Additional to yesterday’s publish, a reader requested a superb query:

No, it’s not due to the Mets–although no one’s extra smug than Mets followers now that they’re lastly having their second, and naturally in case you’re each a Mets fan and a bicycle advocate you could have actually attained one thing near Peak Smugness:

No, the important thing to understanding why folks wish to stay right here is figuring out that New York is the clipless pedal of cities:

You understand how cyclists who use clipless pedals assume it’s the one technique to cycle “significantly,” and even really feel particular as a result of they use them? That’s how New York works too. It attracts individuals who assume the remainder of the nation is filled with rubes and assume they’re morally and intellectually superior as a result of they stay in an costly place filled with crowds and guidelines.
And you know the way in case you’ve been a type of folks for years and then you definitely spend a little bit time on flat pedals you begin to notice they’re really fairly liberating and after awhile you don’t even miss clipless pedals in any respect? That’s what occurs whenever you spend a little bit time away from New York and also you notice folks aren’t rubes in any respect, they only don’t derive a way of ethical and mental superiority from residing lives of inconvenience. The truth is perhaps it’s you who’s been going about all of it fallacious all this time.

Then there are a few of us who commute between clipless and flat pedals similar to there are a few of us who stay on the very fringe of the town so we solely must be clipped in/inconvenienced after we really feel prefer it. (I occur to fall into each classes.) We prefer to assume we’re open-minded, however we’re actually simply insecure, fickle and wishy-washy.
As for individuals who experience flat pedals however nonetheless put on particular sneakers and dork out simply as a lot as individuals who experience clipless pedals, that’s a complete different class:

[Uh, what science? With one your shoe is attached to the pedal and with the other it isn’t. It’s not complicated.]
They might assume they’re liberated however they’re simply as uptight and gear-obsessed and unbearable as their clipped-in counterparts, perhaps much more so. I’m unsure what metropolis that will be, however I’m leaning in direction of San Francisco.
But when we’re being actually trustworthy right here, the true purpose anyone desires to stay in New York is for the pussy:

Sorry.
Truly this isn’t the town, that is Elmsford, and I experience by this cat commonly:

I don’t know the present standing of the bike store, which has been “coming quickly” for a pair years now. It does seem to be an excellent location, being located proper subsequent to the South County Trailway. I’m not fairly curious sufficient to name the quantity, however I did ask the cat, who was aloof and disdainful, like a motorbike store worker whenever you ask them to put in flat pedals and a consolation saddle in your brand-new Pinarello Dogma.
Possibly it was simply the Shimano 105:

I’m unsure what metropolis Shimano 105 can be, although it must be someplace eminently livable and inexpensive regardless of (or maybe due to) the dearth of cachet. It’s on a Milwaukee, so may that be it? All I do know is it undoubtedly wouldn’t be New York.