social.tulsa.ok.us is one of the many independent Mastodon servers you can use to participate in the fediverse.
Green Country's regional fediverse instance.

Server stats:

14
active users

Baloo Uriza

Thinking about livability... was about to say something about getting around but, then it kinda hit me that... it fucking sucks to get around Portland. Portland's crippled by terrain and sprawl (though the infill is helping), Tulsa's relatively compact by comparison so it gains on walkability a lot just on scale and lack of inconvenient cliffs.

Portland has some flats, so Portland gets a lot of points for this. Especially the bridges. Arkansas River isn't even navigable so the weirdly high bridges to cross it any closer than 96th street is amazing (and that's including the new Zink Bridge). I know Portland cyclists like to brag about how bad the wind gets on the Willamette River bridges there, but...next level on the Arkansas River bridges, plus all of 'em have a climb.

All bike rides in Tulsa more than a few blocks are uphill, both ways. There's no avoiding it. You will climb. It will be hot. You want electric pedal assist on your city bike. You'll be lucky to find an empty bike rack on the bus during the hot season (no, I don't get why cycling is more popular when it's deadly hot here either).

Meanwhile in Portland, a big reason why cycling traffic gets really heavy in the parts of town that it does, it's because that route's flat. That's the main ingredient, and the secret sauce when you're riding acoustic. Also why riding in Washington County sucks because it's nothing but narrow painted bicycle gutters or well kept and wide FREEWAY shoulders as your two most likely connections between any two points. Probably why I've had tinnitus my entire adult life, riding in that noise.

Also definitely why I've been hit by a car the most number of times in Washington County, because Washington County is also Not Flat, just flatter than Tulsa tends to be. On the other paw, in Tulsa, the climb ends, and I can't think of any places in the city where you'll be climbing for more than 5 blocks. Not so in Portland, US 26 from Goose Hollow to the top of Sylvan takes most in-shape bicycle commuters about 45 minutes in cool weather, and over an hour in all other situations...

TLDR Tulsa, steeper and shorter than Portland. Portland, shallower, except to get over the west hills, then it's Tulsa steep but also won't stop going up.

One thing I'm learning with ebike range is at least on something that tops out at 25 km/h under its own power and I can't get the cadence high enough to hold that past about 18-22 without spinning out of the gear anyway is that if you do most of the work getting going, it'll take it from there just fine. And it does not care about hills if you try to help it. I start pedaling when I know it's going slow enough for me to actually keep up and I'll help it to a comfortable speed.

If you use it purely twist throttle, like I did the first couple trips to get used to it, I learned...don't.

It throws off the body language other road users are expecting and with the number of full stops I have to make to do it, I could easily run flat a whole battery from full just going to the BOK Center and back just from the accelerations from stops.

But getting it started and goosing the throttle if the controller isn't putting in the expected effort? That's the trick.

Otherwise just ignore the the throttle. It's just there to lift you off the top end of what you can pedal before you spin out and hit the "maintain" button on, and to take the (possibly quite literal) heart attack out of having to expedite a permitted but unprotected move across a stroad (say, coming off a stop sign, or to make a left on a flashing yellow arrow after making it to the middle of a stroad to make that turn in the first place). And to make the stroad blocks less painful.

But those stroad blocks is where I really wish I could get that bitch up to 40-50 km/h under its own power if only as like an "emergency thrust" situation...because that would get enough momentum to go several blocks. Like use case would be crossing under I 44 at Harvard Ave or Yale Ave. Normal speeds are honestly ample most of the time on both of those crossings...up to the first light. Then it's off to the races with a full on sprint for at least a few blocks on either side.

Even if that feature had effectively a once-every-10 or 20 km cooldown rate, then that would still open up a lot of options.

Or we could make better infrastructure for crossing the fucking car moat, since we're apparently stuck with those for another 3 decades...

As it is though, mostly my bike does NOT care if there's a hill or not. And if Strava's guesses are to be believed compared to my old Electra Amsterdam (acoustic city bike with an entry level IGH that was, hands down, flat out ruined me on external gear bikes, it's *that* much better than a derailleur), then my ride speed hasn't really changed at all, however, I can also ride all the way across town over steep hills, in this weather, and STILL look like I was just sitting at a bus stop.

All while only really helping the motor get the bike back up to speed after a dead stop or after having to slow down for something, or it gets really steep. The Tulsa North-South bike route over by work takes some of the steepest streets in town, bike's like "Cool, help me out and I'll give you the same range as if we were on flat ground, capisce?"

You're still putting in the effort, but like a bicycle commuter in 1990s Washington County, it's basically just riding intervals anyway and anytime you're going to be going a long distance without stopping, it's 1) going to suck if the weather is hot or wet, 2) not have any weather protection or shade, and 3) basically make being able to press a button and hold that speed effectively forever makes the difference of whether that's a bike or a car trip.

From my office to my home now? Yeah, could do it on an acoustic bike. From home to the office? Yeah, but not realistically without taking a shower at work. And there's still plenty of the route where you're pedaling out until the motor decides you're ready to be lifted fully off the pedals, so, again, still a workout. But I can also goose the throttle for an immediate boost in how much pedal assist if I need to go cat 6 on something.

Which, yeah, that "doesn't care" applies to goosing it at lights, too, I've seemingly mastered that move for the longer crossings to get up to speed quickly. Just pedal until you run it out as you're twisting it, and press the button

Kinda wonder how much power it's putting down at the pavement...

Kind of amazing, like, even just the pretty tame pedal assist a little Costco folding ebike has, can make the difference between being able to commute crosstown without dying. Especially for a guy like me who has never been in "let's go ride a Fondo in a day" shape. It takes "an exhausting crosstown hellride" without the assist and turns it into "wow, it'd be a perfect ride if it weren't so fucking hot out". Commute like I was in middle school again.

Guess I didn't realize that the part I really hated about cycling is having to push 110% on every start because traffic and really steep hills. I doubt that thing would make it home if I tried to go solely on the throttle all the way just from all the climbs being so steep.

I only get it down to about half a battery riding it like that, effectively only doing intervals off stop signs and maintaining speed. But it takes an hour to do it.

Only because that's where the only through roads are that are flat enough to take.