Andrew Dubber

This is Rusty. He’s my current preferred mode of transportation. Or at least he would be, if he had one more component: a bicycle chain.

He did have one when I bought him. He cost me £15 at the city markets. Worth every penny too. I’d had nothing but trouble with that other bike I bought from Sports Direct, who had to be threatened with a lawsuit from Trading Standards before they would give me my money back on a product they had sold me that was faulty from the outset.

Normally, you expect when you buy a bike that the cogs on the back wheel that the chain uses to push the thing along would be in some way attached to the bicycle, rather than spin freely on their own, whilst moving from side to side in a wobbly and disinterested manner.

So after a week of arguments, phone calls, and dejected walks home pushing a bike that while looking brand new, was completely and utterly useless for the purpose it was purchased, I finally got my way and they decided that their illegal store policy (to refer annoyed customers to their supplier) was in this case more trouble than it was worth.

They’ve sent the bike back to head office just “to check it really is faulty” and then they’ll happily refund my money. In time.

So yeah – I picked up Rusty down at the markets, and he’s been delightful. I’ve ridden him the 8 or 9 miles to my work in Perry Barr and back. Braved the Stratford Road in rush hour (yes, of course I wear a helmet – do you think I’m stupid?) and took the A4540 Ring Road around Digbeth through to Aston.

Yesterday, I thought I’d try taking the canal routes home. I don’t know the canal routes at all, but I was reliably informed that they are lovely and flat, and entirely traffic free.

Sadly I was misinformed. This picture shows one of the few flat, traffic-free bits of the canal system in our fair city. Thanks to an intricate system of locks, the Birmingham/Fazeley canal is basically an uphill waterway from Aston to the city. There’s a steep incline about every 2-3 minutes of cycling. Travelling that way by canalboat must be a complete bitch and take about a week. And worse, there are other cyclists and joggers coming the other (more sensible) way at high speed.

It was on one of these steep inclines in the face of high speed racing cyclists (and the odd drug deal going down under the bridges) that my chain snapped. I was about a third of the way home.

I walked almost an hour to the Jewellery Quarter – taking my best guess at where to come out of the waterways. It’s very difficult to tell where you’re at when you’re down at the canals. The roads above can’t really see you, and you can’t really see the roads above. Signposting down there is a joke and it’s an alternate world beneath the city, which follows its own bizarre rules of geography.

From there, it was a train home, then a 10 minute walk from the station, pushing poor Rusty all the way.

It has been pointed out to me that I must have bad bike karma. Or perhaps that I should not be quite such a cheapskate when it comes to my transportation choices. At any rate, Rusty’s at the shop now. He’ll be home on Monday, and we’ll give this biking to work thing another try.

On good, old-fashioned roads.

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Tagged: Aston, Bicycle, Bicycle chain, Birmingham, Cycling, Personal, Sports, Sports Direct