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StreetFilms Monday, June 13, 2022
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Scott Ambinder Has Docked At All 1,674 Citi Bike Stations

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Scott Ambinder's dedication to Citi Bike is impressive. For one, he has docked at least once at all 1,674 locations throughout NYC (and New Jersey's Hoboken & Jersey City!) He's a fountain of knowledge when it comes to where stations are and what the neighborhoods look like around them. And certainly an expert on how to use the app, score membership extensions and where to look to see when a new station activates in the network.

He was always an avid Citi Bike fanatic but in the Summer of 2020 - and already a top 1% user and with Covid raging throughout NYC - he looked at the new City Explorer Map launched by Citi Bike and started pondering whether he could eventually return his bike at each docking station. Soon after he began strategizing how to attack specific neighborhood grids to maximize the number of stations on daily jaunts. But he added another impressive wrinkle to his accomplishment: he never used mass transit to start or finish his journeys (except to cross the river to NJ to get across the Hudson.)

Scott is only one of three Citi Bike members to crest the 1,600+ mark.

Streetfilms followed him around for a few hours on two days to talk about his unique feat and enthusiasm for City Bike. (Editors Note: as you will discover in the film we met one weekend after Scott offered an incredibly kind gesture of help!)

Towards the end of the film, Scott answered Streetfilms fans questions submitted for him to answer.

StreetFilms Saturday, June 11, 2022
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This Might Be NYC’s First Pool Noodle Bike Ride! (It is!)

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Wowsers! Been living in NYC for 30 years and this is the first time I have ever heard/been to an organized "Pool Noodle Ride"!

The exciting thing is it is happening in a place you don't normally see advocacy rides: Ridgewood, Queens! Deep on the border between Queens & Brooklyn where there is a huge lack of protected bike lanes - or frankly much of anything that is safe for bike riders. Take a look.

Mollie who bikes nearly every day in Ridgewood just meant for this to be a "practice ride" with a few others. But word got out on Twitter fast and 15 others showed up to attach a noodle and try it out.

My own experience: I rode 7 miles home after covering this and definitely felt like some drivers were extra cautious : many going by more carefully than I am used to and actually creeping over the double-yellow line to proceed. Of course, not a real fix and the NYC DOT should be immediately putting in some safe bike lanes throughout the district! Molly is already planning another ride to combine noodles with another awesome trend in cities across the globe: "Pool Noodle-Protected Family Bike Bus"!

StreetFilms Friday, May 20, 2022
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Kid Wheel Power: Barcelona Bici Bus is Magic!

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Last month I had a chance encounter with Rosa Suriñach on the United Nations Bike Ride (link here: https://youtu.be/sEMlTQZqO0k) when we both realized we were winners of the 2022 World Bicycle Day recognition.

We got to talking while riding and I learned she was heavily involved in Barcelona's Bicibús Eixample (Bikebus) which I had seen so many cool Tweeted videos of in the past year. So at the end of the ride I was able to pull her aside and grab a really quick interview about the general idea. (some competition with noise and traffic, but still perfectly useable)

She and some contributors were able to get me some wonderful footage and stellar photos to tell the story. Combined with previous footage I shot in Barcelona in 2018 it makes for a really nice short showing the power of children and their families which are staging a mini-revolution in the streets of Barcelona and encouraging cities worldwide to follow them.

StreetFilms Tuesday, May 17, 2022
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London’s School Streets up close!

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Sam Balto (or "Coach Balto" as he is known since he is a PE teacher in Portland, OR) is a very active member of the Twitterverse worldwide gaggle of advocates for safer & better streets.

He recently took a trip to London and shot quite a bit of photos & video clips of what their School Streets program feels like (an amazing 350 schools activated in just one year!) When he sent over a few clips I told him to send them all and record some dialogue of what he saw with his own eyes. His "special guest correspondent" label is something I hope to encourage others to do since travel is still not as easy in the age of Covid.

Check it out!

StreetFilms Friday, May 6, 2022
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Check out the newest 2022 Citi Bike E-bikes (Exclusive kickoff ride with Streetfilms)

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When friends heard the release of the new Citi Bike e-bikes into the wild was imminent, many wanted to me give them a review ASAP. Little did I know I would get invited to the first public unveiling where we had a huge geek out over and getting to ride with Citi Bike staff and members of the NYCHA riders program. As you will see we had a great time!

