Month: September 2011

Categories
News The Fly-By

Front and Center

CREDIT: Andrew Caldwell

The newly repaved and repainted Front St. now features “sharrows,” the most recent device used in the push to make Memphis streets more bike-friendly.

Sharrows, or shared lane markings, are the familiar bicycle icon painted in dedicated bike lanes but are instead placed within the automobile lane. And while the markings were approved nationally in 2009, this is their first appearance here. For Memphis, the Front St. sharrows will serve as an acid test for the future.

“There are two big benefits to using sharrows,” said Kyle Wagenschutz, the city’s bicycle/pedestrian coordinator. “They give cyclists traveling in shared lanes greater visibility to motorists, and it helps position cyclists by telling them exactly where to ride in the street: directly on top of the markings.”

Front St. was the obvious choice for the first sharrow markings, Wagenschutz said. “[Front] is far too narrow for a dedicated bike lane, and residents and business owners [along Front] expressed their need to maintain on-street parking.”

The markings along Front have been placed near the center of the lane — far enough from cars parked along the curb so bicyclists can avoid any opening doors but not too close to the median, allowing motorists ample room to pass.

The city has no immediate plans for sharrows on other Memphis streets, and their placement will be decided on a case-by-case basis, Wagenschutz said. “Front was ideal in that it has low traffic speed and volume, which is what we’ll look for in the future. We want to use sharrows where there’s a transition between street conditions.”

Wagenschutz said sharrows will be most helpful where a street with a dedicated bike lane narrows to the point where that bike lane couldn’t feasibly continue, as on Front, and cyclists are forced into a shared lane with motorists.

Tennessee law requires motorists to allow at least three feet when passing cyclists. Penalties for violating that law were increased this summer, and though there is no additional fine for violations on roads with sharrows, the markings leave negligent motorists with few excuses.

Since the pedestrian/cyclist coordinator position was created less than a year ago, Wagenschutz, with the help of the cycling community, has established nearly 25 miles of dedicated bike lanes around town, and he’s been working to educate the community on bicycle safety.

In addition to the popular weekly safety classes led by Wagenschutz in locations around the city, he has worked with groups like Livable Memphis, among others, to distribute safety information to cyclists along bike lanes and greenlines.

“There’s definitely a market for [bike safety classes], and we’re always trying to make improvements on what we’ve got. We’re trying to avoid another tragedy with these programs, bike lanes, and sharrows,” Wagenschutz said, referring to the recent hit-and-run death of cyclist Chris Davidson. Davidson was struck by a vehicle near Cooper and Madison earlier this month.

Categories
Book Features Books

A Sad Update

At this point, it’s a matter of wait and see — wait to see what evidence there is to explain the sudden death of Memphian Jeff Klitzner, the author of a memoir published in August and called Call Me Tennessee.

Klitzner had local booksignings planned for August 20th and 21st. He and his book were featured in the Flyer‘s book column headlined “At Peace?” in the issue that hit stands on August 17th. But on the morning of Thursday, August 18th, Klitzner’s body was found in his bed in his house by his roommate and longtime friend Memphis police officer Sean Bolton — the circumstances, again, a matter of wait and see. Blood samples in a few weeks’ time could determine once and for all the cause of Klitzner’s death.

A deliberate death?

That’s a possibility said Klitzner’s friend and publisher Stephen Clements, who delivered a eulogy at Klitzner’s burial. But according to Clements, Klitzner had seemed fine in the days leading up to publication of his memoir.

“Jeff was busy getting the book into stores, setting up signings,” Clements said by phone the day after Klitzner’s funeral at Anshei Sphard Cemetery in Memphis. “I’d spoken to him several times the day before he died. He was making plans for the future. He was working on bringing episodes from Call Me Tennessee to the stage, with help from his friend David Saks at WUMR, the University of Memphis radio station.

