I recycled a bicycle at Recycle A Bicycle

Living in Manhattan means people visit. Even with an apartment under five hundred square feet and only a thin, very firm futon, people sleep over. Nearby hotels cost a few hundred dollars a night.

A friend who stayed with me in July, while walking around seeing the sights, texted me “Do you want a free bike?” The backstory: some neighbor was throwing away a bicycle with many broken parts so, I guess to feel better about themselves, put it on the street with a sign that said “Free.” Or maybe hoping what ended up happening would happen.

My friend brought it back to my place. I couldn’t throw it away, but I didn’t know what to do about it. Since I’m on the Bike New York mailing list, I’d heard about a store called Recycle A Bicycle that donated time and labor to many city biking events. I looked them up. They’re in Brooklyn. I figured I’d take the bike there when I had an appointment near the store and could afford the extra time to bring the bike.

Still, something felt weird about taking a bike by subway. Bikes are transportation. They shouldn’t need other transportation. So for a while this broken old bike took up space in my apartment. It didn’t bother me except that I had to move it back and forth to clean under it when mopping.

Then a friend who stayed with me in August turned out to have extensive bike touring experience, therefore bike repair experience. Plus it was his first time in New York City. Using Citibikes for a day cost fifty dollars and bikes beat public transit. He had incentive and experience to fix the bike, at least to ride around for a day. He succeeded and rode it around for that day, leaving behind a mostly working bike.

Then last weekend I met a few college teammates in Prospect Park, Brooklyn to throw a disc around and talk about how old we are. My knee had healed enough from arthroscopic surgery a week and a half before for me to ride a bike and run. I rode the bike to the park, then after throwing and visiting rode the bike to Recycle A Bicycle and donated it.

The guy at the store said the bike was in good enough condition that by replacing a few parts would be perfect to go back into circulation. I even got a tax write-off for it. Then I took the subway home.

EDIT: I told the store about this post and they wrote “We actually just completed the refurb on the bike this morning and it will soon find a new home.”

Read my weekly newsletter

On initiative, leadership, the environment, and burpees