A Workcycles customer in Frankfurt, Germany sent this photo along; one more handy advantage of a bakfiets.

See also:
Slapen in de bak
Sleeping on het bakfietsbankje

Pascal the little prince in his cool ride.

Last night I loaded our freshly refinished (in RAL 2004 “pure orange”) dinner table into one of our big, classic rental bakfietsen in order to bring it home. This morning I was then faced with the dilemma of how to both return the bakfiets to the shop AND bring Pascal to his “creche” (daycare center), both about a kilometer or two from home. Do I dare let an almost two year old sit in the 190 x 85cm box untethered, unhelmeted, unpadded, unrollcaged…? After some deliberation with Mama-en-meer we decided that it should be OK, particularly since Pascal has logged enough thousands of cycling kilometers to not have much urge to do anything stupid and terrible-twos-toddler-like. Besides, we figured, the bakfiets has a top speed of about 10km/hr and everybody (even taxis!) gives it a nice, wiiiiiiide berth.
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Long time customer Eddy sent this pic of himself and his kids along. Shall we count the “That’s gotta be Amsterdam” elements?…

1. Workcycles Fr8 Crossframe with Massive Rack front carrier (150kg load capacity). The bike is one of two hot-dip galvanized examples in existence. It was such a pain in the ass to make that it’ll probably also be the last.

2. Child on saddle behind the handlebar with footrests on the downtube. Kids absolutely LOVE sitting here and parents enjoy being able to talk while cycling. The kids just have to be mature enough to stay put, awake and keep their feet on the pegs.

3. Giant lock: 10mm hardened steel chain with disk-type Abus lock (hanging from cross point of the top tubes). Virtually impenetrable unless the thief is bold enough to make a lot of noise and sparks.

4. Baby on the belly. Is it safe? That’s debatable but cycling is, in any case, very safe and one cycles very carefully with a baby like this. This setup is certainly better than carrying the baby with any bike other than a Bakfiets Cargobike with a Maxi-Cosi installed (Eddy’s wife’s bike). See my research on the topic: Carrying a Newborn on a Bike

5. Rider making a Fr8 Crossframe look small. It’s a big truck of a bike meaning that Eddy is a Dutch sized guy.

6. Teddy bear on the best seat in the house.

Perhaps most noteworthy is that this image will hardly turn heads here. Watch parents picking their kids up from an elementary school and you’ll see 20 variations on this theme within five minutes, and not a car in sight.

Thanks for passing the photo along Eddy!

Photo by Marc of Amsterdamize

Some industry insiders, myself included, were at least suspecting things weren’t going smoothly at Amsterdam’s populair transport bike producer De Fietsfabriek. Yesterday their filing for bankruptcy got leaked and now the press is all over it like flies on poop. That’s not really surprising considering the uncanny knack those guys had for keeping the media’s attention. It is (or was) indeed a very charismatic story about a temperamental and driven Kurdish immigrant’s success with that most Dutch of products; the bicycle. I have to admit that it sounds far more exciting than “Highly educated industrial designer and ex bike industry guy from New York makes conservative, high quality bikes in Holland”. But I suppose the downside of celebrity status is that you’re even more newsworthy when things go wrong.
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This is 19 month old Pascal’s absolute favorite-est toy; a toddler-sized mini bakfiets purchased last year on Queen’s day for €5 and fixed up a little. Whenever he visits dad at work(cycles) (which is quite often since we live just five minutes bike ride away) Pascal immediately searches out his bakfietsje. He then races around the showroom and workshop, deliberately slamming head-on into chairs, doors and shins. Thankfully he avoids the bikes. Sometimes he’ll fill the box with bells, locks, Brooks handlebar grips or whatever products he can reach and “transports” them to far-flung corners of the building.
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…was luckily also “papa day”. Thursday’s are dad’s weekday to hang out with Pascal. Since a 19 month old demands pretty much full-time attention it means a (nearly) no work day. We do all kind of things on papa day: ride to the zoo, walk around Amsterdam doing errands and checking out every park and playground along the way, visit friends… If it’s decent weather we often go for a bike ride.

Today was beautiful, at least by Dutch late winter standards. After breakfast we got on the bike and then we rode until early evening. We stopped at several playgrounds to test their slides (P’s favorite). The big, curvy one near the wind turbines was the winner. We sat on the terrace of a cafe and shared a chicken saté and frites. We checked out a running windmill where they still grind grains and the nice bakkers bakfiets out front. We even climbed “Het Kopje van Bloemendaal” the biggest hill in the area (43 meters!).
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It takes some cojones to give your brand new €2000 family triplet tandem a spray can paint job and then cover it in cheesy plastic flora… but the results are certainly unique and effective.

Why does the Amsterdammer do such a thing? Simple: Making it crazy and unique wards off thieves. Your bike is critical to getting around but at the same time not an object of obsession. The same family has ridden a similarly decorated Bakfiets Cargobike for years, probably appearing in thousands of holiday photos and blogs as a result. Now the kids are older and it’s time for them to contribute some locomotive force.

Thanks to the kind WorkCycles customer for stopping by with the bike.

In case you want a more subtle way to make your bike undesirable to thieves you can also check out WorkCycles High-Tech Antitheft Bicycle Spray.

“Fietsen worden verwijderd” = “Bicycles will be removed” and is a common sign in Amsterdam since bicycles cover every usable wall, sign pole, lamp post, fence, gate, bridge railing, fence, window (and bike rack). Putting a Fietsen worden verwijderd sign on your window or door is no guarantee that the spot will remain bike free but it’ll at least keep the most conscientious people away.

Ahh, but why is it also written in Chinese characters? I’ll just leave that as a mystery for the locals to answer.

A customer just passed a link to this video along: Riding his WorkCycles Fr8 with his two daughters in GMG seats on the rear carrier, and son on the saddle behind the handlebar… plus a big milk crate on the front carrier. Everybody looks pretty happy with the situation. So sweet, thanks very much Ben!

Eddy de Bruyn’s WorkCycles Fr8 (pronounced “freight”) and his son Jimmy have graced these pages before. But now Eddy’s bike sports a child’s saddle and footrests behind the handlebar so Jimmy can sit between papa’s arms. Both “gezellig” and “stoer”!