Random Bits: Winter bike commuting in NYC day and night front and rear cameras

Winter bike commuting in NYC day and night front and rear cameras

Check out my commute on a bicycle between Roosevelt Island and Manhattan.

On the top you can see my ride from Roosevelt Island around 10pm.

On the bottom is the ride from Manhattan around 7am.

Windy weather with wet snow and temperature below freezing.

I record the front view with GoPro Hero 5 black mounted on the helmet shown on the right

And I use SEEMEE DV mounted on the back rack for the rear view showing on the left.

On this slippery road my average speed is about 8-9 miles an hour.

I speed up the video about 3-4 times for you.

I make the one way trip in about 25 minutes on a normal day's weather.

This time it was 27 minutes to Manhattan and 35 minutes to Roosevelt island.

Check my previous video to see front view videos of SEEMEE and HERO 5 at normal speed.

I know, HERO 5 is a very old camera.

And yet, SEEMEE makes very impressive video recordings without image stabilization.

And SEEMEE sports unbeatable over 6 hours battery life recording with blinking stop lights!

Ah man, I appreciate SEEMEE battery life! Sure, the newest GoPro MAX 360 can do amazing 360 videos drying out 6 batteries for a tenfold price of one SEEMEE :)

I'm just messing with you :)

GoPro is undeniably the golden standard among all action cameras.

And I have to say that the SEEMEE app sucks big time compared to the GoPro app.

Nevertheless it works. And working for many hours, a SEEMEE camera is better for me than any camera with a dead battery.

My longest ride this year was over 4 hours long.

SEEMEE did great through the whole ride in similar weather.

On GoPro I changed 2 batteries and it was not enough to record the whole ride anyway.

And that is what really matters to me.

I hope Magicshine, the maker of SEEMEE, will redesign the app.

And then I would love to get from them the front camera with the front light! Alright, enough about the cameras.

Here we go on the 59th bridge.

Very light traffic on the bridge in this ugly weather.

Light traffic always makes my ride much more pleasant than any weather could ever do.

"Speedsters" don't ride in this weather.

And the city sanitation department usually cleans the bridges better than streets of the city.

As an all year around cyclist I appreciate it a lot.

The bike path over the bridge is basically empty today :)

I like it.

Watching rear view videos is a new experience with an unusual perspective for me.

I only watch my bike videos on occasions when something happens on the road.

Sometimes it's some interesting things to check on.

More often it's accidents or near accidents to learn from.

I ride about 3 hours on an average day.

Have seen many accidents.

And that is one of the main reasons I start recording my rides.

The video camera does not make rides safer.

But a video record could make a solid argument after an accident.

One of the regular riders on an electrical bike just passed me.

I am not going to ghost him in this weather.

New York is a big city with a lot of noise day or night.

And in this particular video I keep the city noise for you to hear.

Well, three times faster as I speed up the video.

The city noise is a huge annoyance and could be harmful.

My apple watch often registers noise over 100 Decibel in places like bridges and around trains.

And trains are everywhere in NYC.

You can hear trains on the bridges, above ground and underground.

With the noise level over 90 Decibel I cannot hear myself talking loud.

And yet, many people prefer to live in buildings next to the bridges and trains.

It makes commuting easier and faster - convenient.

Though, with a 30 minutes ride across the city - cycling is the best way to get around NYC no matter where you live.

Understandably, cycling in this ugly weather is not for everyone.

And I am truly happy for many cyclists staying home.

Don't get me wrong! The less of you on the streets the safer my ride.

Though, if you ride with respect for other people on streets, and are mindful about your safety and safety of others too, then commuting on a bicycle is a joy in NYC any day of the year.

NYC has probably more bike lanes than any other cities in the US, and probably in the world.

And there are NYC drivers...

Well, if you ride long enough you would know what and where to expect and how to go about it.

A lot of people are switching to e-bikes these days.

E-bikes give you no sweat fast rides.

I just wish e-riders learn where to ride fast - bike lanes are not the fast ride lanes.

Many e-bikes can go close or above the city speed limit.

And they often do it right here among pedestrians - why?!

Slow your e-horse or move to the line with fast moving cars where you belong.

There is always a possibility of getting in an accident whether you stand, walk, ride or drive on a street.

And the probability of an accident is increasing exponentially with every added mile of your speed.

The faster you move the less time you have to stop or make an evasive maneuver.