Busycle Journal

PROJECT JOURNAL 

POSTED: JULY 16, 2005

July 15th, Matthew Mazzotta - Settling into this long houred schedule has been overwhelming. I think I am getting the hang of it now. This week I have not gotten back from doing something “busycle related” before 11pm.

On Wednesday, Dave, Ann, Jeff, Matthew, and Vicky met up at Ron’s house to get an early start at the junkyard, only to realize that there was a little leak in the diesel truck we were borrowing. As any good member of the Busycle team, this little leak couldn’t go unchecked. So up came the hood, and Ron climbed in with his freshly shorn “mullet” he had won on a bet.

Within 25 minutes, it was decided that the truck could not be fixed at Ron’s place. So we loaded up and packed in and started our trip. In two seconds we realized that there was now diesel gas “flowing” out of the bottom of the truck. From that moment on, all six of us, accompanied by two to Ron’s roommates, spent the rest of the day at Ron’s fixing the truck, playing with a green rubber kickball, drinking beer, talking, looking at old bikes, and leading missions to truck repair shops for parts.

At the end of the day, when the truck was fixed, and we were looking at each other for what to do next since the junkyard had closed an hour earlier, someone asked “Should we meet up here tomorrow same time?” There was a pause, and just like we kids with not a care in the world, or even the inkling that there is such a thing as 9-5 or a real job, we all said “Sure.”

POSTED: JULY 12, 2005

July 10. Big, big week. We completely dismantled a 1989 Dodge Van with the help of Vicky, Tommy, Dave, Jeff, Tim, Ann, Ron, Heather and Matthew. Now we’re ready to start building the Busycle. We also scored large amounts of metal at the Harvard recycling yard, including 11 bed frames and loads of exercise equipment, which we will cut up and use for welding the Busycle frame. The City of Boston invited us to talk about how they can support the project. They will be helping as advertise and will provide space. We also had a design meeting that was held at Sparqs. And to top that The Boston Phoenix wrote a little thing about us with a photo. That is all the good stuff. On the flip side, Heather and Matthew have reached the unexplored edges of their minds through pinnacles of stress. Learning to stay positive has been quite the challenge on certain days this week.

POSTED: JULY 8, 2005

June 29, 2005 All kinds of excitement have been happening. As of late, Matthew has been a full time worker on the Busycle, pulling 12hr shifts everyday now. Long days, broken up by short guitar breaks and riding his bike down by the lake at night after his mind has frizzled out. Heather is still working full time as an affordable housing developer and the Busycle is filling every space it can find in the rest of her life.

Major goodness has come out of all the Busycle efforts this last week. We were donated our choice of three different vehicles from Charles River Movers in Belmont www.charlesrivermovers.com. We chose a 1989 Dodge Van with the help of Jeff DelPapa (http://www.the-nerds.org), a crazy junk-warring, bike building, all around knowledgeable bearded guy. We’ll be taking the motor out of the van and giving it new life as the busycle.

We put an old license plate on the van and drove it over to Sparqs in Woburn, the Mecca of welding and woodworking. Tim Panagos runs Sparqs, (www.sparqs.com) an Industrial Arts Club that has anything and everything we could ever want to make cool projects. Tim donated the space to us and is interested in helping us work on the project with some of his crew.

The whipped cream on top of that double scooper is that we received an email from the City of Boston telling us that they are interested in working with us and potentially donating space to finish our project. The little cherry sitting on top of this baby is that we have two women – Ann Adelsberger and Hannah Verlin - who have been rolling videotape to hopefully make a documentary of this whole thing.
been on a journey to find the rumored human-powered vehicle perched on top of mount Busycle. They have spent time wading through friendship lake, where they have been noticing how majestic it still is after all these years. Then crossing onto partner path, where the nuances have surprised them both in a pleasant way. Currently the two are just rounding paperwork hills and have started planning their trip through construction alley. Be warned though, as beautiful as this journey may seem, they reported being attacked numerous times by an old winged baggage-monster and his children.
So far Matthew has made a very pleasant transition into Boston from Vermont. The Berwick community has made the social side of meeting a new city very comforting with its cool people, fun little adventures, and casual parties. Heather seems to be enjoying the new friends just as much.
Since the conception of the Busycle in February, there was a long period where nothing happened. Heather and Matthew just lived the same way they had been living. Then around April, the winds began to pick up. The two Busyclers met for the first time in Boston to discuss the game plan. Soon after, the momentum began to build and we met the Berwick Crew.

After meeting our key players in the Berwick, it was time to go out and press the flesh with “Bike people”. We met with bike enthusiasts, SKUL members, MIT grad students, MIT professors specializing in bicycles and human powered vehicles, and who ever else gave us their ear for a moment. These people have become our “Busycle Experts” and we have been working with them through email the last couple of weeks trying to finalize our design, which should put us in a position to get a truck chasse this week.
On another front, there has been a lot of paperwork trying to get sponsors for parts, money, and to help with the event we have planned for the debut of the Busycle. Organizing our joint email account, Busycle@gmail.com, and trying to sort out and respond to all the people that have written us to help has been a job in itself. We have been offered help from people of all backgrounds, including videographers, a radio show producer, bike parts, garage space, welding equipment, overall good Karma, etc.
Overall, this experience has been an interesting road. We thought we were working on a Public Art Project, but we realized we were tricked by bike lovers into building a bicycler’s surreal wet dream. It is quite impressive to feel the power, creativity, detailed knowledge, and love of bicycling from the people in Boston and around the world. We even have people writing us from Australia and South Africa giving us tips.
At this point we feel this project must be dealt with in the stages that present themselves. At the moment we are finishing up the paperwork side of things, and are going to be diving into construction later this week or early next week. The Conceptual part of this project has taken a back seat, though we both all acknowledge that will become a focus again when we have the Busycle actually moving. Feeling like things are moving a bit slow, we are eager to start the next phase, and Heather even prayed to a sweat potato last night for guidance.