Düsseldorf, 2016-04-17
When moving to a new city, you're not really at home and you're not really free until you get your first bicycle. Bicycles are the key to freedom in the city! Armed with that knowledge, it didn't take me too long back in the beginning of 2007 to start looking for my own.
Back then, eBay was of course already pretty strong but there were also paper-based classifieds. After a while of searching – it did take a while, as the used-cycle market in Duesseldorf and its vicinity is nowhere as diverse as Munich's, where I came from, I could tell that right away – I found one for I think, EUR 25, in Remscheid, through the Rhine/Ruhr edition of the Quoka classifieds paper.
Picking that one up in the Carnival weekend of 2007 was an experience of its own. The whole place looked like a disused nuclear test facility to me. I suppose in summer (and when they're not digging up the train station) it could be rather nice there but that's just an assumption. Anyway I picked it up from a very friendly lady and then dragged it into the train. (The town is hilly and I couldn't manage to climb some of it with the bike, an old three-speed. I wonder how she'd done it?)
Cold-war post-nuclear wasteland a.k.a. the city of Remscheid
My first bicycle (2007) in Duesseldorf. What a beauty!
This bike served me for four years, the longest stretch yet, and in hindsight was the best I've had in Duesseldorf. It ran silently and smoothly, and only had the minor issue of a difficult-to-adjust first speed which would require holding down the lever while using it so that it wouldn't snap back into second.
A car once hit it while parked, leaving a dent in the frame. Other than that it went on and on until the first half of 2011, when someone stole one wheel. Not long after that the second one was gone too. At that point I decided to leave the rest of it to the city's own cleansing powers and began looking for a new one.
This time, eBay was the way to go, all the other options had more or less disappeared. I was surprised to find one in Duesseldorf in the very vicinity of my apartment. I believe it was EUR 20; I picked it up near Lichtstrasse in Flingern. It was an aged department-store-type mountain bike that had apparently been involved in the most peculiar accident, leaving one of its pedals detached and the crank guide missing, but the rest undamaged. I replaced the missing part and after replacing it a second time (the first one wouldn't hold), it went without problems from there.
My second bike ("the mountain bike", 2011), parked in front of the Kaiser's in Kaiserswerther Strasse. Quite OK but not for long.
That bike was actually not bad while it lasted. It ran fine enough and enabled me to climb Bergische Landstrasse in Gerresheim with relative ease, due to its multitude of speeds. Although that's not something I have to do very often.
The end of it came in summer 2012 when I had once again exercised the bike's Gerresheim-going capabilities and was on the ride down Dernbuschweg. At a supposed 30 km/h, the rear wheel suddenly started to dance, accompanied by a grinding noise. I managed to stop the bike and saw that the wheel had loosened in its hub. Although I did take it to my apartment, which took me one hour in the heaviest rain, I realized that that was something I couldn't realistically fix myself.
The funny thing is that I removed the lock and indeed, after a few days the bike was stolen, even with the detached rear wheel. Some people are just not picky! If you got a bike to trash in Duesseldorf, you don't need to order the city's services at all. In my case, I had already but cancelled them.
So once again, I was on the lookout and this time, it did take me a while to find a suitable one, i. e. in the EUR 10–30 price range. Once again, I had to leave Duesseldorf to get it. This one was in Langenfeld and cost me a tenner, so it was a real bargain. I went there by bus and took a pump with me, as the guy selling it had indicated that the wheels were flat. So I figured it might really be just that and that's how it was. I started my ride from Langenfeld to Duesseldorf, which is just the right distance for a summer afternoon. The bike was an old but sturdily built single-speed; its general build quality was well above what I had ridden the year before. The gear ratio was a bit high – definitely not something for the quarter-mile. The only trouble I had during the trip was with the bike's speedometer, an aging mechanical type that had initially been indicating something that looked about right, but ground to a halt in Eller, ripping off the fastening element at the front hub. I didn't care much about it, just moved the bent parts out of the way of the spokes and didn't touch it from there.
The third bike (2012), a down-to-earth banger with the most useless arrangement of reflectors around it, with selfie in front of the famous vista point in Pulheim/Stommeln
That bike had the worst Bergische-Landstrasse performance I had experienced to date due to its transmission ratio. Fahneburgstrasse was close to hopeless, I only managed it once or twice. Still I liked it for its down-to-earth approach. I took me to our team's annual barbecue/wakeboarding event in Langenfeld more than once, packed with two sixpacks of Pilsner Urquell, a bag of ice to keep them cool, and some sandwich material.
But all good things come to an end. Because of the transmission ratio, I had always started pedaling with some stress on the handlebar to get the thing going. In early 2015 after grabbing a coffee at Oehme for one of my usual Medienhafen breakfasts, I pulled it off the bike! The metal clamp attaching it to the frame had fractured.
I decided to not leave the bike to the city's metal scroungers just yet, but took it to my apartment, which was something of a challenge as the handlebar was loose and the point where it had broken off was razor sharp. Eventually I reached my destination and I locked it in place.
The decision to hold on to the broken bike proved right. After a few weeks of surveying a particularly deserted market, an offer I had been outbidden on at eBay came back to me at EUR 10 as the winner hadn't responded. The item was located in Rheinhausen in Duisburg, and had all signs of a bicycle that had been parked in the city for a bit too long (no saddle, no valves, no dynamo). I ripped everything that I thought would be needed from the old bike and set off for Duisburg. Nice try, as the saddle wouldn't fit without adapter and the inner tubes as well as the tires had completely disintegrated – no go even with my valves. I moved the bike to Rheinhausen train station in what felt like 35 degrees heat and went back to Duesseldorf. There I bought a new seat post which cost me four Euros at real. After replacing the inner tubes from my old bike, and mounting a new set of tires I still had in the cellar, the thing was good to go.
The fourth bike (2015), an elegant if somewhat flimsy six-speed, in front of my parking garage near Ernst-Derra-Strasse
The bicycle is an old six-speed design, manufactured by now-defunct Rola from Oberhausen, where the shift lever is mounted below the handlebar to the side of the frame. To my surprise, it worked precisely the way it was supposed to. Its usefulness is limited though as no real hill-going speed is available; the first three speeds are barely apart. Also, the bike feels a bit unstable all the time, as if it was made out of some soft material. Unlike the previous one, it runs straight when removing one's hands from the handlebar, but dances and shakes erratically after a while. Still it's not a bad bike for what I need it.
So that's about it! For now. As I might be moving to Frankfurt later in the year, watch out for a continuation piece where I'll be detailing my experiences there.
If Duesseldorf is known for one thing to its inhabitants, it's confusing and totally useless bicycle lane markings. Not only do they pose more questions than they answer, it also takes the city an incredibly long planning and building effort to implement each of them. I'll later include a small selection here, people are invited to send me more.