DAY 176 - September, 11, 2011
Not sure if this is a Ghost Bike or not
“Those who wish to control their own lives and move beyond existence as mere clients and consumers- those people ride a bike.” - Wolfgang SachsVancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Here are some words about something that happened.
Last Friday, an Albuquerque District Court judge declared a mistrial in the case against the driver who killed David Anderson. This news cut through the noise of everything else happening in my life and in the world right now. Yet I have written a few drafts of this post and still not figured out exactly what I want to say about it. I am often hasty and inarticulate in my passionate rush to express my opinions, but it’s not often that I’m just not sure what to -feel- about something.
A feeling that life is not fair. A feeling that common sense has died out completely. A feeling that the same things happen over and over again. A feeling that it’s always the good ones who go early. A feeling that the system is broken. Feelings of deja vu, feelings of the past rushing up to slap me in the present, and an achey feeling in certain body parts that makes me want to curl up and sleep for days. A feeling of hope that people are fighting for a change, fighting to fix the system, fighting to revive common sense and mutual respect, fighting for a kinda more beautiful world.
Sherry Anderson possesses a deep inner strength and an outward grace that I hope to achieve and maintain in my own life. She has been a positive presence in my life, offering strength and wisdom about the grieving process, and nurturing my own inner strength. We first met over a year ago, through my documentary film project.
I was introduced to Sherry Anderson through Jennifer Buntz, whom I met through the magical esoterica of the internets. Jennifer and her partner Steve Matthias founded the Duke City Wheelman Foundation and launched the first organized large scale ghost bikes project in Albuquerque. They have been tremendous supporters and participants in the film project. They are awesome people and I am grateful to have them in my life.
In Jennifer and Sherry I found complete understanding, sympathy, and affirmation that the thing to do in the face of loss is to create something beautiful and meaningful. We all three had some very similar things in common, and I experienced for perhaps the first time in my life a sense of tremendous relief in being able to speak openly on topics that have always been raw and ineffable.
The love in the bike community in Albuquerque is tremendous. It is beautiful.
Every time you are driving, remember this: your actions have consequences. The size of your vehicle amplifies your actions and their resulting consequences. We all make choices, and sometimes we make mistakes, but we are all required to take responsibility for our actions.
Your actions affect those around you and limit our ability to make our own choices. When you injure or kill someone with your vehicle, you have taken away their right to live on their own terms. You have created a permanent change in the lives of everyone involved. You have created suffering.
There is so much more I could say, but I’m not sure how to organize the words.
We are all connected.
hearts.
Eilidh's Ghost Bike and the painful truth that still more people are being killed all the time »
via @KaraByerswriter
Cyclist Fatally Doored in Harlem »
October 22, 2010:
An unidentified 27-year-old cyclist was killed in East Harlem around 8 a.m. today when a driver opened the door of his Honda and knocked him into the path of a box truck. The cyclist was in the bike lane on East 120th Street about 20 feet from the intersection with 3rd Avenue when he got doored, NBC NY reports. The driver of the Honda was issued a summons for “unsafe exiting a vehicle” and the truck driver got five summonses for equipment violations. An investigation is ongoing but no criminality is alleged; we’ll update once more details emerge.
Bicyclist dies after hitting vehicle in Rogers Park »
A bicyclist died this afternoon after running through a stop sign and striking a vehicle this morning in the Far North Side’s Rogers Park community, according to Chicago police.
The crash happened about 9:45 a.m. in the 2000 block of West Farwell Avenue, police said.
The cyclist, a 69-year-old man, was westbound on Farwell when riding through a stop sign at Ridge Boulevard, striking the vehicle, said Chicago Police Officer Veejay Zala, a police spokesman. He said the victim then fell from the bicycle onto the pavement.
No citations have been issued against the driver of the vehicle that was hit as of this afternoon.
Condolences to the deceased, but the thing I don’t understand about this story is how combative the comments are getting. Most of these threads turn into a bikes vs cars argument, but simply stated, this is a perfect illustration of how you’re gambling with your life when you take risks and ignore the rules of the road when you’re on a bike. But it also shows that a cyclist’s carelessness usually only ends up in the cyclist being injured/killed in a bike vs. car/truck/bus collision.
This guy rolled the dice and paid the ultimate price and people are flipping out about it in the comments. Meanwhile, two days ago a cyclist was run down and killed in a hit-and-run and it’s generated nary a peep. I just don’t get it.
I have heard many times how important the ghost bikes are to the families and friends of those who have died. Serving as a memorial and reminder that can be easily accessed within city limits, these ghost bikes are practically sacred to many,” Lentol said. ““I believe that the ghost bikes not only memorialize lives, they save lives too.”
What made me come out is that I felt a loss when I heard a fellow cyclist was hit. We didn’t know him, but he shared the same passion that we did.”
— Joe Stiller, talking about the ghost bike installation for Kevin Lee Rogers in Sioux Falls
Park Slope ‘ghost stroller’ is causing internet and neighborhood to go nuts.
One ponytailed mother pushing a Bugaboo walked by the stroller without breaking pace, but her eyes lingered on it a moment longer than necessary. She flicked her gaze back to her own baby’s face for a moment, then stared straight ahead, safe to return to her own thoughts, or the nonthoughts of exhausted new mothers everywhere.
