Finding the unexpected in the everyday.
December 27, 2006 In Los Angeles, a bus station was opened in the neighborhood of Canoga Park in the city’s San Fernando Valley region. This station, which is specifically located on Canoga Avenue, is part of the G Line of the Los Angeles Metro Busway system. Canoga station was built to help address the lack... Continue Reading →
October 8, 1889 Philippe Thys, whose high-achieving career as a cyclist would include winning the Tour de France a total of three times, was born in the municipality of Anderlecht in central Belgium. Early on in his cycling career in 1910, Thys won the first edition of the Belgian National Cyclo-cross Championship. This type of... Continue Reading →
July 10, 1899 Heinrich “Heiri” Suter, who achieved widespread renown as a champion road racing cyclist, was born in the municipality of Gränichen in north-central Switzerland. During the course of his career, he won a total of 58 professional cycling races and in the process established some noteworthy records. On March 18, 1923, for example,... Continue Reading →
January 4, 2017 Robert Marchand, a 105-year-old French cyclist, established a world record in one-hour track cycling for people in his age group. At the Paris-area indoor track known as the Velodrome National, he completed 92 laps and in the process covered a total of 14 miles (22.6 kilometers). Marchand achieved this record while wearing... Continue Reading →
November 18, 1885 In the Kingdom of Württemberg (at the time a state of the German Empire and now part of the Federal Republic of Germany), 17-year-old Paul Daimler undertook the first trial run of what is widely regarded as the world’s first motorcycle. His father Gottlieb Daimler, along with Wilhelm Maybach, built the vehicle in... Continue Reading →
April 21, 1890 Frank E. Weaver launched a coast-to-coast trip, pedaling out of New Haven, Connecticut, on a four-foot (1.2-meter)-high bicycle built by the Eagle Bicycle Manufacturing Company. The 19-year-old Weaver was originally from New Bedford, Massachusetts, but had lived in New Haven for four to five years. Weaver established himself as one of the most accomplished... Continue Reading →
October 8, 1897 A large parade of bicyclists took place in Louisville, Kentucky. The event, which was part of a carnival celebration, reflected the strong enthusiasm for bicycling throughout that era. On the day before the parade, the city’s Courier-Journal newspaper even ventured that the event could be “as pretty a bicycle display as has ever... Continue Reading →
September 8, 1896 In New York, what was technically the final leg of an ambitious and unprecedented transcontinental bicycle relay race took place when two bicyclists departed the southern tip of Manhattan known as the Battery for the U.S. Army post at nearby Governors Island at 1:55 p.m. A.H. Hand and Annie St. Tel, each... Continue Reading →
September 3, 2013 A bicycle-and-pedestrian path on the newly constructed eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge (famously nicknamed the Bay Bridge) made its debut. The noontime opening of the completed two-thirds of the path took place the day after the roadway portion of the new span was inaugurated. A segment of the original... Continue Reading →
August 28, 2018 In England’s North East region, the recently completed Northern Spire Bridge within the city and metropolitan borough of Sunderland was opened to pedestrians. This two-span cable-stayed bridge carries the highway A1231 over the River Wear and serves as a link between the Sunderland suburbs of Pallion and Castletown. The 1,102-foot (336-meter)-long structure... Continue Reading →
Transportation History 