THE FRESNAN

Hot Fresno Girls + Bikes = World's Capital Of Awesome

In our continuing effort to help Fresno become a big bicycle city (at least somewhere near Porltand's status so we can shut their hippy/hipster/nerd asses up about how fuckin' cool they think they are), we'd like to alert you to some public meetings about Fresno's Bicycle Master Plan.

The meetings are Tuesday and Wednesday and all the info can be found on Fresno Bicycle Coalition blog.

We say, you can plan all you want to make Fresno more biker friendly but if that plan doesn't have a method for getting hot Fresno girls to ride bikes around town, it probably won't work.

Look at this Amsterdam biking vid' and you might see what we mean:

Our theory is if Fresnans see beautiful women riding around town all the time, all of a sudden you're a big fan of biking around town. Either you'll want to meet these girls by riding along side or you want to be these girrllls... um, we haven't quite worked out how this would get girls to get on bikes but we're working on it.

*Post inspired by a Fresno Bicycle Coalition tweet and SVBC blog post.

Fresno: A City Dismayed/Depressed/Disillusioned?

Milano's was packed tonight (-->insert comment about irony<--) for tonight's screening of Fresno: A City Reborn. My mid-movie tweet pretty much sums up what I thought, but for those who couldn't make it, I offer a brief recap.

The first half of the movie talks about the qualities of successful cities, and the threat of sprawl imposed by the au-to-mo-bile. The second half highlights the innovative thinking of Fresno's leadership (-->insert comment about irony<--) and the "newly formed Redevelopment Agency and Downtown Association."

In the early-mid 1960s, city leadership recognized the threat of sprawl, and countered with a redefined downtown, which included the closing of the mall to traffic. (Side note: evidently, cars pose a serious threat to old people, and metered parking is a deterrent to downtown activity). According to the video, foot traffic increased 115% in the twelve months following the mall's opening, with some stores reporting a 40% increase in profit. Happy little white kids were everywhere. The water features and statues represented calm and cleanliness…purification.

So what the fuck happened?
When/where did we go wrong?
Where do we go from here?
And why are we now the epitome of sprawl?

When other cities do it better: Portlanders know how to corral their bikes

Fresno can easily be more bike friendly. For many reasons, two being it wouldn't be all that hard and Portland is better than us at it - it's annoying when Portland does things better. We're flat, on a grid and it rarely rains, all ingredients for a good bike city. Hell, Portland is wet and hilly and they're, like, the bike capitol and stuff.

One simple idea: Better bike racks. Just look what the Madison Mallards baseball team did. (Are you listening Chuckchanski Park?) Any semi major business or public place should be required to have dedicated bike racks, just like they have parking stalls. (More than a couple metal bars stuck in a corner of the shopping center, anyway.)

If you watch the video below, you'll see what innovative bike parking can do for business. Totally could see this in front of the Revue:

MORE BIKE BACKING

>If you've been thinking about biking to work, the city of Fresno has some reasons why you should make the move to pedal power.

>Bill Mac's recent column about biking in Fresno and creating more bike trails (canal banks...hellooo).

>Famous Whitewater actually rides to his internet-y work.

>Local bike shops: Stevens. Tri-Sport. Herb Bauer. Sumner's. Rubber Soul. Cycle Paths. Fresno Schwinn. Performance Bikes. Tower Velo. Momentum Cycling. Tower Bike Shop.

>Local Bike groups: Fresno County Bicycle Coalition.

>More cool examples of what Portland is doing: Bike signage in Portland. Naked bike ride in Portland. Portland bike traffic light.

Full disclosure: At Fresnan HQ, we aren't going around biking everywhere. Totally mean to, though. For realz. We're just waiting for more bike racks is all.