Howdy everyone, we took a long break before we start to join rides and started riding again! Haha! Mostly because of me actually, I’ve been tied up mostly with family & work commitments. Anyway, we just joined the Togoparts/OCBC Cycle Singapore Charity Mass Ride which took place on the 31/01/2010! It was a 34Km ride, 25kmph causal riding and no chionging kinda ride. The entire ride was supervised and very properly done by Togoparts, the ride leaders are adequately polite and friendly to us, when certain riders are stuck at the red lights, the ride leaders immediately inform those at the front that there’s riders being stopped by red lights. Overall experience: Cool!!! These are the few images taken at Marina Barrage:

As well as one little video taken when we were taking a really quick short break at Marina Barrage (only 17km away from ECP)…. LOL!!!

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the evening started at 10pm at pasir ris, we travelled to jln kayu via old tampines – hougang – sk, jln kayu was packed with ppl when we reached at 11pm. finally got seats 20mins later and at the same time, garlic came by to rrss n try our bikes.

After a meal of Roti john, mee goreng n drinks, we rode over to seletar camp where garlic took a spin on our bikes at piccadily, after the test ride, garlic bid ur goodbye n we went on our way….

the dam was packed wif ppl compared to the last time we came, mabbi cos it was fri nite. alot of scrabblers n harleys. from yishun, we took mandai rd towards kranji, rolling hills along dis stretch took alot out of me (*mental note to get slicks =p), we passed by the zoo where unker snapped some pix….ended up at the LNG station in kranji where we proceeded to Kranji dam.

as this was the first time we hit dis area so i prepped a map + the SLA pda app. we managed to topo our way till kranji road, asking ppl along the way…

riding into kranji way, we passed by the rail tracks with an old skool intersection then into heavy industral area…..lots of dogs here so do take note….just before the dam, there is a JTC hawker area where we spotted a 24hr mini mart for e foreign worker hostel in the area…mabbi next time we can plan 1 water break here…from the dam, we can see the bright lights of JB on one side glowing becons of the massive BBC antennas….and crossing the dam we hit neo tew….

this part of the ride was most enjoyable….long, meandering, deserted rds with dim str lamps, it no longer felt like we were in SG…we went pass alot of agro farms n sungei buloh nat reserve…

soon the narrow path opended up into wide fields, the air was krisp with the smell of greenery…we can just spot the mist in the distance along the rolling plains…the land here is really extensive…a reminder that we are now riding along SAF training gnds…CHEY…no wonder it felt so familiar….=p we can make out the camp boundaries of tengah AB, as we reach a junction to turn into lim chu kang rd.

from here on is mainly SAF gnds, we went pass Armor camp in sungei gudong, ama keng camp, tengah AB n SCDF academy, etc….it was also along this stretch we rode along the temp runway stretch b4 the LCK cemetary gnds, around 3-5k of straight, 6 lane rd….spotted some inital D wannabes here, civics n evos….drifting within the cemetary gnds….

proceeded straight done to jurong were we spotted HDB blks again….just as we crossed the MRT tracks b4 boon lay station, it started raining and we had to take shelter at a bus stop opposite caldbury choc factory….yum yum…after waiting for 20mins, it seem that the rain was not going to stop anytime soon so we packed our non water proof stuff and prep to ride on…

straight down to jurong island causeway, we took a right to jln buroh, a couple of flyovers later we reached west coast road, came by a rodalink, at first tot it was related to the rodalink chain where we bot our bikes but later realised that this might be a stand alone shop….moving alone we passed ginza plaza (upgrading) and haw par villa….took a break at 7-11 along the fong sing stretch be moving on to vivio then fullerton…

by then the rain had stopped….but as we rode into raffles place, it started raining again, it grew larger as we rode along nicoll and we stopped large groups of students on a mass cycling event taking shelter at bus shelters n flyovers…this group was huge, easily 2-300 strong, all with matching tees and cisco outriders to boot…WTF?!?!??

we turned into fort road and moved into ECP where unker seperated at Mac to move on to still rd, ubi, hougang while i moved on east to pasir ris…the rain turned into a downpour as i rode pass the hawker centre area, with alot of the osim tri workers taking shelter everywhere…the stretch along from bedok jetty till saf sailing centre was in bad shape, alot of flooding on the whole path and u can easily ride into an open drain as it was no longer able to differenciate the 2…in short…i was aquagliding in a swimming pool…lol…

cool n shivering from the cold sea breeze, my fingers shrivelled like a prune from the wet, i pushed on….(lan lan, how else to go home?) rode along a deserted coastal route sans a few hardcore tri/marathon ppl…

reached changi v. FC and rushed in to gobble up a nasi lemak….(hungry n cold….smlj oso taste goot….rofl) be continuing back to pasir ris….dat was it….a smooth ride sans the rain….only mishap was i drifted when i reached my blk….my knobbles were so wet there was no traction at all on the ceramic tile floor…ride states below…till next ride then….=)

distance – 119.5km
time peddled – 6hr 40 mins

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Transport planners in the Netherlands know how to safely fit bicycle use into tight spaces. The country is one the most densely settled in the world, with compact cities and many older areas with narrow streets. They also have much higher car ownership than Singapore. It would be hard to argue that the Netherlands’ cities have more space for bicycle facilities than we do in Singapore.

