Louisville Mojo: Join My Quadracycle Gang

What's better than a bicycle? A quadracycle! Four wheels good, two wheels bad!

Although I enjoy biking and ride mine almost every day, I find the conventional two-wheel bicycle to be poorly suited for interaction with cars in busy traffic. I certainly support biker's rights in principle, but common sense dictates that most Americans in our lifetimes will never treat bikes the same way they treat cars on the road. Realistically, it's just not going to happen. Even though it's mandated by law in many places.

Heck, you can't even get cars to treat each other with caution and respect - our nation's roads are essentially a crash derby of inattentive knuckleheads recklessly hurling their deadly weight around and having no awareness of what a turn signal is for.

Part of what makes it an unsolvable problem is that bicycles are narrow enough to do all kinds of tricky things. And even though the law frowns on this too, I constantly see bicyclists driving like maniacs, whipping in front of cars with no warning, weaving, bobbing, ducking, darting all over the place. While cars must generally stay in their lane and on the road at any given moment, bicyclists can easily zoom down a sidewalk, then abruptly swooosh into the bike lane, then suddenly enter the main traffic and drive amongst the cars, then ride on medians and long turning lanes before dashing between cars to get back to their bike lane. And usually without giving a turn signal at any point during the wobbly exhibition.

It's this erratic and unpredictable nature of bicycling that I find to be a key cause of many cyclist-motorist conflicts, combined with the aforementioned fact that the world is full of just plain lousy drivers and that's not likely to change.

But a quadracycle (I prefer the term "pedal surrey"), now that's very different. It takes up at least the same space on the road as a golf cart, and isn't really suited to pulling cowboy stunts like curb-hopping or zipping around unpredictably. In traffic amongst cars, its size and width and shape makes it far more easily seen and accepted by car drivers.

Is it still, like a bike, fragile and dangerous and unprotected? Well, yeah.

Nevertheless, I'd like to see the pedal surrey become more popular, as part of subverting the two-wheeled hipster "bike culture" into a more all-encompassing "pedal culture". Of course, to some people, its quaint old-fashionedness may not make it as cool - but to me, the Victorian era is cool - that's why I featured the pedal surrey on my steampunk blog last summer and vowed to obtain one for myself this year.

The Industrial Bicycles company is probably where I'll be ordering mine from, unless I find a good deal with a local vendor. They also offer a plethora of other four-wheel options, and three-wheelers as well. I intend to trick mine out with some James Bond sort of modifications too. It's going to be a good summer.

But the important thing is, I'm doing it for one reason only: FUN. Not out of liberal guilt to reduce my carbon footprint or any other such ideological rationale. If you're riding a pedal device of any type for any reason other than sheer fun, delight and joy, you're doin' it wrong. (That is, unless it's all you've got to get around with, or maybe you're a courier, or maybe you work for a great place like EcoTaxi.)

I'm also intrigued by the Human-powered Vehicle that my esteemed colleague Kirk Kandle discussed in a recent post of his, but it seems like it might be a tad too cramped and claustrophobic for my tastes. Visibility also seems like it might be wonky. On the other hand, it's probably nice to be inside one in the sub-zero winter weather. I look forward to Kirk's continued research into the matter!

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Kool Jerk mon jan 04 2010 at 9:49 pm ·


	It's wide and slow. It can't share the road with cars.

J.S. Holland mon jan 04 2010 at 9:55 pm ·


	Actually, they're not as slow as you might think. My grandmother had one and I used to really get some speed out of it, zipping around downtown Mt.Vernon. The model pictured is a 7-speed. And pedal cars are perfectly street-legal.

Kool Jerk mon jan 04 2010 at 9:58 pm ·


	It seems heavy. I guess it could be geared in a way to be fast enough. I was thinking a car can go around a bike but that would be difficult. I like it.

FunkyPumpkin mon jan 04 2010 at 11:03 pm ·


	Wide, slow and geeky.

Jax Rhapsody tue jan 05 2010 at 3:23 am ·


	The ones that they rent at the water front are single speeds. PRovided it's setup right it may work. I'm trying to make my trike so it can move at bike-like speed. If you get it I'll ride it with you and see if it can survive this hilly city.

Mixed Mojo tue jan 05 2010 at 10:39 am ·


	As soon as they sell them at Walmart, I'm getting one though I know your tongue must surely have been planted in your cheek while writing this.

J.S. Holland tue jan 05 2010 at 10:53 am ·


	Naw, I'm dead serious. I love these things, and I'm all about 19th century retro. And I like the fact that they pretty much have to behave more like a car in traffic. Industrial Bicycles, Inc. also sells a curious ride called the Impello: http://www.industrialbicycles.com/The_Impello.htm It's a 7-speed three-wheeler with a 1950's-looking boatlike body, making it something of an aesthetic missing link between my gaslight-era Surrey and Kirk's space-age human-powered vehicle.

Mixed Mojo tue jan 05 2010 at 11:18 am ·


	We'll see bikes like those about the same time we start seeing rickshaw around town.

J.S. Holland tue jan 05 2010 at 11:21 am ·


	You do know there's a rickshaw courier guy downtown, right? Not to mention the aforementioned ecotaxis (see the link in article) which are de-facto rickshaws.

Mixed Mojo tue jan 05 2010 at 11:22 am ·


	not that I don't agree with you on your points about some bikers buzzing around like gnats on crack and then inflicting us with whoa over cars not "respecting" them. I respect life. I don't want to kill or hurt anyone. Not only would it be upsetting psychologically it would be very inconvenient. Waiting for the ambulance and then dealing with cops, lawyers and insurance companies. It would just ruin my day. Most other people feel the same, I bet. Bikers are just on inferior vehicles. Bikes always lose. Cars are winners.

Jorge Pancho tue jan 05 2010 at 6:14 pm ·


	I haven't seen or ridden on of these since the summer of '86 on Lake Ontario in Toronto. They are as much fun as can be had legally. Thanks for taking me back to a good time.

Kool Jerk tue jan 05 2010 at 6:22 pm ·


	There is a lady that lives near me that rides one very similar. I don't think it has two wheels in the front.

GtownGuy tue jan 05 2010 at 6:47 pm ·


	Of course, that 4-wheeled cycle design is just the forerunner to (gasp!) the automobile.

Kool Jerk tue jan 05 2010 at 6:50 pm ·


	This all reminds me of how they pedaled on Gilligan's Island to generate electricity.

Jax Rhapsody tue jan 05 2010 at 7:26 pm ·


	The fact they're so car like, they're not really unique as trikes or bikes. Honestly 7 speeds or not, it's slow speed and size wil piss off alot of people.

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