A tall woman wearing her baby in a sling craned her head to keep looking as she walked by at high speed. She gasped: “So tragic!”
The stroller pushing mommies and daddies of Park Slope have been abuzz with speculation about the baby stroller done up to look like a street memorial, chained to a post at the corner of 6th Avenue and Union St.
- Susan Dominus, NY Times
The appearance of this white painted stroller with fake flowers attached has been a constant topic of conversation on a variety of blogs. Someone Tweeted a photo, captioning it as a ghost stroller. There is a thread on Brooklynian about the ghost stroller. The NY Times did a story on it and then opened up a thread on the City Room blog. NY Magazine did a story, and so did NBC New York. Now CBS has it too. Even “Vanity Fair ran a piece on it after they read the NY Times article.
No one knows who put there, or why this spot was chosen since NYPD apparently has confirmed that there are no known fatalities at this intersection and locals don’t recall any incidents. Someone placed a sign on it, asking for an explanation from whoever installed it, but there was no response. It has nothing to do with the ghost bikes project: NYC Street Memorials definitely didn’t place it, and so whichever private individual locked it there has their own motives.
What its purpose might be, I don’t know. Nor, does it seem, does anyone else. But I can report that as an artistic statement, this melodramatic monument is highly derivative. Not only does it clearly take its visual cues from Ghost Bikes— the sculptural series that began sprouting around New York five years ago in memory of slain bike riders—but it follows a long tradition of artists taking some shit and painting it white, from Cy Twombly’s all-white sculptural assemblages to Jasper Johns’s white flag to Günther Uecker’s nails on a canvas board to Robert Ryman’s pallid canvases. And, of course, there is the visual debt to sculptor Charles Long, below, whose 2003 work “Soundly Through the Noise” kinda looks like it could at one point have been a stroller chained to a signpost. (Speaking of which, this little number could be yours simply by dialing the esteemed Tonya Bonakdar Gallery.)
- Carolina Miranda, Dadwagon.com
If the point of the ghost stroller is, indeed, to frighten or insult Park Slope residents based on widely-held perceptions of their character, here are some other ghost installations we’re expecting to see in Brooklyn:
• In Gowanus, a giant ghost nose. (Gowanus smells bad.)
• Bushwick will get a pair of ghost skinny jeans thrown in a heap on the floor of a ghost artists’ collective, littered with ghost 45s and ghost American Spirits. (Hipsters, you see!)
• For Clinton Hill, Ghos’ Def. (Mos Def lives in Clinton Hill.)
• And in DUMBO, a ghost Grimaldi’s. (This one is already in progress)
- Alexandria Symonds, Vanity Fair
updated @ghostbikesfilm Flickr page.
NYC, April 10th: Memorial and Ghost Bike Dedication for Meg Charlop »
from Transportation Alternatives newsroom:
Bicyclists ride in remembrance of a Bronx mother, advocate and mentor
Bike Ride Details
When: Saturday, April 10, 1 pm
What: Bicyclists riding from Norwood to the site of Meg’s crash in East Tremont.
Where: Valentine-Varian House, 3266 Bainbridge Avenue between East 208th Street and Van Cortlandt Avenue East, Norwood, the BronxGhost Bike Dedication Details
When: Saturday, April 10, 1:45 pm
What: Friends and colleagues speak in Meg’s memory, lay flowers and dedicate the white-painted Ghost Bike in her honor.
Where: Intersection of Crotona Avenue and East Tremont Avenue, East Tremont, the BronxThis Saturday, Transportation Alternatives will join residents of the Bronx to honor Meg Felice Charlop. Meg was killed on March 17th while riding her bicycle to work in East Tremont in the Bronx. According to media reports, she was avoiding a car door opened in her path when she was struck and killed by a bus.
Meg devoted her entire life to helping New Yorkers fight for health, dignity and a better future. She improved her community at every scale from individuals she mentored, to home improvements on abandoned houses, to advocating for better infrastructure. As the Director of the Community Health Division at the Montefiore School Health Program, Megan worked tirelessly to encourage more active, healthy living in neighborhoods with few open spaces or amenities.
Friends, coworkers and colleagues will ride from Norwood to East Tremont, where they will dedicate a Ghost Bike in her honor.
Meg Charlop was a beloved member of her community, and an amazing woman who was a strong activist for the betterment of her community and fellow human beings.
You can learn a little about her life and work from this 1981 NY Times article:
“She Heals Ailing Neighborhoods”
Meg is remembered and loved by many people and organizations she has worked and lived with over the years in the Bronx:
NY Daily News: Bronx ‘Mother Teresa’ Megan Charlop, biker killed by city bus, ‘sought to do good’
NY Times City Room: For Bronx Community Organizer, Work and Life Were One
Bronx News Network mourns public health advocate
Statement from Transportation Alternatives
personal post from scienceblogs.com: Remembering Megan
personal post from fellow tumblr my life as dunford
It should be noted that, while initial reports indicated Meg swerved to avoid an opening car door, NY1 later corrected their original report to reflect that Meg was actually struck by the opening door and was knocked into the bus as a result.
“Cyclist Dies After Striking City Bus”
Saturday’s memorial ride follows Meg’s daily commute route, ending at the site of the incident where a ghost bike will be installed in her memory. View the route on Google maps.
"Ghost Bike" Ride Remembers Cyclists Killed in 2009 »
Yesterday, went out to film this for the documentary.
