Bike Friendly Richardson

It’s time for another installment of the I Bike Richardson series, where we put a face on Richardson cyclists. We’d like to introduce Bryan Lindsey. He took the time to answer a few questions about biking. Enjoy:

Name:
Bryan Lindsey
literaturewithlindsey.com

How long have you been riding?
I’ve been riding a bike as an adult for the last seven years.

How often do you ride?
My commute is the Holy Trinity of environmental responsibility. I ride my bike to the train station every day, take the train downtown, and then walk to my building. After work, I do it all again in reverse.

What’s your favorite route?
I avoid Campbell on my daily trip to Galatyn Station by skipping through a couple of neighborhoods, and then taking Owens north of the trail toward Lookout Park. From there, I hit the sad excuse for a bike lane on Lookout past the Owens Farm and then into the business parks around Galatyn. That’s not my favorite route; it’s just my most practical commute. For sheer kicks, I could ride the paths around the Galatyn Park nature area all day long.

Why do you cycle?
It started when I needed to get into shape, and my doctor told me to find a kind of exercise that I thought was fun. At the time, the only exercise I remembered enjoying was riding my bike as a kid, so that’s what I went with. I still ride for exercise and fun, but once I learned that it was something that I could do, then it seemed like kind of an ethical responsibility to do it as often as possible. As a matter of fact, that’s also exactly how I became a vegetarian.

What is your perspective on riding – in general or in Richardson?
The presence of all of the race clubs from Planet Spandex and the RBM retail monolith don’t hurt, but cycling in Richardson is great because of advocacy and awareness groups like, say, this one. I commuted by bike from Lower Greenville into Oak Cliff for a couple of years, and the culture of cyclists that has developed in Richardson is friendlier and more laid back than a lot of what I encountered in those neighborhoods. The same is true of the traffic. You can find jerks in cars everywhere, just like you can find jerks on bikes everywhere. Richardson just seems to have fewer of both.

Tell us about your bikes.
My daily mount is an early-90’s Schwinn High Plains, held together mostly by stickers and zip ties. She’s not the Prom Queen, but you probably wouldn’t leave the Prom Queen locked up at the train station all day either; that’s between you and CSI SVU. In other news, I also have a six-year-old Marin hard tail mountain bike, though it’s been way too long since I’ve been on the trails.

The Next Generation of Lindsey Cyclists

We want to thank Bryan, for sharing his perspective on Richardson cyling.

We’d also like to extend an invitation to any cyclist who lives and/or rides in Richardson to share their story as well. You can either answer the questions (above) or send in a story – along with some pics to bikefriendlyrichardson(at)gmail.com.