Tall Tree Cycles

When I was in Ottawa this past week, I took a little time out to visit Tall Tree Cycles. I can’t quite remember how I first heard about them, but I knew that they had originated the Steelwool Bicycle brand, so I figured that they were not a typical bike store.

Here is the view from the entrance. There are some Steelwool prototypes in the lower left corner, fat bike tires and rims hanging up to the upper left, and an Xtracycle Edgerunner frame displayed prominently near in front of the service area. Lots of fun things to look at.

I was surprised to see the Edgerunner, since I thought that only a limited number were going to be available this first year of production, and I was even more pleased to see one fully built up on the other side of the shop (with e-assist). Here you can see that the stance of the regular Xtracycle (in the foreground) and the Edgerunner are quite similar.
From the back, the deck heights are about the same, and you have to look carefully to notice that the back wheel is 406, rather than the 26″ wheel on the bike to the right.
The new bags look much more durable than the older ones.

Here’s a closer look at the frame. The fact that it is one piece would make it much stiffer than my Xtracycle free radical which gets a bit noodly when I load it up with more than 50 Lbs. I was told that it was cost competitive with the Big Dummy. What makes it even more special is that Xtracycle collaborated with Sam Whittingham and the Edgerunner is basically a mass market version of his Mule Cargobike. If I were in the market for a cargobike, this would be the one.

There were lots of other cool things in the shop. This fatbike for instance.
Apparently they are selling quite well. I especially liked the wiiiide studded tires.

Here is a Brodie Once that is being used as a four season commuter. So much salt on such a pretty bike, but even nice bikes are meant to be ridden!

A very cool shop. If you are ever in Ottawa, I highly recommend a visit.

I also wanted to note that I took Ottawa transit to the shop from downtown, and this was the first time I saw one of their very cool transitways.
Here is the dedicated roadway for buses. No problems, even at rush hour.

Just a little further on, the roadway went below grade, essentially a highway only for buses that was partially buried.

Here is one of the stations. You get off the bus, and go up the stairs to street level. Almost like a subway, about as fast, and much cheaper to build, so long as you have the land for the corridor. Something like this would be fantastic as a westward extension of the forthcoming LRT along the Eglinton Corridor from Jane to the 427.

UPDATE: some more information about the Ottawa Transitways here. Note that Tall Tree Cycles is a short walk from the Westboro station.

Also, here is some coverage about proposed bikeways in downtown Ottawa.

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