DRTYFN
10-18-2006, 05:39 AM
Our local fishwrapper idiots are at it again. This is a link to an article that was on the front page of our Sunday paper. After reading it you'll probably wonder how this was front page worthy and not buried in the op-ed section. Our Hummer dealership just severed ties with the paper. That's a $40K/mo loss for the lieberal morons.:OWNED: :OWNED:
http://www.oregonlive.com/search/index.ssf?/base/news/1160879117305180.xml?oregonian?lcg&coll=7
Portland cyclists to Hummer: Peddle your bikes elsewhere
The link to the gas-hungry SUV, though in name only, is enough to perturb the purists
Sunday, October 15, 2006
JOSEPH ROSE
Imagine the bumper sticker: "My other Hummer is a bike."
Or the jokes: "What's lollipop yellow, has two wheels and gets 5 mpg (Minutes of Pedaling to Go a foot) in the city?"
And parallel parking? Suddenly it's a cinch in a Hummer.
Actually, when Michael Jones discovered recently that Hummer makes bicycles as well as petrol-gulping hoopties, he was hardly amused.
"It didn't elicit very good feelings," said Jones, a Portland computer programmer and avid cyclist. "Hummer bike: It just might be the ultimate oxymoron."
Well, there's a slogan, but certainly not the one featured in an ad for the brawny all-terrain bike that popped up in Jones' Gmail account. He forwarded the Hummerbike.com link to the Shift List, the Portland bike community's online rendezvous spot, asking, "Does this strike anyone else as odd?"
Of course. It's Portland, where bicycling is a tribal experience, fixed-brake bikes help define local cool and sticking to two wheels is often a political stand, er, ride against the car-centric life. And nothing rallies the faithful like the lane-hogging Hummer SUV.
For some ardent pedalers, slapping the gargantuan vehicle's bold, in-your-face logo on the side of a bicycle and riding it through Portland is akin to driving the General Lee from the "The Dukes of Hazzard" in a Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade.
Responses to Jones' e-mail zoomed onto the Shift List like cyclists onto the Hawthorne Bridge during rush hour. The disdain for anything with the H-word was palpable.
"I've already seen one of these pulling up to a rack at the 7-Corner's New Seasons . . . with its female rider in tow," wrote one cyclist.
But Hummer doesn't even make the six models of bikes, which have chunky frames and come in four colors and two price categories: $750 and $1,000.
All models are manufactured by Massachusetts-based Montague, using a "patented military folding system, developed to allow paratroopers an easy exit from military aircraft with a full-size mountain bike," according to the Web site.
Hardly the excessive, dinosaur-like design many bicyclists envision when they hear the brand name.
And while the Hummer bikes might only now be getting noticed by the Portland bike crowd, they aren't exactly new. Camas-based Hummerbike.net has been in business for three years, co-owner Brian Gonsalves said.
Montague licenses the name, and Gonsalves sells them. "It's like merchandising sports memorabilia," Gonsalves said. "People who own a Hummer might want a bike to go with their car."
The thinking: Hummer owners tend to think of themselves as adventurous, and they might like to haul a matching mountain bike out into the roughlands.
Of course, a call to Vic Alfonso Cadillac-Hummer, which also sells the bikes, revealed that people aren't exactly rushing to accessorize one of the largest and least fuel-efficient vehicles on the road with bicycles. The dealership sells 40 to 50 of the sport utility vehicles a month but only about two or three bikes, a manager said.
A bicyclist responding to Jones' post on the Shift List noted that Jeep also markets bikes, as does Cadillac. But the Hummer has a special place in hell for Portland's bike movement, repeatedly getting bashed in comical skits at bike fairs and pushed around on pro-bike stickers (Yes, Hummer rhymes with dumber).
Not since BMW in the 1980s has a make of vehicle been so exploited and vilified by a movement, said Randy Blazak, a Portland State University sociologist and bicycle commuter. "It was the yuppie car," Blazak said. "It was for the crass, upwardly mobile, fashion-conscious materialist. You knew the neighborhood was gentrifying when the BMW's showed up."
Not surprisingly, then, the Hummer also stirs up some fancy, revolutionary-like rhetoric.
"It's has become a symbol in the fight against the oppression of motor vehicles on our roadways," said Jonathan Maus, who runs the BikePortland.org weblog. "It shows how America's public spaces are dominated by the vehicle and how out of hand things have gotten, that something like the Hummer ever made it into production."
That said, Gonsalves still can't figure out the big fuss over marrying the auto brand with a bicycle. "Why wouldn't people look at it as a positive thing?" he said. "It's a big alternative to (Hummer) vehicles."
Maybe, but it's just not natural, Jones said, no matter how spiffy the engineering. "I think of Hummers being large and bulky and guzzling gas and overkill," he said. "And I think of bikes being small and nimble and not needing gas."
Plus, for a guy whose bike is an integral part of life in the city (he once transported a keg of beer to a party on his Xtracycle sport utility bike), Jones can't fathom why someone would "put their bike in their car and drive 60 miles to ride it."
Of course, the Hummer trimmings don't stop with a bike. Just visit Hummerstuff.com. Hmmm. What's more offensive: a Hummer bike or a $54 bottle of Hummer Limited Edition Eau De Toilette cologne?
You can only imagine what that smells like.
