Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Berlin Polizei VS. Brakeless Fixies



This news just in from Berlin (and from Straightchain, danke)


"For the first time the police will have an eye on a special kind of bicycle. They are called "Fixies" or "Singlespeed-Bikes". These minimalist trend-bikes, e.g. ridden by bike-messengers and members of a growing fan-scene are being used more and more in city-traffic. The bicycles, for the purpose of saving weight and conveying a very special "Kick" during fast riding, do not have proper security-measurements, i.e. they lack any sort of brake. Only foresighted riding, and enormous capacity of reaction ought to hinder accidents. The use of such vehicles, which were originally designed to be used for track-bike sports, in road traffic is profoundly dangerous and inevitably bound to health- and live-threatening situations for other road-users as well as the rider. In consequence, police will not only file a complaint against the riders of such fixies, but make insistently clear, that the bicycles will be seized after reoccurring identification."


Uuh, I'm scared now, because I will be in Berlin, on my brakeless fixie, in the end of May. 

Don't actually know if the Berlin 5-0 rides a Segway, though...

10 comments:

  1. I wonder if the segway's can even keep up with a bike.

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  2. Not a chance. Love highly misinforming and ignorant articles like this.

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  3. hello,
    they will be looking for those "trendbikes" from april 1st to 13th, but i guess afterwards every cop in berlin knows what a trackbike is!? i think they already know anyway... i rememember they tried to control nyc back in 2000 too, but they gave up. no segways, but motorcycles...

    today a friend of ours got busted while working as a messenger. when he came downstairs from his drop, they waited for him and confiscated his bike...let's see how the whole berlin fixed gear story goes!?

    ridesafe, see you in may!

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  4. please be VERY aware of the police, i got busted last week (3rd april) at chauseestrasse. my poor bike is somewhere at a police-station in wedding in a cellar ;(((

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  5. Yeah, my mate Klaus got nicked last week. He's got his bike back (which now has a shiny new front brake) and he's waiting for the ticket to arrive from the luvely Berlin Police (They are the best! They manage to recover 1% of all the stolen bikes here!!! Great! that's why they have so much spare time to waste chasing hipsters around).
    Anyway, it's been road bike for me the whole month so far. Police evryyyywhere!!! Watch out!

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  6. got my fixie back, which was really in a cellar in wedding. police sucks but i won´t ever put any brakes on it!

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  7. Hi, good to know you're rolling on the streets again. Now you just need to be faster, I guess? ;)

    Jussi

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  8. Not a chance. Love highly misinforming and ignorant articles like this.

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