Utility Cycling Tips From Bike Zealot Martha Stewart

In addition to nerve-wracking weather, one sure sign of spring is the re-emergence of the bicycle as pop culture totem. If you're on many catalogue mailing lists, you've probably seen them -- gleaming utility bikes and cruisers at the ready as toned and tanned models relax at the outdoor cafe or by the pool. And they're not just props -- furniture and housewares retailer CB2 has its own city bike, developed with a Florida-based manufacturer ($499; details at Treehugger).

Coupled with poll data and legislative action showing general support for human-oriented public space and transportation initiatives, it's enough to suggest that the bike-hating American public is mostly a myth, conjured and nursed by out of touch politicians and conflict-craving, auto-driven media.

Enter Martha Stewart. In advance of Bike Month, Stewart invited Emilia Crotty of Bike New York into the studio for a thorough lesson on cycle maintenance, followed by a bike and schwag giveaway (congratulations Georgiana Powell of Moscow, PA). Turns out Stewart is a cyclist herself, as are, at least for this segment, many members of her studio audience.

If this isn't a marker of cycling for transportation becoming a more mainstream American activity, it's hard to imagine what would be.