word. thanks for the beta son. i only have 7 miles to go, cant be too bad...

Just got off the greenway..

There are a couple of inches of snow and what seems to be a 5-6' path that
was cut by a plow some time ago. This is really the only portion that is ridable at
the current moment, the rest being too thick for most bikes (pugsley excluded).

It made things a little difficult with oncoming bikers, there wasn't what I would have liked for clearance between myself and anyone coming the opposite direction. I had my new 106 Nokian on the front and that did a good job of guiding through the snow, the rear slick made the bike fishtail a little. I don't know how things would be with both slicks, I wouldn't recommend it.

The plowing ended at the 28th. From Sabo until 30th where I turned off it was fresh snow with ruts from those who came before me.

Most of the roads are precarious, I even took a little spill 1/2 block from my house, nothing major just the bike slipping out from under me.

I started commuting at 5:20 and it took me maybe 5-10 minutes longer than normal (20 min).

Well, I made it home in 70 minutes versus 45 minutes this morning. I took the LRT to Hutchinson, to the CLP. There was maybe 3-5 inches of snow to plow through. I crossed paths with someone by the Depot and get to use some of his tracks, although they were filling in as I rode. I hope he was able to use heading E to 11th. This was an awesome ride and I was running 28C Contacts, which did fine tearing through the slop, snow, and slush with no problems. The only issues was hitting someone elses ruts and sliding around when it broke.

Hah! Me too! Although I was on a sidewalk at Lake, and some asshole with his fucking window down started laughing. At least I have the chutzpa to bike out there.

I found most of the trail after crossing Hiawatha was pretty decent, although yeah, not much room. Luckily no one was heading towards me. One guy passed me and I passed another one and a couple walking.

The offramp was the worst part. Just couldn't get around that turn to keep going up, so I walked up to the sidewalk.

Where to ride on days like today:

Take the lane? Ride in the only clearing on the road along with traffic.

Ride over in the crap along the side of the road?

Me, I had a variety of different conditions on the way home with the best being virgin snow on the pathway between Glenwood and Plymouth Ave through Theo Wirth. Looks like someone with Pugsley was riding the trails?

2 hours to go 15 miles from 394 & Highway 100 to Roseville. Glad I was on a bike... at least I was moving... Albeit at times not very fast.

I'm pissed at MnDOT. The trail crossing Mendota sucked even worse today. During my afternoon commute, it now was covered by:

* rutted, somewhat hardened (and well-rutted) 1" left from original snowblowing
* 1" light, freshly fallen snow
* scattered golfball to baseball-sized chunks of icy hardpack blown over the jersey barrier by a plow
* about another 1" of freshly fallen snow

I was on the Pusley today, and I still couldn't ride through or over this crap. I ended up walking (and pushing the bike) all the way from the eastern side of the bridge to the intersection with the plowed Fort Snelling sidewalk. Exactly 1 mile, according to the GMP. Stupid MnDOT!

Fortunately, I was making good time and floating over pretty much everything else on my commute. The Pugsley glides through an inch or two of fresh snow like a dream, as long as there is some kind of solid surface beneath it.

I just sent a note to the Mayor, to ask
that the bike trails be plowed, and soon,
before they turn to ice.

Here is his e-mail: rt@minneapolis.org

Please contact RT and let him know how
much you commute in the winter, and
how difficult it is to get to work on time/
safely with the current state of the Greenway/LRT/etc.
He is usually really responsive.

On the news this morning they had a story about improvements to the snow plows. Apparently they've added GPS and sensors to track how much salt has been released. The thought is that this will keep them from over or under salting, and make them more efficient at plowing, since the controllers back at the station won't accidentally send plows to already plowed streets.

Seems like it would be a pretty good idea. I guess the plan is to actually have this information available online for the public, too. That's a couple years away, but it would be pretty sweet to be able to open up a map, take a look at your commute and see if it's plowed or if you need to take an alternate route...

Done, regarding the diagonal trail.

The Greenway/SW trail was dicey today. I got on at Anne Sullivan, thinking "sweet, looks like it's plowed." Just east of Hiawatha: not plowed. So I took Lake Street up to 5th (good surface, light traffic BTW), and found the Greenway plowed again, which it was all the way through the rest of Minneapolis. Not great, but rideable.

St. Louis Park east of Beltline: no plow. So I took Excelsior up to the Depot, still no plow. So I poked along on the service road (Washington/3rd?) and the Honda dealership parking lot until I found the trail plowed again. A little late for work, but like I really care with 2 more days to go out here in the land with no "there" there.

Hope St. Louis Park and Mpls. get around to plowing the rest of the trail today...

I found Kenilworth, MT/SW LRT nice all the to Blake, where it seems that Hopkins takes over and they decided it was not worth plowing. I plowed through and expected the rest the SW trail to be the same, but it was plowed very nicely starting at the depot. I also found the sidewalk/path the runs along 394 at Penn ave unplowed and I had to walk until Kenwood pkwy, so RT will be getting an email about that! I mean we are the 2nd best commuting city, right?

Yes, it was Blake where the plow stopped, not Beltline. Also, I guy I work with tells me the greenway was plowed after the Sabo Bridge, just not to the Hiawatha grade crosswalk.

Man, the greenway SW trail was a breeze today compared to last nite. no good at all. i only passed two other bikers last nite, one dude was haulin a trailer. rode in a pugsleys tracks as much as i could... but its no fun when you pop out of if and monkey all over the place. man, i almost should have taken you up on that ride ted. then again.. if some guy with a trailer can bike it...

Hah! About half way home in the car (1 hour and counting) I kinda wished I had ridden my bike. I probably would have got home at around the same time. But then there was the shoveling to do, and I would have been all in after plowing through that mess with my bike.

I thought I saw endomorph tracks this morning! Yeah, the bridge sucked ass today. I hopped the barrier and rode on the shoulder of 55 because I couldn't make any progress. The shoulder on 13 sucked ass too. And on Sibley Memorial. As a matter of fact, the whole commute pretty much sucked ass until I said f-it and got on the LRT at Ft Snelling.