Megabus is giving away 100,000 free tickets for routes in the Midwest and Northeast, the company announced. Just go to the bus company’s website and use the promocode “greenbus” for travel dates between Jan. 14 and March 18.
I have taken Megabus once between Cincinnati and Chicago and I have to say, it was really a pleasant bus trip. It might beat waiting at the airport come this holiday season.
Dinesh Sabu used to be a bike messenger in Chicago.
Dinesh spent one summer as a bike messenger in Chicago.
Below he talks about his experience overcoming his fear of traffic and the tough life of delivering packages by bike.
What made you decide to become a bike messenger?
I graduated. I needed a job. I thought, why not be a bike messenger? It was the least intellectual thing I could think of after the University of Chicago. I started it and I quickly grew to hate it. I was a messenger for six weeks. July to August, the hottest time of the year.
What was it like in the beginning?
It was fun kind of learning the ropes. Riding in traffic was never something I was really comfortable with until I was forced to. Imagine having the feeling like you’re jaywalking for eight hours a day, especially as a messenger on a bike downtown. You always feel that you’re breaking the law or a car is coming. A tiny anxiety. At the very worst there have been near misses with cars, but after long enough I think the most successful messengers are the ones who are really crazy. Maybe not so much reckless, but able to conquer their fear. They can ride the wrong way down Dearborn and are able to do these kind of feats unfazed and emerge safely.
What was your typical day like?
Ideally, I’d like to be downtown by 7, 7:30 a.m. So I’m downtown, I pick up my pager and cell phone. You identify yourself by your number. ‘This is 135, I’m clean at the relay’ [the office downtown], which is my location. Then they tried to give you work. They give it to you once verbally, the address, or name of the building, and page it to you. You bike there, pick it up. They don’t let messengers go through the front door. You have to go to the loading dock, for whatever reason. It really pissed me off that I wasn’t welcome through the front door. You go through the back, pick up the package. Typically they’re paying anywhere from five to 10 dollars to deliver it, and as a messenger you get half of that. So it was pretty much ground picking up, calling in, hopefully they’ll give you more work. If they’re really clever they’ll give you work that’s close by so you can devise a route.
Did you ever have any accidents?
I never actually got hit by a car. The worst was those grated bridges downtown. When you’re going over these bridges, if you hit it at just the right speed, it would throw you off. The scariest was when I hit one of those bridges, there was traffic on the street and it threw me off. I was lying in the middle of traffic. That was really scary. Fortunately, the cars were able to stop and I was able to get back on. The cliché was that taxi drivers really hated messengers. I never really got much hate from them. One time I was trying to make a left turn and this guy wouldn’t let me. After I turned, he sped up and said something really threatening to me. Occasionally you get cut off by a bus. It’s not just an ego thing, the faster you ride, the more you make. Time is money.
Why do people use a bike messenger instead of other delivery services?
It’s a matter of urgency. FedEx would pick it up and it would go to a sorting plant and get there the next day whereas with a bike you’d get it that day. Some packages they’d want it in one day, a few hours, even an hour. It would work if you have legal documents that can’t be emailed or faxed. I would be picking up tapes from one video house and dropping it off at post-production.
What did you learn from your job?
You really get a good feel for downtown. It used to be I had every single street and alley memorized. I had the Chicago grid system down pretty well. I learned how to handle myself in traffic. How not to fear cars, how to weave in and out of cars. Running red lights became par of course. Skill wise, I was able to briefly to do a track stand. You balance yourself on two wheels while completely stopped. It comes from track racing. The most talented messengers were essentially able to play frogger with traffic by doing trackstanding. You were able to efficiently run a red light without wasting energy. I hadn’t gotten to the point where I was creeping through red lights. I got really really good at cycling. I would time myself on biking the path from Balbo to 55th Street. I think my best time was something like 14 min. for about 6 miles.
What would you tell others who are interested in the job?
I think everybody could develop the aptitude. You have to love biking a hell of a lot. Knowing how to fix your own bike is really important. I knew messengers who didn’t know much about bikes. There were times the chain would break. One time in the rain my crank fell off. Being able to put that on definitely helps. You would have to really love biking, be in great shape, and not mind not using your brain, like critical faculty. In the end, it’s a service profession. When I filled out the application, it didn’t ask for education. It’s very menial labor.
Be considerate of other riders so we can all have a more enjoyable ride.
There are some common etiquette rules that I’d like to clear up for CTA riders (for my sake and everyone else’s). If I sound annoyed, it’s because stuff like this happens all the time.
Ah, if only everyone followed these rules. Think of how much better it would be!
If you are not an I-Go member and would like to sign up, consider going to their membership drive event on Tues. Oct. 28, 5-7pm at 6301 N. Sheridan Rd. in Edgewater. The normal rate is $25 for the application fee, then $50 for the first year, but with the discount it is only $25 to sign up for the first year. If you are a student in Chicago, it is likely you can already get this discount at any time by using the special code for your school when signing up.
I-Go is a nonprofit that has cars available across the city available by the half hour. They have different rate plans you can sign up for depending on how much you think you’ll use the cars. I am on the Budget plan, which costs $15 a month and includes three hours and 150 miles per day. It’s great for taking two grocery trips during the month or doing Target runs. You don’t pay gas or insurance for I-Go.
I have generally had a good experience with the program. Some things to keep in mind are:
Enjoy!
The CTA is planning on raising the cost of 30-day passes to $90 and rail/bus rides by a quarter.
I have heard rumors about CTA wanting to get rid of 25 cent transfers, but after checking out their proposed 2009 fares I am relieved to see that this rumor is untrue.
However, there are going to be some changes made that will make traveling by bus or train more expensive. The CTA is planning on getting rid of the 10 percent bonus from Chicago Cards, raising bus rides to $2.00, rail rides to $2.25 and 30-day passes to $90 from a current rate of $75. Transfers will remain at 25 cents. And for those of us who are living off student loans, there will be a 20 percent increase in U-Pass costs. The U-Pass cost increase won’t be happening until fall of 2009 (so if all goes well, I will be long out of school by then). New York’s MTA costs $82 for a 30-day pass and $2 for base fare.
The public can respond to the 2009 budget proposal at a public hearing on Wed. Oct. 29, 6 p.m., at CTA Headquarters, 567 W. Lake Street.
During my break from school, I had the fortunate opportunity to go to Fort Collins, Colorado and take a tour of New Belgium Brewery. If you are familiar with Fat Tire Ale, you know the label has a red cruiser on it.
Employees of New Belgium Brewing receive a bike after working there for a year.
I found out on the tour that employees of the company can actually own one of these bikes after working there for a year.
The company promotes bike riding almost as much as its beer, hosting an annual traveling bike festival across the country called Tour de Fat and running a campaign called Team Wonderbike to get people to bike more and drive less. Unfortunately, I just missed their latest event in Chicago, but I will keep my eyes open for any other happenings in the area.
I was surprised to see a photo of a six-pack of Fat Tire in the Wall Street Journal on Monday. The article, called “Six Products, Six Carbon Footprints” by Jeffrey Ball, takes a look into how much carbon is released in the air when different products are produced. For the Fat Tire beer, only seven pounds of carbon are released, thanks to the company’s commitment to reducing waste. While you might think that transportation is the main source of carbon output, it actually is the energy needed to refrigerate the beer. But I’m sure the biking helps.
Know of any other businesses that support biking?
SansCar 