reports of all of these rubberneckers going to court in order to show the judge how upset they are with Igor. They even have Facebook groups dedicated to it! They hope the judge will take this into account and treat him more harshly. In another words, trial by popularity. That would make a great justice system. Hopefully the judge sees through it and remains impartial until he hears all of the evidence. How stupid will all of these rubberneckers look if it turns out Igor is mentally ill or a hardened gang captain member who now has all of their contact info?

Regardless of his level of guilt or plain innocence one thing cannot be ignored. Igor spent tens of thousands of dollars acquiring these bikes, made little effort to cover his tracks and got away with it for years. He was so good at it several cyclists have reported that the cops sent them to Igor’s to see if they can find their bikes. These rubberneckers should delve a little deeper into this and find out why and how Igor got away with it. I know one thing for sure, they will not like the answers.

Just wondering about all those stolen bikes. Have the cops recorded the serial numbers of each one of them and compared them to stolen bike reports? I had a bike stolen and I will not be going done to look for it. Even if I find it the bike will belong to my insurance company who paid out on it. The police report I filed was done over the phone, think anyone ever investigated?

I cannot handle anymore people getting on the radio and telling me that E-Bikes are zero emission. They are not. If you believe that they are you also believe that gas is organic as it comes from fossils.

Some 40% of the electricity used to recharge those E-Bikes comes from nuclear power plants and about 12% from coal fired generators. What would you rather have? Some spent fuel rods, an open container of gas or a smelly cyclist living on your living room couch? Your E-Bike might not be spewing out crap in front of you but it is creating emissions where its power is being generated.

Yes, I get it. E-Bikes emit far far less than a car. Just do not call them zero emission. Its a damn lie.

Looks like the cops in New York City need a lesson or two from ours here in Toronto. New York cops have their shorts tied so tightly in a knot over Critical Mass that they are known to even arrest pedestrians taking in the sights. Went so far last week to even beat a cyclist in view of a video camera and then lie about it. After watching the video you really have to appreciate how well and progressively Toronto cops have adapted to CM.

Last year the City put in sharrows on the Dundas E St bridge over the DVP. Since then they have been left to fade to the point they were almost invisible early spring. Then all of a sudden last week they were repainted, though none of the faded bike lane stripes on River St or Dundas before and after the bridge were. I was thinking that was a nice effort, they are finally paying attention to the bridge after the lousy job they did.

Found out the reason today for the new paint. The City was doing a cycling survey today on the bridge. What a shallow expense to justify their existence, both them and the sharrows. Why not have the sharrows reflect reality? Show how they, like every other neglected cycling facility, perform without a self-serving touch up the week before.

In other news. The Toronto Zoo demanded their monkeys back. The City of Toronto asked to keep them on for another few weeks as they have not finished conjuring up their next new cycling facility.

So this story continues to get stranger by the minute. Police are now alleging that Igor had in his possession more than 3000 bicycles. Let us review the math here.

Igor was rumoured to pay between $20 and $70 for bicycles. That equates to between $60 000 and $210 000 out of his own pocket to pay for the bikes.

The bikes that were stolen were worth anywhere from $100 to $4 000 retail. That represents a value of $300 000 to $12 million.

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