Austin's Yellow Bike Project Celebrates Independence Day
The concert by The Invincible Czars closed with the 1812 Overture (minus the cannon sounds) and attracted a crowd of around a hundred. Grant brought his brown duck, Puddles, who rides around in a cage strapped to the back of his bike. “They make great pets,” he said. “You throw her up in the air and she flies right back.” That is how yellow bikes are supposed to work: once freed, they should stick around.
When the concert ended, the crowd quickly melted away. So did two of the four remaining yellow bikes. The band had mostly packed up as the last two bikes rested on their sides under the shade of a cedar elm. James, a YBP member, planned to drive one of them to Barton Springs. Asked where the bike would end up, he said: “Fourth and Congress. I’m going to take the bus home.”
This reporter decided to hang around and wait for the last bike to disappear. Eventually, a man wearing a battered Boston Red Sox cap wandered over from the Austin History Center to inspect the frail single-speed. Someone had hand-painted “Thomas Paine” on the cross bar; “Smell the Freedom” had been written on a white banner.
“Are you going for a ride?”
“Yeah. I’m taking it to Barton Springs,” he said hesitantly, pulling the bike upright by the bare handle bars. He said his name was John.
“Have you ridden a yellow bike before?”
“Yes.” He continued to eye the bike, holding it tentatively. The thin tires were cracked; the rear chrome fender was bent. “I wanted the one with the soldiers on it.”
“And after Barton Springs?”
“I’ll go over to one of the state parking lots,” he said, “and watch the fireworks.”
“Where will you leave the bike?”
“I don’t know,” John said softly. He then pushed the bike up to the sidewalk along Guadalupe, started peddling and turned west on 9th Street. From there, he had about three blocks of straight downhill.