The new bikes feature a different color scheme. But they go farther (now nearly 60 miles on a charge), they accelerate faster, they have new cool safety lighting schemes, the seat is so easily adjustable that your wrists will want to kiss the stem, it has an actual battery-life indicator right on the screen and plenty of other fun features!

So take a look at our sort of exclusive video of the Queens kickoff ride (Streetfilms was the only camera crew at the launch!) One thing I have to mention is that I have covered a lot of group rides. I arrived via my large and heavy Workcycle and the new Citi Bike e-bikes get you so quickly up to speed that I had a very hard time keeping up with the riders to get my footage. But as you'll see I got to use one at the end.

 

 

StreetFilms Sunday, May 1, 2022
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UN NYC Bike Tour

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Some of NYC's biggest cycling heavyweights showed up for a ride with the United Nations to help support the goal to advocate for cycling as a priority transportation mode and essential service for achieving the mobility goals of the New Urban Agenda ahead of the United Nations General Assembly meeting.

StreetFilms Saturday, April 16, 2022
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Announcing the 2022 World Bicycle Day Award for Streetfilms!

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Announcing very exciting news as Clarence Eckerson, Jr. the director & producer of over 1,000 videos for Streetfilms over the past 17 years, has been selected by the United Nations as a Lifetime Achievement recipient of the World Bicycle Day awards for 2022 on June 3rd.

Spanning a career of nearly 25 years, Mr. Eckerson has been making films by bike in New York City since the late 1990s and for the majority of that time covering the advocacy movement for biking nationally and worldwide while director for Streetfilms. Prior to working in his current role (which began in 2005) he's also done ample documentation and coverage during his volunteerism thru Transportation Alternatives and for the cable-access show bikeTV for six years.

The Class of 2022 includes over two dozen recipients from all six inhabited continents and over 15 countries. Included in the eclectic list is the Nepal Cycle Society, Maud de Vries of The Netherlands, Ugandan urban planner Amanda Ngabirano and the London Ambulance Service's Cycle Response Unit!

Unfortunately, due to Covid protocols the United Nations is not holding their usual ceremony and presentation in-person. However, each honoree was shipped their award and told to take promotional photos to announce their achievements. But since Streetfilms' specialty is making movies, Leszek Sibilski from the United Nations granted his blessing for us to make this very short acceptance in one of the most people-friendly places in New York City: Queens' 34th Ave open street which demonstrates how much safer bicycling and public space is becoming in New York. Clarence would like to thank the United Nations, his family, all of his co-workers from over the years and the wonderfully diverse Class of 2022 for inspiring him to keep documenting the worldwide movement!

StreetFilms Wednesday, April 6, 2022
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Washington, DC: A Biking Streetfilms Adventure!

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At the end of March, The League of American Bicyclists tried out a hybrid style Bike Summit 2022 due to the pandemic's still uncertain effect on daily life. I liked that some of it was on-line and a good deal of it I could do outdoors. So I sojourned to Washington, D.C. to attend and also see what has happened with infrastructure one of the better biking cities in the nation during Covid.

Truth is D.C. is doing a lot! I enjoyed quite a few solid, protected lanes that are new in the past two years and a bridge (Frederick Douglass) that while still not fully finished is already opened to the public for those on foot, bike and scooters with a 20-foot wide path (and on the other side another path will open later this year.) I believe that it could be a record for a multi-use path in terms of width since the two sides will equal 40-feet combined!!

D.C. has a lot of cool stuff going on. One thing I really like is that when they decide to build protected bike lanes they utilize many barriers and strategies and they work extremely well. You will see many styles sprinkled in amongst the footage as we got to talk to Citifi's Gabe Klein (who is a previous head of DC DOT), DC Cycling Concierge's Jeff Miller and Fionnuala Quinn the Director of the wonderful Discover Traffic Gardens who guide us on our fun journey to see a lot in just 48 hours.

One drawback was the weather. I had planned an even far more extensive film but with brutally cold temperatures (there was a windchill of low 20s for our Cherry Blossom ride on Monday morning) some precipitation and frequent 30+ mph wind gusts it made filming a real chore the entire a trip with frozen fingers. So a small apology for being able to hear the wind quite a bit at times. The usual temps in DC are 60 degrees at this time.