If you want to know the Dutch “secret” for a great bicycling environment then an excellent start would be the visually stunning, Cycling in the Netherlands (pdf), put out by the Dutch equivalent of the LTA.

One of its key points is that “bicycle policy works“!

… a consistent approach by Dutch policy makers to the bicycle has had a demonstrable effect. Municipalities which have had a focused bicycle policy for some time have a higher bicycle share than other cities. Traffic safety has also benefited from the bicycle policy. (p.19)

There is safety in numbers for bicycle users as this figure from page 13 shows. The more bicycle use there is in a city, the safer it is per km.

Page 64 of Cycling in the Netherlands also kindly lists further English-language resources on Dutch bicycle policy:

CROW, Sign up for the bike: Design manual for a bicycle-friendly infrastructure, 1996. This manual can still be supplied. See www.crow.nl. An English translation of the revised Ontwerpwijze Fietsverkeer (Cycle Traffic Design Method) may appear in 2007.

The SWOV organisation for traffic safety research also has an extensive website in English, containing considerable information about bicycle use and bicycle safety: www.swov.nl

The research unit of the Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management, AVV, has a
large number of reports on traffic in the Netherlands in the English section of its website, including ‘passenger transport’ and various publications relevant to bicycle policy: www.rws-avv.nl

The Fietsberaad, or bicycle consultancy, recently issued an English-language publication outlining bicycle policy in a number of cycling cities: Continous and integral: The cycling policies of Groningen and other European cycling cities (Fietsberaad-publication no. 7, April 2006). This publication contains a number of accounts on the traffic policy of several cities characterised by a relatively high degree of bicycle use, extending over a prolonged period. Each account gives a specific picture of the ‘course of development’ of bicycle use in a municipality and the relationship between bicycle use and local policy. It covers five cities in the Netherlands known as ‘cycling cities’: Groningen, Amsterdam, Enschede, Zwolle and Veenendaal. This is augmented by a selection of five cities from other neighbouring countries also featuring a reasonable level of bicycle use: Münster and Freiburg in Germany, Copenhagen and Odense in Denmark and Ghent in Belgium. The publication can be downloaded from www.fietsberaad.nl, via ‘rapporten’.

To these sources I would add the Interface for Cycling Expertise (I-ce), which is devoted to sharing Dutch bicycle planning expertise worldwide.

[Update: I wrote a follow-up to this post over at the Reinventing Urban Transport blog.]

Thanks to Cor-Henk for the link to the Cycling in the Netherlands document.

Credits: http://cyclinginsingapore.blogspot.com

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1st, our meeting point was set at Kaki Bukit traffic junction towards Ubi, heading towards East Coast direction. That is the best meeting point for the both of us due to the location that both of us stay.

Upon meeting up, we ride a few streets down to the absolutely famous “Gold Rolex King” Hokkien Mee food stall along Jalan Eunos.

Following on, we headed to city riding through Joo Chiat Road, we made our way through Kallang and our next destination was MUSTAFA… So what were we doing at Mustafa? Oh, we went there to buy the Motorola ear piece for the walkie talkies I brought along for this city ride… it looked something exactly like this:

As the rain was getting heavier, we decided to go for Swee Choon Dim Sum, not really taking a break but more of trying to find a hiding place to prevent ourselves from getting drench in the rain if it gets heavier. We ordered some dim sum at Swee Choon, it will be quite embarrassing for not ordering any food and occupying their seats, here’s what we got! Their famous signature dishes -- Fried Mee Suah Cake and Steam Egg Chicken… nice!

After we cleared the delicious dim sim, the next destination went further down towards Keppel PSA… yeah, you are very smart indeed! Yes, thats correct… we were going to Sentosa Island.

Admission charges for cycling is $3… And we caused a minor traffic jam at the gantry, the cashier at the gantry lacked of a dollar change so she had to run to the next one to get me my change…

Sentosa Island’s biggest challenges are its steep uphills and downhills and they are always up and down… We couldn’t make it on some uphills so we did the “push push” technique… lol…

We went straight for the beaches and nearly got lost as Alex and I went different directions, luckily we still have our newly bought walkie talkie sets with ear pieces to communicate.

We finally met each other again just outside Cafe Del Mar, and after taking a short break, we went roaming along the beach pubs and headed towards Palawan Beach and that’s where we witnessed a very happening beach side event they held, superb lightings and sound system!

Ok, done with Sentosa… should we be going home??? Nope… next place >>> Chinatown… which is pretty nearby. So whats good at Chinatown at about 2 -- 3am? Ah… Here’s the good deal… Tiong Shian Porridge Center… Here’s the stall image…

Alex ordered a fish porridge which was a big mistake, take note >>> ANY porridge is good there except for fish porridges… Approximately, we rested an hour, the porridges sold there are super hot when served, so we took our time and have a good break before going back east…

Next stop, we made it all the way back to Geylang and I had Teo Chew porridge there but the food wasn’t exceptionally nice, never going back there again…

That is all for this city ride of ours… We’ll be back next week… :D

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