VF> Well, I do admit that hauling 500 pounds of wood 
 VF> chips, saw cuttings, and other srap to the recycle 
 VF> place would have been most difficult on a bike. 
 
Check out the January 1996 issue of BICYCLING magazine, page 61.
I'm looking at a picture of bicyclists in Xian, China.  There's a picture of 
a man on a three wheeled bicycle that sports a huge cargo bed, and he is 
transporting 1,600 pounds of harvest.  Pretty heavy duty bike, you can really 
see how thick the spokes are.
 
The article's title reads "The U.S. may have forgotten the bicycle's original 
purpose, but the rest of the world hasn't."
 
Some interesting captions and facts from the article:
 
* China: Only one person in 74,000 owns a car in China.  There is one
  car for every 2 Americans.
 
* There are more than 800 million bicycles in the world, twice the
  number of automobiles.
 
* Half of all urban space in America is devoted to highways.  It takes
  only one lane to accommodate 40,000 bicycle commuters per hour,
  but 12 lanes to accommodate 40,000 drivers.
 
* Beijing, China: Approximately 75% of the workforce rides to work.
  In America, less than 1% commute by bike.
 
* Paris: Bicycling is not a matter of affluence.  Most Western
  Europeans have a higher per capita income than Americans, yet
  they cycle 10 times as much.
 
* Xian, China: A bicycle can carry 10 times its own weight, a
  capability no automobile, airplane, or bridge can match.
 
* A cyclist is more energy efficient than a salmon, an eagle,
  and a gazelle.
 
* Converting calories into gasoline, a bicycle gets 3,000 miles
  to the gallon.
--- Maximus 2.02
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