Joseph Rose: 503-221-8029; josephrose@news.oregonian.com
I'm sure Joe would love to be put on all kinds of spam lists and receive lots of phone calls. Aubs, feel free not to participate.
http://www.oregonlive.com/search/index.ssf?/base/news/1160879117305180.xml?oregonian?lcg&coll=7
Portland cyclists to Hummer: Peddle your bikes elsewhere
The link to the gas-hungry SUV, though in name only, is enough to perturb the purists
Sunday, October 15, 2006
JOSEPH ROSE
Imagine the bumper sticker: "My other Hummer is a bike."
Or the jokes: "What's lollipop yellow, has two wheels and gets 5 mpg (Minutes of Pedaling to Go a foot) in the city?"
And parallel parking? Suddenly it's a cinch in a Hummer.
Actually, when Michael Jones discovered recently that Hummer makes bicycles as well as petrol-gulping hoopties, he was hardly amused.
"It didn't elicit very good feelings," said Jones, a Portland computer programmer and avid cyclist. "Hummer bike: It just might be the ultimate oxymoron."
Well, there's a slogan, but certainly not the one featured in an ad for the brawny all-terrain bike that popped up in Jones' Gmail account. He forwarded the Hummerbike.com link to the Shift List, the Portland bike community's online rendezvous spot, asking, "Does this strike anyone else as odd?"
Of course. It's Portland, where bicycling is a tribal experience, fixed-brake bikes help define local cool and sticking to two wheels is often a political stand, er, ride against the car-centric life. And nothing rallies the faithful like the lane-hogging Hummer SUV.
For some ardent pedalers, slapping the gargantuan vehicle's bold, in-your-face logo on the side of a bicycle and riding it through Portland is akin to driving the General Lee from the "The Dukes of Hazzard" in a Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade.
Responses to Jones' e-mail zoomed onto the Shift List like cyclists onto the Hawthorne Bridge during rush hour. The disdain for anything with the H-word was palpable.
"I've already seen one of these pulling up to a rack at the 7-Corner's New Seasons . . . with its female rider in tow," wrote one cyclist.
But Hummer doesn't even make the six models of bikes, which have chunky frames and come in four colors and two price categories: $750 and $1,000.
All models are manufactured by Massachusetts-based Montague, using a "patented military folding system, developed to allow paratroopers an easy exit from military aircraft with a full-size mountain bike," according to the Web site.
Hardly the excessive, dinosaur-like design many bicyclists envision when they hear the brand name.
And while the Hummer bikes might only now be getting noticed by the Portland bike crowd, they aren't exactly new. Camas-based Hummerbike.net has been in business for three years, co-owner Brian Gonsalves said.
Montague licenses the name, and Gonsalves sells them. "It's like merchandising sports memorabilia," Gonsalves said. "People who own a Hummer might want a bike to go with their car."
The thinking: Hummer owners tend to think of themselves as adventurous, and they might like to haul a matching mountain bike out into the roughlands.
Of course, a call to Vic Alfonso Cadillac-Hummer, which also sells the bikes, revealed that people aren't exactly rushing to accessorize one of the largest and least fuel-efficient vehicles on the road with bicycles. The dealership sells 40 to 50 of the sport utility vehicles a month but only about two or three bikes, a manager said.
A bicyclist responding to Jones' post on the Shift List noted that Jeep also markets bikes, as does Cadillac. But the Hummer has a special place in hell for Portland's bike movement, repeatedly getting bashed in comical skits at bike fairs and pushed around on pro-bike stickers (Yes, Hummer rhymes with dumber).
Not since BMW in the 1980s has a make of vehicle been so exploited and vilified by a movement, said Randy Blazak, a Portland State University sociologist and bicycle commuter. "It was the yuppie car," Blazak said. "It was for the crass, upwardly mobile, fashion-conscious materialist. You knew the neighborhood was gentrifying when the BMW's showed up."
Not surprisingly, then, the Hummer also stirs up some fancy, revolutionary-like rhetoric.
"It's has become a symbol in the fight against the oppression of motor vehicles on our roadways," said Jonathan Maus, who runs the BikePortland.org weblog. "It shows how America's public spaces are dominated by the vehicle and how out of hand things have gotten, that something like the Hummer ever made it into production."
That said, Gonsalves still can't figure out the big fuss over marrying the auto brand with a bicycle. "Why wouldn't people look at it as a positive thing?" he said. "It's a big alternative to (Hummer) vehicles."
Maybe, but it's just not natural, Jones said, no matter how spiffy the engineering. "I think of Hummers being large and bulky and guzzling gas and overkill," he said. "And I think of bikes being small and nimble and not needing gas."
Plus, for a guy whose bike is an integral part of life in the city (he once transported a keg of beer to a party on his Xtracycle sport utility bike), Jones can't fathom why someone would "put their bike in their car and drive 60 miles to ride it."
Of course, the Hummer trimmings don't stop with a bike. Just visit Hummerstuff.com. Hmmm. What's more offensive: a Hummer bike or a $54 bottle of Hummer Limited Edition Eau De Toilette cologne?
You can only imagine what that smells like.
Joseph Rose: 503-221-8029; josephrose@news.oregonian.com
I'm sure Joe would love to be put on all kinds of spam lists and receive lots of phone calls. Aubs, feel free not to participate.