Big Finish

What a gratifying close to Budapest's nine-year run of Critical Mass rides! Saturday's was announced as the last Critical Mass, and everyone was urged to come out and give it a grand finale. The goal was to make it the biggest one ever. I have to admit I was skeptical, knowing that participation had dropped off by half since the record setting ride of 2008. I was proven wrong. The sea of people at the closing bike lift behind Petöfi Csarnok was bigger than any I'd ever seen it. Cyclists took up the entire meadow behind the csarnok, and the spillover on the other side of  Zichy Milhály út may have been as big as the crowd in the meadow.

As always, it's impossible to get a convincing head count. But organiser Gábor Kürti told the kerékagy blog that if the spring 2008 record had been 80,000, the turnout Saturday was surely 100,000. He confessed, though, that he didn't witness the closing bike lifts because he'd broken down in tears. Reading that Kuku cried made me cry. What a great story!

My own ride got started about half an hour behind schedule, because our girl, Sequoia decided to go down for her afternoon nap right before the scheduled start at 3:55 p.m. I put on her shoes as she laid there snoozing, and she was still half dozing as I carried her down to my bike in the courtyard.

Start of Critical Mass, Kristin, me and Sequoia and Gabor's daughter Anna in background with head framed by bike sign.

Luckily, the starting point was just right across Margit híd from us, so when we arrived on the Pest side at half past 4, the procession was still just starting. I met up with Critical Mass activist Gábor Bihari and his daughter Anna just south of the bridge on the bike path. We sat there chatting for another half hour as the very long queue of cyclists on the quay crawled down toward Parliament and then just got stuck for awhile due to some downstream obstruction.

We were still sitting there when my wife, Kristin, joined us after dropping our boy off at a friend's. We couldn't even get down to the quay from the bike path because escorts blocked our way. If they'd let people cut in, the procession would never have moved. I guess it was past 5 when the whole procession had advanced far enough, and we were able to join it on the tail end. We hooked up with friend Steve Graning and his two girls, Sara and Melina (the latter on a scooter cause her bike had been polished up for resale).

We were at the very end of a kilometres-long line and being shepherded by green-shirted escorts on bikes, an ambulance (sweeping up the hundreds of dead and injured --  just kidding!!) and some crabby cops in a squad car. The cops yelled at us to move it along, apparently anxious to reopen the roads to motor traffic as quickly as possible.

We ran into a friend Péter Dalos, who was on a two-wheeled cargo bike with two children, a huge bag full of laundry, and the kids' two little bikes. I'd seen him with the same enormous load just three days earlier and I was too embarrassed to ask him if he'd been evicted from his home. I'm sure there's another explanation -- the whole family seemed very enthused and were wearing clean clothes.

Sequoia needed a pancake break on the final stretch down Andrássy út.

Of course, every bar that we passed had a crowd of cyclists loitering outside with tins of beer in their hands. Cycling while intoxicated is illegal, but this rule is openly flouted by thousands of participants at Critical Mass. I guess the idea is, if enough people drink, it's just impossible to enforce. A prime example of civil disobedience as a force for good! I kept asking Kristin if we could stop and join the fun and she kept on resisting, saying I shouldn't drink and ride with our daughter on board (she had me in a corner there). Then we passed by a wine bar (the Bor Tarsaság near the Buda side of the Chain Bridge) and then the shoe was on the other foot!

By the time we got across the Chain Bridge, the weather was turning and it looked like the predicted rains would soak us afterall. But the blackening skies and gusts of wind were all bark and no bite. I felt a couple drops of rain, or imagined I did, but it turned out to be one of those classic Earth Day Critical Masses whose huge turnouts had the blessing of Mother Nature.

It was pretty loud at the closing bike lift.

Sequoia was a real trooper, too. Didn't pout once and was generally amused by the whole thing. At the end, a nice young man who'd picked up a blue Cyclists Club balloon gave it to Sequoia, and that kept her happy all the way home.

These guys used a bus stop as a band shell and gave us a serenade as we were leaving City Park following the bike lift.

After the event, scrambling for the exits.

One More for the Road

So this Saturday, April 20, will be the last Budapest Critical Mass. That's what they say, anyway, and although I'm skeptical, I was very relieved to have gotten my hands on the sticker (slogan: "Critical Mass Forever") and I will definitely NOT make other plans for the weekend.

According to the spring CM tradition, the event will happen on Earth Day, and the route will be closed to motor traffic and everyone is encouraged to come out, children included.

It'll start at 3:55 p.m. on the Pest riverside road just north of Margit hid (Carl Lutz rakpart). This is the same place it started in spring of 2012 (above video) -- the road will be closed to motor traffic and it's wide enough to accommodate a huge crowd for the opening bike lift.

The route (details here) will go across the Chain Bridge and through the tunnel to the Taban, and will eventually return to Pest and end up at City Park for the closing bike lift -- at about 6:30 p.m.

From 7:30 p.m. til 4 a.m., an after party will take place at the Akvárium Klub (former Gödör) at Erzsébet tér. As in past years, the party will follow a bike-fashion theme and is co-organised by the Hungarian Cycle Chic blog. But now it seems they've got a bunch of sponsors (e.g. InStyle magazine and H&M clothing) and added features include a big musical lineup. Cover is HUF 1,000.

