The Life-Sized City Blog

Unbelievable. Absolutely unbelievable. I recieved a text message from Christian (at left, above) saying that he had spotted my red stolen Bullitt in his backyard in the Nørrebro neighbourhood. I called him instantly. (I mean INSTANTLY) and we went over the details on the bike. There was no question it was The Missing Bullitt. My friend Andreas and I hopped onto our bikes and flew off from Copenhagenize Consulting's offices in the centre of Copenhagen to meet up with Christian. Sure enough, there it was. My primary means of transport. Not locked to anything, with just a cheap wire lock through the wheel and frame. Christian had locked it with his own lock to the railing, just in case. The guy who nicked it peeled a few of the stickers off - the Bike Portland ones, the Cycle Chic one, but left the main stickers on the sides intact. DUH! The little seat where my daughter sits on the crossbar was gone, as was the wheel lock, but that's about it. Almost completely as I last saw ...

Photo by Diego Franssens - from interview in Belgian magazine Knack. Saturday morning, 11:30. Came out of the flat with the kids, heading for a toy store to buy a present that Felix would then take to a birthday party. Lulu-Sophia and I would then run some errands and hang out in the backyard. All of this would happen with my red Bullitt cargo bike. Which, I discovered, wasn't where I parked it. First thought... "Hmm, I thought I parked it there..." Second thought... "Maybe I parked it in the other spot..." Third thought, gradual realisation... "It's been nicked..." Not a foreign line of thought. Hell, I've had loads of bikes stolen before. But the fourth thought really says all about the role of the bicycle in Copenhagen - and in my life: "Shit... how I am going to get around today?!" Standing there with two kids - Felix was on his own bike - with things to do, places to go and stuff to buy and the cargo bike rug was pulled out from...

Saw this photo in a Danish newspaper, Politiken, this morning. The Danish air force sent F-16 jets to Sicily today and this photo shows one of the planes being prepared for duty. I love that there are two classic Danish short john bicycles parked next to them. The bicycle used when maintaining expensive fighter jets. Six F-16s fly off this morning to take part in the global push to battle a dictator who is slaughtering civilians... No... not Yemen, silly! They only have sand and dead civilians! We mean Libya, of course. They have oil and dead civilians. So off we go to war.

I'm sure many readers will remember playing card games like this one, particularly if you live in Europe. There were variations on the theme but cars were the main one. You competed with a friend or friends to see who could win each round by trumping the others' cards with more horsepower or top speed or price, etc. The City of Copenhagen (if I recall correctly) included a set of updated cars in 2009, included in a magazine and called Climate Car Cards. The theme was winning each round with the most environmentally friendly vehicle. A Christiania Bike was featured on one of the cards. It must have the win-all card. It reads as follows: Type: Cargo bike for child transport 0-100 km/h: Unlikely Horsepower: Varies Top speed: Circa 30 km/h Range: Depends on the motor Recharging time: 6-7 hours sleep Energy source: Rye bread Motor: Rye bread motor (it's an Danish expression that a bicycle has a "rye bread motor") Launched: 1984 Price: 11,200 kroner ...

Spotted this outside a supermarket. What a cool little short john for kids. Front racks are all the rage in Denmark - everybody is slapping them on their bicycles. Perfect on a kids bike.

I'd forgotten about this photo from last summer. Two postmen racing down the bicycle path on their Christania bikes after finishing their rounds. Heading back to the post centre on Finsensvej. Enjoying every minute of it. Love it.

The thaw continues but the icy remants of the many snowstorms are useful on occasion.

There are very few things that can't be done by bicycle in Copenhagen. We often blog about the various cargo bike variations in this city. Meet Jacob - aka The Bikeman . He's a bike mechanic with a rolling workshop. He has everything he needs in his cargo box, including a portable stand for suspending bikes. He'll go anywhere you need him to on his Bullitt in the city centre. Jacob also has arrangements with various companies. He comes out during work hours and the employees can go down and get their bikes adjusted, tuned, de-squeaked, whatever you need. No need to sacrifice your bicycle for a day by chucking it into a bikeshop. Brilliant. The professional bikeshop comes to you. If you're in Copenhagen and need to get a hold of The Bikeman , ring 28 40 35 67.

So the Brits are ditching their bicycle postmen. Royal Mail is calling it "modernisation" and citing "safety" as the reason . Over a century of not only tradition but also role models for urban and rural mobility will soon be lost. It's just mad. Does anyone know which company will be providing the vans to replace the bicycles? Was there lobby work at play? Wouldn't surprise me. With a sigh of disgust I just figured I'd chuck a whole bunch of photos of postmen and women in Copenhagen doing what they've done for over a century. And here's a spot of Cycle Chic on the left and a stamp celebrating Danish postal workers.

