Momentum Magazine Covers L.A.

Well, it finally happened!

Momentum Magazine finally got to L.A. – and the article running in this month’s issue, “Los Angeles” by Richard Risemberg, is thorough, honest, and full of some pretty neat images too.

The Flying Pigeon LA bike shop and our neighbor two doors up, the Bike Oven, get a nice mention. Harv Woien, the man that trained me to be a mechanic & turned the Bike Oven into a viable repair space, got his own mini-write-up with a shot of him relaxing in his private workshop. Harv has put in more hours, and more thought, into turning the Bike Oven into a legitimate bike repair workshop than anyone I can think of (and that is saying a lot, considering the hard-working bunch that have come together to make the Oven work).

Harv Woien working hard on a bicycle at the Bike Oven.

“Also associated with the Bike Oven is Harv Woien who has been pedaling bicycles and peddling bicycling for nearly 55 years. Woien was born in New York City, obtained his first full-sized bike when he was eleven and said, “I taught myself to ride in the street in traffic, and I have ridden only in the street, in traffic, since.” He keeps a pickup truck in the garage, but drives it so seldom he fills the tank up only twice a year.

Woien’s family moved to Los Angeles when he was twelve, and “As soon as the bike was off the moving van, I was all over this city.” He rode everywhere, night and day, buying his first ten-speed just in time for the 1970s Bike Boom. His experience made him the local “expert” for his colleagues who became interested in bikes and he founded the DWP Bicycle Club, leading rides all over the city.

Now retired, he is busier than ever with volunteer advocacy work for North East Los Angeles Bikes (NELA Bikes!) and Cyclists Inciting Change thru Live Exchange (CICLE.org) in Pasadena. But the Bike Oven, just down the hill from his Montecito Heights home, is where he spends much of his time, helping with outreach and educational programs that go beyond just bikes. One of their more recent efforts provided a delivery bike for a South-Central Los Angeles food co-op.“
– “Los Angeles” by Richard Risemberg, Momentum Magainze, No. 42

As a side note:
The one thing missing from the Bike Oven/Flying Pigeon LA locale (that all the other bike co-op/bike shop relationships have) is a quality eatery on the block that is open in the evenings with a place to sit down out doors. The street we’re located on could also use some traffic calming (it’s hard to have a conversation with 45mph traffic blowing by) – but that I suppose that is a topic for another blog post.