CM organisers Kuku and Sinya (co-owners of Hajtas Pajtas bike couriers) announced last year that this would be the last CM. They explained that, now that everyday cycling is established in Budapest, CM has served its purpose. Although modal share needs to keep growing, the two activists are convinced that CM is no longer the right tool for the job, that the bike community has to redirect its energies and resources toward professional lobbying. Kuku and Sinya are involved with the Hungarian Cyclists Club, and they have made repeated appeals for cyclists to support the organisation with donations and volunteer help.

The decision to call it a day was met by emotional protest from the green shirts who have helped promote and carry out CM for the past nine years. However, I still haven't heard of any concrete plans by anyone to take up the CM mantle and carry on the tradition. It's hard to believe that an event this popular will just die in its tracks. But in any case, I don't want to miss it.

Critical Mass Saturday 3 p.m.!

In case anyone hasn't heard, the annual Critical Mass Earth Day ride begins tomorrow at 3 p.m. I would have posted on it earlier, but I was stuck in volcanic limbo all last week. It kind-of snuck up on me -- along with a hundred other things.

Everything you need to know about it is posted in English here. Thanks to Gábor Bihari for making this info available to the Magyar challenged.

The theme of this year's ride, in keeping with the ongoing Parliamentary elections, is to Vote for Cycling. Just by showing up, you're casting a vote. The huge crowds that participate in the twice-annual ride -- on Earth Day in spring and European Car Free Day in fall -- are largely responsible for kick-starting the whole cycling scene in Budapest. Since the first major ride in 2004, there've been several positive developments that likely wouldn't have happened otherwise, such as:

• the approval of a new Budapest Cycling Concept by City Hall;
• the city's application for a new bike-sharing system (like Paris's Velib) that's due to open in spring 2011;
• new lanes and paths on such streets as Bajcsy-Zsilinszky út, Alkotmány utca, Thököly út and the kiskörút;
• installation of hundreds of public bike racks throughout the city; and
  
• the contracting of the Hungarian Cyclists Club as a professional advisory body to the Mayor's Office.

The most important step forward, though, has been a huge growth in numbers of everyday cyclists. The city has not implemented a systematic means of tracking the growth, but a handful of one-off spot counts during the last five years indicate that cycling levels have been grown 5-20 percentage points on several major downtown streets.

All this is to say that participation in Critical Mass helps demonstrate the popular demand for cycling facilities in Budapest. By coming out, you really can make a difference.

This year's ride will be opened by the Dutch ambassador to Hungary, Robert Milders. Today (Friday), he was on hand at Liszt Ferenc tér to annouce a Dutch donation of new bike racks at the corner by the Music Academy.

Critical Mass Downshifts

This spring's Critical Mass was a family affair, as you can see here: Kristin holding up Lance (buckled into the seat on the back of my bike) mid-way through the procession, with bikers coming off the Chain Bridge into Roosevelt tér.

As you can see from the photo, there weren't as many cyclists as usual. Both Népszabadság and kerekagy.blog.hu estimated 30,000 participants, less than half of last year's figure of 80,000.

I was struck by how sparse the crowd was compared to previous years, when you would spend 80 percent of the time walking your bike because the crowd was so thick and moving so slowly. This year, by contrast, we peddled all the way through it at a slow, comfortable pace, stopping only for the occasional crossing guard. We finished in record time, and had about an hour to kill at City Park waiting for the customary bike lift.

There could be a few reasons for the smaller turnout. The weather was nice, but it was threatening to rain all day, so that may have scared off some people. And let's face it, Critical Mass isn't going to last forever. Although many participants will come out time after time to make a political statement, others are there mainly for the fun of it. For them, the Critical Mass closing party at City Park doesn't offer much aside from some recorded music and a few beer and pretzel vendors. With professional organisation, it could become a major festival. To date, however, it's been put together by a loose coalition of volunteer helpers, and it probably won't grow without stronger direction.

Having said that, I don't think the decline of Critical Mass is necessarily lamentable. The ultimate goal is for Budapest to become a bike-friendly city where cyclists can get from any origin to any destination safely and comfortably. As long as the city makes serious strides in this direction, I don't care about Critical Mass. For me, it's a means, not an end.

Critical Mass cometh

View Larger Map
Budapest's twice-annual demonstration/celebration for bicycling happens once again this Sunday (April 19), starting at 3 p.m. from the park in Tabán. To ensure a good-sized crowd by starting time, organisers encourage participants to make a day of it by bringing food and drink to the park for a picnic starting around 1 p.m. Officially, alcohol is discouraged, as boozing before biking is illegal. Probably one beer won't hurt -- but you didn't read that here!

The procession will go down Krisztina krt, across Erzsebet bridge, do a quick loop in Pest and come back across the river, back up the Tabán on Attila út, then through the Chain bridge tunnel and across the river again ... Nevermind: you can see the full route directions here. Click the first subhead: Mikor lesz a felvonulás? És hol? És mettől meddig tart majd?

As has been the custom for Earth Day Critical Masses, the event culminates with a bike lifting at City Park 2.5 hours after the starting time at 5:30 p.m.

This event won't be the in-your-face, politically-serious, rush-hour type ride as organised last fall during European Car Free Day. Instead, it will be a light-hearted, celebratory ride in which everyone is encouraged to turn out, including children. In fact, parents with prams are invited to take part in the first-annual "babakocsi" Critical Mass, which will start from Kodaly körönd at 3:30 p.m., and then proceed straight down Andrássy to join the cyclists at City Park.

It'll be interesting to see if participation in this year's Earth Day Critical Mass can beat last year's, which organisers claimed set a likely World record at 80,000. A lot will depend on the weather, which looked partly cloudy, partly sunny, but with rain on the day before and the day after. Cross your fingers.