I experienced a strange little behavourial shift in myself recently. I use my two bicycles rather equally - the Velorbis and the Bullitt cargo bike. When not transporting kids, the Bullitt cargo bay is a respository for my bag. I just chuck it in, instead of having it slung around my shoulder. I discovered that I missed this ease-of-use when riding the upright Velorbis. I stuck the bag, Copenhagen-style, on the back rack under the rat trap. Which is what I've always done and, indeed, what most people without baskets do. Then I got a front rack put onto the Velorbis. These front racks have been a main feature for over a century, especially on Short Johns or delivery bikes/chimney sweep bikes or whatever you want to call them. Interestingly, they're experiencing a bit of a revival these day in Copenhagen. As soon as mine was on, I noticed that I was just slapping my bag onto the front rack and securing it with a bungee cord. Super quick and easy. Then I realised that the damned t...

Historical photo of a rolling advert for the Svajerløb - the bike messenger races - back in the 1940's. A sign attached onto that iconic cargo bike - The Long John. Here's a Long John in action the other day.

The vast majority of parents to children at our daycare drop off/pick up their kids on bicycles. Last Friday the children dressed up in costumes to celebrate Fastelavn, the millenia-old Nordic pagan version of the carnival celebrating the approaching spring. The parents were invited to hang out and have a cup of coffee and a fastelavn pastry, which is why there is congestion in the bicycle parking out front. Normally, the drop off / pick up times are scattered all over the morning / afternoon depending on each family's routine so it was cool to see the armada of bicycles all at once. This is just one angle. I was in a hurry. The bicycles continue around the corner and into the beyond. It's different at schools where the bell rings daily at 08:00 so there is an intense flow of bicycles approaching my son's school in the 10-15 minutes up to the bell. Get there early to get a good bike parking spot.

A bike thief got a shock yesterday when he stole a Christiania cargo bike from outside a shop here in Copenhagen. A man parked the bike and went into a shop. When he came out the bike was gone. A man had hopped onto it and rode off. The cargo bay had a cover on it, like in the photo above, and when the bike thief looked inside he saw three sleeping children, ages one, four and seven. Not quite what he bargained for when nicking the bike. The police were notified and all available personnel were set to the task of finding the children in the bike. When my wife and I saw this breaking news on the telly my first thought was that the thief would discover the children and then deliver them to safety. Sure enough, after he found them he hid the bike in a cellar entrance and asked the seven year old where they lived. He then followed all three of them home, notified some neighbours and delivered the kids. The police were called and he was arrested. " The bike thief followed the children...

The Copenhagen version of the White Van Man . A lot more relaxed.

Photo courtesy of and © Copenhagen City Museum / Københavns Bymuseum . This is not a photo of my dad. I wish it were. I wish I could have found a photo of him while perusing the photo archives of the Copenhagen City Museum but those odds are quite astronomical. While it's not him, it almost could be. During the Second World War my grandmother - my dad's mum - died and one of his aunts took care of him. He moved from Northern Jutland to Roskilde, near Copenhagen at the age of 15. He got a job, like many Danish boys, as a bike messenger boy in the town. Not long after, he got a job in Copenhagen, working for a green grocers on Gothersgade. Again, he was a bike messenger, riding out to the so-calle 'Vegetable Square' - where shops stocked up on wholesale greens and fruits in the morning - on a Short John like in the photo or a large three-wheeler. He also delivered goods to customers during the day and he lived with the family who owned the shop. So this photo, for me, is ...

With all the travelling I've been doing lately comes the fact that I have borrowed a number of different bikes. I often consider taking my Mobiky folding bike with me, but since I invariably meet up with readers or like-minded people, there always seem to be bikes nearby. On my recent visit to New York, Johnathan was amazingly kind enough to let me borrow his Bullitt TNT cargo bike from Larry vs Harry . Johnathan flew to Copenhagen earlier this year just to buy one and ship it home. He provided me with not only the bike but two locks, a pump, a map of the city and a tool kit. Totally brilliant. He cycles in cycling shoes so the only hitch was that I had to adjust to pedalling on clipless pedals in my regular shoes, but that was no big deal. It was amazing how many conversations I struck up with people when I rode around on the bike. I'm on the Manhattan Bridge, stopped to take some photos, and a couple of workers on the railway shouted at me to come over. They wanted to know a...