DKNY says ride a bike...just not our orange ones.

See the happy fashionable couple wearing their hot DKNY clothes? They look sharp in their spring 08 collecting being followed by the NYPD scooter brigade. This is part of DKNY's new advertising to boast about their commitment to alternative transportation and the money they've given to the city to promote a better environment for biking. Of course the NYPD harassment campaign to group rides is my own little addition to the photo, but represents how I feel about the "cities commitment" to making it a pain in the ass to ride your bike here. DKNY has locked up 75 orange painted bikes around NYC with their logo being the only identifying thing on the bikes themselves.

Read about it here at this Conde Naste publication blog. Its for fashion week and at least some of these bikes are locked to trees in Tompkins square park, which is illegal. How does this promote cycling? Seems to me another form of the corporate advertising think tank, stealing our street art and using for their own. To pat themselves on the back and try and catch some of the Green Chic "save the environment," fever. Hmmm, what other painted bicycles put up around the city?
Picture by Fred Askew

The ghost bikes represent how the city has ignored the plight of the cyclist by not doing enough to prevent this from happening, for instance not putting in bike lanes on Houston Street or following through with investigations on how these people died. And tell me again why I got a ticket for "not riding in the bike lane?" on a Friday before Critical Mass, when our beloved bike lane is filled with obstructions on a daily basis? Lets not forget a number of the people immortalized by bike lanes were killed by using bike lanes and bike paths.

If you dig around on the DKNY website you will eventually find a page that talks about how they have donated money to the city for free bike maps and helmets. Their main goal is to promote cycling. I just don't see how locking bikes around town is going to get the message across. Most people are kind of pissed off with this kind of invasion of our mental space and all the abandon bikes left around giving active bicycle commuters and workers a bad name. But its ok when DKNY does it. Are their people arriving on bicycle? Are the super models commuting to the tent at Bryant park on bicycle? Does that portable tent use alternative fuel or green energy. NO NO and No. But some how if you walk around looking at a bike you can't even ride, this will encourage you to ride a bike. Brilliant job people. Seems like something more out of Zoolander. DKNY should be more concerned with where their overpriced clothes are made and the environmental impact of sweatshops. The last time I checked they were getting boycotted for having sweatshops with unsavory work conditions in some far off remote land called... New York City.