On Friday, October 12, 2007 the day was finally here when yours truly managed to visit the Cycle 2007 cycle show at Earls Court 1 in London and I must say that a great number of new innovations for those of us that cycle to work and for general getting around town and country, e.g. for those of us who use the bicycle as a means of alternative carbon neutral and green mode of transport, were about on that show.
Of some of those I shall be bringing you information and product reviews over the next couple of weeks or so and I hope to be receiving some more products for review also.
As a service to you, the reader, I pledge that any reviews will be honest and if a product is not up to standard in any way, shape or form, this journal shall tell you so.
I was, obviously, not so much as looking at bicycles in the way of a piece of, often hightec, sports equipment and those of the extreme mountain bike kind but rather as to how and what for bikes were intended, namely as a means of personal transportation for the masses, and here I was also especially on the lookout for those innovations that make the carrying of good and children a possibility. Needless to say those were indeed found.
Also and especially my interest was for bicycles for the commuter; those that want to go all the way from home to work directly as well as those that want to ride a bike to their departure station nearest to home, then take the bike on a train and at their destination station get off with the bike and continue their journey by their bicycle to their place of work.
Here the range of folding bikes was very impressive, from very low-cost ones of the Explorer range provided by Deep Blue Sky (www.deepbluesky.eu) beginning at just about £60 to those from a variety of other manufacturers and distributors ranging all the way up to the best part of £2,700, as the most expensive, by Riese und Müller, from Darmstadt, in Germany, distributed in the UK by Alan Davidson (alan@birdybikes.co.uk).
On the other hand what I believe is most interesting for us here, I am sure, are workhorse bicycles for personal transport and there a couple of companies stand out, and two most especially, as the bikes are made in a time proven style and a time-honored manner, and in one instance are hand-built in Britain.
Those companies are Velorbis from Denmark (www.velorbis.co.uk / www.velorbis.dk) whose cycles are made in Germany - hand-built, so I am led to believe - with all German and/or Scandinavian parts, and the other being Pashley Classic Bicycles (www.pashley.co.uk), whose bicycles are hand-built in the UK. Both are in the time-proven style harking back to the good old days of cycling and are sturdy cycles with modern dynamo lights and real saddles, made from real leather with springs as in the old days, giving a ride as a should be, free of pains in the rear. I must admit that I was drooling over the bikes on both stands and would dearly love to own one of either range, seeing that I do not own or drive a motorcar.
Another interest was, obviously, protection from the weather and visibility and security, and there everything could be found as well, and one other the other product shall be reviewed here in due course. One will be a rather novel piece of rain gear and the others will be on safety lights for the bike in order to be seen and therefore, hopefully, be safe on the road.
© M V Smith, October 2007