By Jack B. Rochester

My journey on bicycles and a special offer just for MassBike members.

Dear Fellow Cyclists of MassBike,

You and I ride one of the most innovative machines in world history. Bikes became popular in the 1800s because of a shortage of horses caused by -  whoa! a volcano eruption? - and henceforth were called “hobby horses!” Before flying, the Wright Brothers had a bicycle shop, selling bikes named “Van Cleve” and “St. Clair.” Mark Twain wrote a ludicrously humorous article about his experience riding – and falling from - a “penny farthing” bicycle, pictured here.

I got my first bike at about seven or eight. I swear it was cast iron. My father must have taken pity on me because the following Christmas he gave me an Raleigh English racing bike with a three-speed shifter. When I got my first paper route, age ten and a half, I rode a sturdy Schwinn with a Bendix two-speed shifter.

I rode a Trek, then a Cannondale, equipped with the Mavic Mektronic gruppo, over about 20 years. Of course, Shimano eventually introduced its SEIS “electronic intelligent” shifting system, and has continued to innovate its gruppos ever since. 

There’s been so much innovation in the simple bicycle over the years! As a round-the-world cyclist and technology writer, how could I not want to write a novel about cycling and a radical new shifting scheme? Yes, my fellow cyclists, I created the Spinner in the fab shop of my imagination. 

My novel is Bridge Across the Ocean. It’s a story set in New England and Taiwan in 2011 about cycling, technological innovation, international business espionage and last but not least, love. It starts with a hit-and-run killing of a cyclist and takes off like a time-trialer from there. 

Since cycling safety is paramount for all of us, I’m donating 100 percent of my earnings from Bridge to Mass Bike. You get a great read and MassBike gets a bunch of money to devote to its cycling safety initiatives. You get to help determine how much. 

Please go to the Bridge Across the Ocean website, click on “Get Yours” from the photo menu, and choose your favorite book format – hardcover, paperback, eBook or audiobook. Payment is easy with PayPal - you don’t need an account. 

As a bonus gift for your purchase, I’ll send you the Spinner PowerPoint presentation, which doesn’t appear in the book or elsewhere. Even though it’s imaginary, you’ll soon see it could certainly become a reality in the very near technological future.

So please, let’s raise a bunch of money for cycling safety in our neighborhoods. Thanks so much from both MassBike and me. We appreciate your support so much!

Get Your Copy of Bridge Across the Ocean

Ghost Bike Memorial for Peter A. Del Sette, Jr.

This Sunday, November 21 is World Day of Remembrance. As a somber tradition every year, those who participate in World Day of Remembrance will pause to reflect on the humanity of those lost to traffic violence in Massachusetts. The purpose of World Day of Remembrance is to note that each fatal crash is not a statistic, but a person lost. Whether they were driving, walking, biking, or otherwise caught in a terrible circumstance, we remember a person with family members, mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters, friends, co-workers, neighbors, and community members who still mourn.

Every day through our work at MassBike, we strive to build a better world. We earnestly believe that by advocating for safer cycling, we are saving lives. This is a noble cause, and we believe each fatal crash is avoidable and the dangers able to be mitigated through changes to infrastructure design, vehicle modifications, and education for all road users. At MassBike, our intention is not to focus on the dangers of our roads, but rather on the work we can do to make our world safer for everyone out there. 

Specifically, World Day of Remembrance emboldens our work in our legislative capacity to pass bills that would define Vulnerable Users on our roads and require a 3+ foot passing distance for drivers, mandate safety protections such as backup cameras, convex mirrors and side guards on trucks, and standardize crash reporting so we can better analyze and react when crashes occur. 

World Day of Remembrance also gives humanity to our infrastructure advocacy. As we pursue road redesigns at specific crash sites that realign dangerous intersections, paint bicycle lanes, and slow traffic, we are able to honor those killed at sites by placing memorials, or “ghost bikes,” and giving a place where a bicycle rider took their last breath a sacred reminder to the severity of responsibility we all accept when we choose to drive and ride on our roads.

How will we remember this year? Throughout the state on Sunday November 21, in cities and towns across the commonwealth, we are encouraging local advocates to organize vigils that call attention to the people killed. In the major cities of Springfield, Worcester, and Boston, where people have been killed in the past few years, we will gather to lay flowers at crash sites and at city halls, and call on our elected leaders and policymakers to join us.

When someone dies on our roads, we all feel a shudder of loss throughout the community. And together with our allies, we want to be clear that we are redoubling our efforts to extend this work for all roads, bridges, intersections, and paths. And we vow to not slow our efforts until the perceived and actual danger no longer requires us to call aloud those killed and to reaffirm our demand for no more ghost bikes.

How to Celebrate World Day of Remembrance 2021

• Plan a small World Day of Remembrance gathering for your community
• Write to your local legislators in support of 3 critical safety bills:
  • "An Act to Reduce Traffic Fatalities", Representative Mike Moran & Representative William Straus, H.3549 // Senator William Brownsberger, S.2273
  • "An Act to protect vulnerable road users by requiring certain vehicles to be equipped with side under-ride guards and blind sport mirrors", filed by: Representative Daniel Hunt, H.3505
  • "An Act relative to automated enforcement", filed by: Representative Michelle Ciccolo for H.2426 and Representative Paul Tucker for H.2532 // Senator William Brownsberger for S.1545
• Assist us in our ghost bike memorial data collection so we can appropriately honor fatal crash victims