1,000 bikes were counted last Friday night at the San Jose Bike Party ride. They started on Bascom near Hamilton and rode their bikes to see the new Mary Avenue bike bridge connecting Cupertino and Sunnyvale. Read more here.

I was reading this article about a Houston columnist’s first bike commute when I noticed this tidbit about a Bike Safety “three feet” law working its way through the state House of Representatives.

The law would make it a illegal for car and truck drivers to get closer than three feet from a biker or any other “vulnerable road user,” like a runner, child, disabled person, or highway construction worker.

In fact, lawmakers sponsoring this bill aren’t calling it a bicycle safety bill; they’re calling it the “Safe Passing Bill,” and oh by the way it benefits cyclists as well. For those having difficulty passing this type of law, can you imagine rewriting just a little to include construction workers and the campaign ads you can do with that? “Representative Smith voted NO on a law that would improve safety for highway workers.”

Back to Houston Chronicle column, in which Carolynn Feibel discovers the reality of bike commuting in the American South —

As your transportation columnist, I felt obligated to accept the Bike To Work challenge. First I had to buy a bike. Then I had a wonderful and amusing week dodging potholes, feeling a virtuous burn in my quads, and arriving at work looking like a wet, bedraggled chicken.

My one-way ride took about 15 minutes. So yes, it is possible. But is it desirable? I still say yes, though tentatively. But that has far less to do with traffic and distance than with, well, showers. I mean, it’s Houston. We should call it “National Bike to Work and Shower at Work Week.”

After college, I used to bike commute 20 miles from Forth Worth to Irving, Texas. In the Texas heat there is absolutely no way you can do a ‘stylish’ commute in your work clothes, even if you ride slowly for short distances.
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• Bike Houston
• Bike Texas

Happy Sunday!

I biked around Santa Cruz yesterday afternoon for a couple of hours. Here’s two minutes of my ride down West Cliff Drive and past the Boardwalk. Temperatures were in the 90s on Saturday, making for a very busy day at the beaches and the Boardwalk.

In this video I’m mostly riding in a two way bike-only sidepath adjacent to a one way street. How many bikes do you count in this video? How many cars and trucks do I pass?

California State Route 17 is the main route connecting Santa Cruz with San Jose. During the week there are something like 38,000 trips across the Santa Cruz Mountains on Highway 17. As I type this on Saturday morning where we have an expected high of 98°F today, I’m sure Highway 17 is bumper to bumper with beach traffic.

I hooked up a GoPro HERO Wide Camera to my bicycle handlebar, put my bike on the Highway 17 commuter express bus and turned the camera on. Partly because of the image stabilization software but mostly because of the wide angle view, the bus’s bouncing up and down on the highway isn’t too bad. Music by Santa Cruz singer Michael Gaither.

Because SR17 is designated a County Expressway between Los Gatos and Scotts Valley, bicycles are technically permitted on this highway. Except for a short stretch near Lexington Reservoir, I always take an alternate route and I don’t recommend biking on Highway 17.

New condo features bicycle workshop

The Plant 51 residential development near downtown San Jose has its grand opening this weekend. Those who ride Caltrain from San Jose have watched its construction over the past four or five years or so.

The Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition held its San Jose Bike Away From Work Bash in the Plant 51 courtyard on Thursday night. I wish I had a little more time to look around and take photos, but the little bit I saw seemed positively lovely.

Plant 51 is an historic Del Monte cannery near downtown San Jose that Centex converted over the past four years or so into 1 and 2 bedroom flats and lofts. Plant 51 is immediately adjacent to San Jose Diridon Station with Caltrain, ACE Rail, Amtrak, VTA light rail, the free DASH shuttles to downtown, about a dozen or more VTA bus lines and at least that many employee shuttles. When / If BART and HSR comes to Silicon Valley, they will both stop at Diridon Station. There’s a Longs Drugs (soon to be CVS) just a block away on The Alameda; a Safeway grocery store will open soon on San Fernando at 3rd. A bus stop for VTA 22 (service all up and down Santa Clara Street / The Alameda / El Camino Real) is directly in front of Plant 51 on The Alameda; the #22 bus get students to within about 150 yards of the schools that serve this area.

The coolest amenity? The Bicycle Kitchen is an on site bicycle workshop and storage area. The Plant 51 BIcycle Kitchen “has everything you need to store, repair and maintain your bike,” according to the Plant 51 website. “Pumps, tools, clamps at your disposal.”

Some of the negatives? Though Centex has dropped the price at least 25%, these units still seem a little pricey starting at something around $350,000 for a one bedroom. I’d like to know how soundproof the units are: Caltrain immediate adjacent is attractive to me as a daily Caltrain rider, but that also means Caltrain big engine noise for about 18 hours a day. San Jose airport traffic flies low directly over downtown. The two bedroom units may be a limitation for those of us with families.

Still, I think it’s worth taking a look for anybody planning to buy in San Jose. Plant 51 grand opening today and Sunday, downtown San Jose at The Alameda and Bush Street. You can easily walk there from Diridon Station, especially from the Diridon Light Rail Station.

Seven bucks for a box of cereal??