“I was trained in and taught suicide prevention for my unit when I served in Iraq,” Clements added. “I know what to look for. But Jeff was also physically in rough shape. I’d like to think I slowed down his destructive behavior, just a hair. There’s a distinct possibility, though, that his body simply gave out.”

Memphian John Gavin, who’s known Klitzner since serving as his “big brother” in the local Big Brothers Big Sisters program, agreed to that possibility too.

Gavin has kept in touch with Klitzner over the years by phone or by email — and especially in the weeks leading up to the publication of Klitzner’s book. He’d had dinner with him in early July. Gavin said that Klitzner was excited about his book’s appearance: “He was looking forward to things going better. A little nervous maybe. A little afraid of success and the responsibility that comes with it.”

But according to Gavin, “Maybe I had a naive, narrow view into Jeff’s life. Maybe I was in denial. I didn’t realize until a few years ago how heavily he drank. I suspect he didn’t take the best care of himself. He would drink coffee all day. He always told me only what he wanted me to know. He shielded people that he loved.

“Jeff had had a series of surgeries in the past, including gastric bypass. I remember him saying he had to take special vitamins. I thought, knowing Jeffrey, he’s not going to hold to the regimen prescribed. And even if he’d taken better care of himself, there could have been medical complications.

“But I do know that he was deeply religious. He did love his family. He didn’t necessarily show that to others. Maybe if we’d all known more, we could have helped him more.”

“I know I’ve gone off on different paths in my life.”

Those are the words Jeff Klitzner said to me in an interview a week before he died. And he added:

“I’m hoping now to keep everything on the straight and narrow. I’m even trying to get involved in life-coaching. It’s hard, though, to find the people who need the help who are also looking for help.”

Then Klitzner said something on a subject he covers in Call Me Tennessee: religious belief — how to come to terms with it, how to put it into practice.

“I’ve always had drama with belief — inner turmoil. I practice religion, but I’m not fully religious like I could be or have been at one point or another in my life. I’ve tried, though, to arrive at some peace within my own heart — a peace that I’m comfortable with.”

I’d thought while listening to him that Klitzner’s words were more carefully chosen than I thought they’d be — his manner on the phone milder than the nonstop and often self-destructive behavior described in his memoir, his excitable self tempered, perhaps, by his new life as a published writer with future plans.

What’s more to say? These few words: May Jeff Klitzner now be “at peace,” no question mark.

Categories
Music Music Features

Bake Sale and Tiger High at the Hi-Tone Café

A lot of the high-profile action in Memphis music this year has come from new rappers (Don Trip, Cities Aviv) and established roots artists (North Mississippi Allstars, Amy LaVere). But there’s interesting new stuff on the indie-rock scene too, and two of the most promising new-ish local indie bands pair up this week at the Hi-Tone.

Tiger High is the latest project from the brothers Vest (Jake and Toby), who previously partnered in notable local bands such as the Bulletproof Vests and Third Man. Here they’re joined by longtime collaborator Greg Faison and former Reigning Sound drummer Greg Roberson to forge a sound that drifts from their earlier art- and classic-rock styles into something at once poppier, fuzzier, and more psychedelic, captured most recently on an excellent two-song single (“Hot Rod Honda”/”Riding the Wave”).

Bake Sale (pictured) also has a debut single out (“As Predicted”/”Meanwhile”), recorded by the Vest brothers at their Midtown studio. Live, Bake Sale always reminds me of forgotten ’90s minimalists Scrawl. On record, they’re a little softer and less conversational, maybe more akin to recent indie notables Vivian Girls and Best Coast.

Though there are personal connections between them, Bake Sale and Tiger High also have plenty in common musically. Both evoke the mid-’60s without any trace of retro fussiness — echoes of Spectorian pop, surf music, garage rock, and girl groups popping up easily and honestly here and there. Bake Sale and Tiger High play the Hi-Tone Café, with Data Drums, on Friday, September 2nd. Doors open at 9 p.m. Admission is $5.