The Fremont Podcast
The only podcast dedicated to telling the stories of the people and places of Fremont, CA. The diversity and integration of people and cultures of Fremont truly makes it a special place. This podcast explores these stories.
The Fremont Podcast
Episode 117: Daniel Karpelevitch - Biking into a Better Type of Community
Remember the freedom of your first bike ride? Our latest episode takes that youthful joy and rides with it into an in-depth exploration of cycling's transformative power in the bustling city of Fremont. We're joined by Daniel Karpolevich, whose early 200-mile pedal from Fremont to Lake Tahoe sparked a lifelong passion, leading him to the local Mobility Commission, where he advocates for a bike-friendly cityscape. We share stories of self-powered commutes, the ins and outs of law enforcement along our trails, and the profound personal growth found on two wheels.
As we pedal further into the conversation, we unpack the broader implications of a bikeable and walkable city. Fremont's Niles district serves as a microcosm of potential, illustrating how community-centric urban planning can foster safer, more lively neighborhoods. We tackle the challenges of non-vehicle friendly infrastructures like railroad underpasses, gleaning insights from local advocacy groups. It's not just about the bike lanes; it's about reimagining our streets as conduits of connection and community well-being.
Whether you're intrigued by the intersection of urban life and outdoor escapades or contemplating a tech career amid Silicon Valley's backdrop, this episode gears up to take you on a memorable journey. Join us as we navigate the landscapes of cycling, community, and the choices that steer our lives in Fremont.
For more information about the biking routes and trails check out our city website.
For bike Fremont information, check out the Facebook page here.
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Founder: Ricky B.
Intro and outro voice-overs made by Gary Williams.
Editor: Andrew Cavette.
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This is a Muggins Media Podcast.
I ride my bike everywhere. Right, that's my main form of transportation. That, and you know, transit BART trains et cetera, and I think that's like a good thing for people to have that option. Right, I'm not saying everyone needs to sell their car, but I think I'm really passionate about thinking, hey, we should at least make that a viable choice for people, right?
Speaker 3:Coming to you straight from Fremont, california. This is the Fremont Podcast, dedicated to telling the stories of the past and present of the people and places of the city of Fremont, one conversation at a time.
Speaker 4:It's a little past five in the evening, the wind is picking up and I am at the Alameda Creek Regional Trail and as beautiful as it is out here, with the water, the sunlight and the wildlife Ooh, there's an egret. As beautiful as it is out here. This is an example of an enforcement quagmire in Fremont. If that egret were up here on the trail and committed a crime, the police department within the East Bay landed here and committed the same crime. The Fremont police would have to get involved. And if the egret landed down here in the creek itself, the enforcement would come from the Alameda County Water District. With three enforcement bodies in less than 100 feet.
Speaker 4:Enforcement can be complicated, to say the least, and seemingly those three enforcement bodies want to make really sure that the violation, the crime, is happening on their part and not one of the other two. As a resident, it makes it a little difficult to report things. If you were to see someone littering or, more importantly, dumping toxic material into the water supply, someone harassing the wildlife, simply someone trespassing, and while taking a swim where you shouldn't is probably not a priority. If it were any more serious, like back in the drought when we had the rubber dam slashed, lost all that water if someone had seen it while it was happening. And the follow-up question was where exactly on the slope are they? At any rate, with a little empathy, I'm sure that much jurisdictional division makes it difficult for everybody. That egret just landed on a rock in the middle of the creek and you are listening to episode 117 of the Fremont Podcast.
Speaker 3:Now here's your host, Ricky B.
Speaker 5:I'm going to introduce you. I'm with Daniel, and how do you say your last name? Karpolevich Karpolevich. Good luck with that. And how do you say your last name? Karpolevich Karpolevich. Good luck with that. So, daniel, you and I met when I worked at REI, so we ran into each other recently at Billy Roy's for an event there. But I remember you looked familiar because I worked there and I sold camping gear and cycling gear and all the stuff, and I remember you being a regular customer and so when I recognized you at Billy Roy's I was like wait a minute, I haven't seen him in a while.
