Every fan and promoter of urban cycling simply needsмаси a copy of Shirley Agudo’s “Bicycle Mania”. You can regard it as a photo book, with probably the best collection of Dutch cycling photos ever assembled. Even as an Amsterdam resident and amateur(ish) photographer I marvel at the shots in these pages. Have a peek at a few examples here at the Eduard Planting gallery.

But “Bicycle Mania” goes much deeper. The photos are accompanied by well-informed and thoughtfully written text covering in sections covering the how and why the Dutch have achieved (and continue to build upon) the world’s best of nearly everything in transportation cycling: broad popularity, amazing infrastructure, safety, fun and pure variety on wheels. The text is in both English and Dutch, handy learning for those anglophiles who want to delve deeper into Dutch cycling culture than English can take you. Numerous authorities are interviewed, hyperbole and abuse of statistics is thankfully avoided and and it’s just a good read. In a nutshell: Recommended.

Read more about it at the Bicycle Mania website.

In related news a bike photo contest is being held in conjunction with the launch of “Bicycle Mania” by The XPat Journal magazine. First prize is (yep, you guessed it)… a custom built WorkCycles Secret Service bike.

Think you can take this one home? Well, you’d better act quickly since the deadline is 20 January. Photos must be emailed as jpeg’s of maximum 3Mb to: editor@xpat.nl. One photo entry per person and include your full name and phone number.

Wanna check out the bike first to see if it’s worth the trouble? It’s at the Eduard Planting Fine Art Photographs gallery where a number of Agudo’s photographs are on display. I also “borrowed” the above image from their site.

Nope, I’m entirely unclear on what Ryan Doyle’s creation, dubbed the “Hell-a-Copter” is and does. I see something that looks like a giant, donut shaped, glazed balloon with lights, a frame suspended below, a hipster Pabst Blue Ribbon drinker and his legs spinning what seems to be a sort of horizontal propeller. It’s got pedals and art so it earns a mention on B.E.M. It’s intriguing though doesn’t seem nearly as hellish as another Doyle creation called “The Regurgitator”. Wanna get spun around faster than the feet of a Goldsprint competitor? Then you’d better hook up with Doyle and his cronies. Have a look below. Just thinking about it makes me wanna toss my cookies.

In any case you can go check all of this out… and RIDE them too during Doyle’s three part exhibition at Art Basel Miami Beach, December 3-6 2009. The details:

Squishy Universe Gallery
150 NW 24th Street
Miami, FL 33127

ps: I think I might have seen Doyle in Amsterdam years ago when they did the “Tall Bike Jousting World Championships” here. Here are a couple pics, somewhat more interesting than the event actually was.

38 (more): Chaise Cruiser, originally uploaded by theglife.

Check out this awesome Long John desert rig with 36″ wheels, xtracycle rear end and a cargo bed of at least 150cm. Sort of part WorkCycles Cargobike Extra Long and part Mad Max, all on steroids. Then again I suppose half of the creations at Burning Man have a Mad Max Look… “Speed is only a matter of money. How fast can you afford to go?”

A man travels with his home-built home on a bicycle. That’s all I know about this one. Thanks to artist friend Abner Preis for the tip but don’t go searching for his website – it seems to have been hacked into a porno site, I assume NOT Abner’s doing.

Speaking of houses on bikes I’d forgotten about this fantastic camper bike from Kevin Cyr:

UPDATE: Jason Moore in the first comment below reminds me of another bicycle camper/motorhome, this one traveled with and lived in full-time by Brian Campbell. His bike, which has gone through several iterations is ingenious. Brian’s situation though isn’t one to be envied; I’m under the impression he doesn’t live in his bicycle entirely by choice. You can read about Brian on Bike Portland, and also the sites of many others who’ve met Brian during his travels. Photos by Jonathan Maus of Bike Portland.

But then I begin to google camper bikes further and find that a whole new world has opened to me: bicyclists not content to merely travel by bicycle but who also insist upon sleeping in or on their bicycle. Take these Midget Bicycle Campers from Australia for example:

And then there’s this one by Paul Welkins, as seen on the Design Boom site:

Check out Welkin’s site for an amazing array of self-built, efficient vehicles and other random stuff.

Even the sober “doe maar normaal” Dutch are at it. Check out “Met een bakfiets op vakantie“.

And a family from Zeeland (as in the original Zeeland that New Zealand is the new version of in the same way that New York is the new version of Amsterdam… or something like that) who used to ride their old bakfiets as a camper, kids riding alongside on their own little bikes.

A few years ago there was an Italian firm called “Tasso Italia” that offered (though probably didn’t ever sell) a copy of the Main Street Pedicabs trike with a pop-out camper tent on the bed but they seem to have disappeared into the ether.

