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.

Here in Amsterdam we just ride our Bakfiets Cargobikes, but over in North America it seems to be fashionable to put them on your giant car and drive around with them. Doesn’t seem like nearly as much fun to me, but hey, who am I to complain… I’m profiting from their excesses.

But just in case the guy with the ghetto blacked out Suburban with Cargobike on roof thinks he’s tough, check out this one. It’s a Unimog with the same Cargobike practically disappearing into the bed.

Never heard of a Unimog? Well then check out these videos of Unimogs in action. Suburbans are for pussies!

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!

Before I moved to the Netherlands in 2000 I was hardly aware of carrier bikes, especially anything more exotic than a Schwinn Cycle Truck or Worksman hot dog cart. Even in cycling capital of the world Groningen where I first lived here transport bikes were very uncommon. The streets were swarming seas of cyclists but everybody just rode normal Dutch bikes. The only unmotorized bakfiets I recall was a loaner at a second hand shop called Mamamini. It was big, old fashioned bakfiets just we sell at WorkCycles. Mamamini even shows the bakfietsen in front of their stores on their website. But somehow that trike didn’t interest me. Maybe it just seemed too absurd, as if it were just a prop. In reality these bikes are actually quite easy to ride as long as the terrain is flat.

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But in Groningen I met Marjette, crazy about bikes, probably ten centimeters taller than me and fond of riding her bike in absurdly short skirts. Marjette had (and still has) a hand-built carrier bike of a type I’d never seen before (not that that was a challenge). It’s a Long John type bike cobbled together from an old city bike, a folding bike, an upright from a heavy duty shelving system and random scrapyard bits. Most importantly it has a big rack in the middle to carry stuff: a couple crates of beer, a fridge or a chest of drawers etc. It might be crude but it is strong. The steering system was very cranky making the bike difficult to ride but after tweaking it here and there and lubricating the pivot points it was much more manageable. In any case that relationship didn’t last long but the obsession with transportfietsen stuck with me.

How Marjette got this bike is a good story in itself. It was made by the neighbor of an acquaintance who lived on a boat in the Oostelijk Eilanden (eastern islands) area of Amsterdam. This is the 19th century docklands area where WorkCycles Veemart shop is also located. Like a handful of the area residents this guy had a yard full of rusty, old stuff. Marjette brought him 20 liters of paint from a Groningen paint factory where you could get “seconds” paint for free. As payment Marjette could choose something from the scrap pile. She chose the Long John bike and believes the guy was very happy she didn’t go for the motorcycle next to it.

Sometimes we get strange requests at WorkCycles. This time it was (for the second time) to make bakfietsen with trees in them. Hey, if your cash is good and it isn’t harmful or dangerous we’ll make it.

I’ve no idea what equidura is but somebody is apparently selling the stuff.

I don’t know whether the customer had seen this one we did a couple years ago for the Zwitserleven pension and life insurance company. Apparently they rode around Amsterdam with a pretty girl in the chair to demonstrate the relaxed life one would have as a result of buying their insurance, or something like that.

The cheapest way to get a palm tree for this bike was to buy one… and to this day this palm lives in our bedroom. We’re very fortunate to have high ceilings since the tree is almost 300cm tall now.

Jimmy sleeping in the Cargobike box

Some time ago I posted a photo of a child sleeping on the bench of a Bakfiets Cargobike. Here customer Jimmy de Bruyn in Amsterdam naps in the Cargobike box amongst the day’s picnic gear. Yeah, there’s a lot of space in there.

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.

bakfiets-pascal-henry-panda (2), originally uploaded by henry in a’dam.

We were back at the panda portrait thing on the way to dinner this evening on the bakfiets cargobike. Still haven’t gotten around to mounting the camera to get Kyoko in the shot too. I guess we don’t really plan these things.

One could actually debate whether these are truly “pandas” considering that the one taking the picture (Kyoko) is not the one piloting the bike (me). But, in our defense all three of us are riding on the bike and considering that poles, remotes, tripods are acceptable for pandas I cannot see why a passenger photographer would not be accepted.

Actually I’d like to take some shots of how we usually ride as a family: Pascal in the box, me piloting and Kyoko side-saddle on the rear carrier. But to do that we’d have to mount the camera and operate it remotely, something that would actually require planning.

four person tandem in amsterdam, originally uploaded by henry in a’dam.

I can’t believe I’ve never come across this quadruple tandem before. I was parked on the Keizersgracht in the center of Amsterdam and looks as if it’s been there for years.

It’s a sweet bike too: a Gazelle, probably built in the 1950’s or 60’s mostly from bakfiets and transportfiets parts. A few cool details:

It’s also really heavy. I tried to set it more upright for the photo but realized that would have required a helper.

unsolicited sticker found on doede's bakfiets

Our website dude Doede van der Linden sent me this pic today. Somebody stuck this sticker on his Bakfiets Cargobike today.

“Rot op met deze &*%$#@! fiets” roughly translates to “Fuck off with this fucking bike” .

In other words somebody is displeased with Doede’s choice of bicycle. Below, the same in better detail.

The sticker in all it's glory

Here we can read the smaller text below.

Dit is een asociale fiets hij is echt te groot en waarschijnlijk kan ook jij er niet normaal mee fietsen

And in English: “This is an antisocial bike it is really too big and you probably also can’t cycle normally”

Now let’s consider this more carefully.

Now if anything is antisocial it’s telling people, unsolicited, by sticking things on their bikes, that they have too many kids, that they ride a bike that’s “too big”, and that they probably can’t ride a bike normally. So fuck off, you righteous asshole! Put stickers on your own bike and don’t tell people how they should live. Be happy that Doede rides a bakfiets (no wider than the handlebars of a normal bike in case it matters) instead of driving a Cadillac Escalade. And be happy that you live in Amsterdam, cycling capital of the world.