StreetFilms Sunday, April 3, 2022
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Women’s Ride (The Bronx 2022)

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About 200 folks turned out for yesterday's Women's Ride from The Bronx. Tune in to see the merriment, fun and statement the day made for some of the participants.

The ride was put on by The Bronx Committee and staff of Transportation Alternatives. There were Women's Rides in Queens in 2018 and 2019 as well.

StreetFilms Friday, April 1, 2022
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Fast Motion Fun: Bicycling Around Utrecht

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Just having a little fun re-editing some old stuff. I usually never use fast motion or slow-mo in anything I do. But for some reason this just hit the spot. This is footage from my 2019 Utrecht trip where I made numerous Streetfilms. Enjoy!

StreetFilms Tuesday, March 29, 2022
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Washington DC Blossoms Bike Tour 2022

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Come along with "DC's Cycling Concierge" Jeff Miller as he leads a ride to see Washington D.C.'s cherry blossoms in full bloom for this year's Bike Summit Conference 2022 from The League of American Bicyclists! It's a short tour but full of sites and flowering trees. This ride departed at 645am Monday morning on March 28. The temps were in the mid-20s and it was very cold. But it turned out with so few people up that early and the bitter cold provided an excellent ride without crowds so often gathering to see nature's bloomings.

StreetFilms Sunday, March 20, 2022
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A.U.T.O. Lobbyist Veronica Moss Visits Times Square (2022 Re-Mix)

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After this winter FINALLY unearthing this raw footage I have been searching everywhere for the better part of ten years, I've finally been able to see all of the hilarious stuff left on the cutting room when Kate McKinnon played the fictional A.U.T.O. lobbyist Veronica Moss being overwhelmed visiting Times Square's new pedestrian plazas in this fun parody. It was so much fun filming it.

This certainly doesn't vary in tone and form compared to the original, but the bulk of the content in this new re-edit is an alternate take or brand new footage - mostly all improved by the great Kate McKinnon who has been the funniest performer on the SNL cast from the past ten years!

StreetFilms Tuesday, March 8, 2022
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The Nijmegen Railway Bridge is also a Fantastically Cool Bridge to Bike

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Here's a cool one. I have been revisiting some of my old footage as I await being able to travel some. I did a great film about Nijmegen you may have seen. But as with many things I shoot I had to leave a ton of great stuff on the cutting room floor.

The Nijmegen Railway Bridge had a bikeway attached to it in 2004 and it is one of the most thrilling and dreamy bridges I have ever ridden over. For one: Nijmegen is the beginning of the RijnWaalpad, a fast bike superhighway that stretches 16km all the way to Arnhem, its twin city. I also did a video on that one too!

In any event, in looking thru the archives I realized I had ample footage from all sorts of angles to give people the experience of a full-rounded perspective: from the pathway itself, from down by the waterfront looking up, from the tallest structure downtown the church (looking down) and filming from inside the train itself arriving & departing Nijmegen.

One thing I want to point out that is pretty cool about this Streetfilm: I had a production company who inquired about using some of my "drone" footage. But there is none - all of the footage was shot by my very steady hand balancing on a bike. I have been doing that style of filming for nearly 25 years. The kids these days don't realize old school. (Though I am getting pretty old to keep being able to pull it off.)

StreetFilms Monday, March 7, 2022
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Rotterdam Central: A Peaceful Transportation Hive of Human Activity

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Last week on the same day I found myself visiting both Grand Central Terminal and Penn Station with my son due to a fun multi-train/subway/bus sojourn all over the city. And while I am appreciating some of the measures the city/state/MTA are taking to making it nicer around our most important hubs, it still compares to every single Dutch train station.

It made me recall my Rotterdam experience a few years ago. I thought having a hotel room overlooking Rotterdam Central made me extra appreciate the lack of cars and the safety for people on all other modes. I also recently picked out my favorite dozen things in all Dutch cities for a short video which Rotterdam Central also made. So I figured why not revisit my footage to give some proper montage love to my favorite.

StreetFilms Sunday, February 27, 2022
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NYC Mayor Eric Adams Visits 34th Avenue Open Street

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Huge news! Both NYC Mayor Eric Adams and NYC DOT Commissioner visited the NYC Open Street on 34th Avenue in Jackson Heights, Queens as guests of newly-elected councilman Shekar Krishnan (25th District) to tour just how much the street is appreciated by the local community and neighbors.

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