Of course that’s all good fun but we shouldn’t ignore the countless rickshaw drivers in Indonesia, India and elsewhere who sleep in their bikes out of necessity and not for kicks. It’s about as easy to forget as the fact that a great number (a majority even?) of transportation cyclists in the US are neither “cycle chic” nor “cycling enthusiast”. In fact they’re people who cannot drive; they’ve either lost their licenses or are too poor to own a car, and their accident statistics are so appalling that they skew US bicycling safety stats markedly toward the danger direction.

I don’t normally expect to find intellectually stimulating material in the pages of Wallpaper magazine, not surprising for a glossy with the byline “International Design, Interiors, Fashion & Travel”. Mostly it just reminds me of my vapid days in industrial design, as do most “designer bikes” such as the Bamboomega and the Triobike.

This image has a little food for thought though. The sculpture by Ai Weiwei, very appropriately made of bicycles, is titled “Forever”. The bikes go ’round and ’round, climbing into a sort of geodesic dome.

A Bike is basically “forever”, just a few kilos of metal, plastic, rubber and leather that, like an ant, carries many times its weight. Beyond its initial manufacture few resources are needed to keep the bicycle running for an absurdly long time in modern terms. Every part, including the frame, is replaceable meaning that a quality, well designed bike really does have a practically endless lifespan.

Is this what Weiwei meant? Probably not but it fits my needs nicely.

Thanks to Frank Kloos for the tip. And while you’re behind that screen check out Frank’s cool new site featuring inspiring photography from around the globe: The Black Snapper.

The ash-tray bike!, originally uploaded by Iam sterdam.

WorkCycles didn’t make this one and I haven’t seen it yet myself. The Amsterdam city District “de Baarsjes” is using this brilliant “Asbakfiets” to promote smoke free and butt free surroundings. They’re giving out little cigarette and gum wallet/baggies to hold the nasties until a suitable trash container can be found.

A little background:
Ashtray = asbak
Cargo trike = bakfiets

The “bak” part of the words is the same: means “tray”, “box”, or “bin”. I suppose “bucket” probably also comes from the same origin.

Here’s more (humorous) bakfiets etymology

Thanks Iam sterdam for the great photo!

Amsterdam’s happy, horny, musical clown from the 1980’s sings “The Bicycle Seat Song” . Only here in Amsterdam, Netherlands, the world’s cycling capitol city.

The above photo by supertsaar on Flickr reminded me of a conversation I had with Jos Louwman, founder of the well-known Mac Bike bicycle rental company in Amsterdam. Jos rode the same “Pfanntoom 1″ bakfiets to our Oktoberfietsfeest party this past fall and I commented that it reminded me of the casket bakfiets I’d seen recently.

As it turns out there’s quite an interesting story behind the Pfanntoom and the reference to the casket trike was eerily close to the truth. Here’s a rough translation of Jos’ response:

“Funny that you the Phanntoom 1 compare to the casket bakfiets. My friend Henk Pfann (the godfather of the Amsterdam Bakfiets Club) is buried in the box that was originally mounted on the bakfiets. As a memorial we mounted a pontoon from a aquaplane on the chassis.”

It’s also worth noting that the box that was originally on this bakfiets (the one Henk Pfann is now buried in) was in the shape of a book, specifically a bible; Henk and his family were in the book business.

The name Pfanntoom is a word play on the Dutch “fantoom”, the English “phantom” (meaning the same thing) and the name Pfann.

A little more about Henk Pfann on Wikipedia.

The bakfiets chassis under the pontoon appears to be an old Maxwell, a long extinct firm that made some of the best bakfietsen ever. Maxwells often had unusual features including triple main tubes, lovely double chainstays, and a handle built into a rear fender reinforcement. Maxwell was founded in 1914 and continued until 1961 though I’ve never seen a Maxwell bakfiets or transportfiets that looked as if it was built after WWII. The Maxwell name is still in use for a generic line of Dutch city bikes but these don’t have anything to do with the old Maxwell.

Tripping Angels presents “Konijnen Fruit’; a rabbit bakfiets cycling trip through Amsterdam. Unnecessary inside joke: It helps to have seen the classic Paul Verhoeven film Turkish Delight (”Turks Fruit”), which you should see anyway because it’s a great film and has some quintessentially Dutch cycling scenes.

In case you were wondering what people do with a rental bakfiets, here’s an example.

Wobine: Thanks. The next rental is on the house!

Perhaps only in Amsterdam: A jazz band that plays while riding in a bakfiets.

And I just noticed that the video was made in the Palmgracht, right around the corner from WorkCycles Lijnbaansgracht shop.