Speaker 5:So that was kind of cool. But when we met at REI you were into hiking, backpacking all that stuff. Yeah, and cycling and cycling. Did you start doing that young, or was that something that started later on?
Speaker 1:um, yeah, so I my intro to cycling was road cycling. Um, and I think one of my friends in high school, or actually a friend from middle school, but that I knew in middle school and then we went to different schools and and um, we were, we were hanging out and he had started cycling.
Speaker 1:He was like hey, let's go on a bike ride and so I took my like dad's like old, like kind of crappy road bike and it was too big for me and you know, I didn't really know. I mean I knew how to ride a bike but it wasn't like sure I didn't know how to ride like well, or you know how many. I mean, I was like fit, but I wasn't.
Speaker 1:I was like 14, I was sure a scrawny little kid like I wasn't really into cycling and and we me and two other friends you know it was a group of three of us and we, we like kind of fell in love with it over a summer, I think, maybe like between freshman and sophomore year in high school, and we just started riding a whole bunch all around um, and then we actually capped that off with a bike ride from Fremont to Lake Tahoe.
Speaker 2:Oh, my, oh, wow yeah.
Speaker 1:That's incredible. I think it's like 200 something miles. We did it over five days.
Speaker 2:Wow, that's cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, those Sierra Nevadas, I think we had one whole day where we did nothing but go up Wow For the whole day. Did nothing but go up wow, um for the whole day. Wow, that's crazy. After that I was hooked. Yeah, how old were you? I think I was 14. Okay, yeah, I was. I think I was 14. I was like a, like a between freshmen and who all? Were you with? Uh, yeah, me and two of my friends, I think were they also 14 and 15?
Speaker 2:I think maybe they were a year older.
Speaker 1:Yeah, um and one of one of their dads, like drove behind us in his minivan like with like food and snacks and stuff that's cool.
Speaker 5:You got into, obviously, the cycling, riding races and stuff like that, and um, and you, uh, came here to this interview today riding a bike. Yeah, pretty cool bike yeah not not a road bike.
Speaker 1:Not a road bike, not a race bike hybrid hybrid uh I'd call it a city bike, a commuter bike, yeah, yeah you know, after high school, racing just became. It's like six days a week of training, like you know, 12 hours a week of you know writing like and like, not just like fun writing necessarily. It's like you're doing repeats, you're doing sets, up and down the hill yeah you're doing sprints and workouts and you have a schedule and it's it.
Speaker 1:It and that's just to be, like at the base level of competitiveness, like that's not like oh, I'm an elite athlete like I was just like I'm having fun.
Speaker 2:Basically that's cool and you know I went.
Speaker 1:I started going to aloni and I you know life got in the way so I've kept riding. It's ebb and flowed, but racing is probably not in the cards for me in the near future. I like to say I'm retired there, you go.
Speaker 5:I'm a retired racer, that's good. That's good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but I fell in love with, I'll say, biking, not cycling, but just riding a bike. Yeah, but I've, you know, I, I'm. I fell in love with with, I'll say biking, not cycling but just riding a bike.
Speaker 1:Okay, right, like that, that's my, that's my current love. Yeah, I still have a road bike. I still ride it with the race team, I still ride it with, you know, ffbc, which is like the local cycling club. But nowadays, like like my, my passion is really just for riding to the grocery store, to the coffee shop, to work, to the train station, to see family and friends. Like that's what I'm really more interested in now and now I have a bike that you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's reliable and it's got a belt drive and it's got fenders and it's you know, comfy ready, ready to go.
Speaker 5:Yeah, take the city, that's cool. Uh, you're a part of a commission, volunteer commission, yeah, um, that was one of the things that kind of like connected us because you were at Billy Roy's at an event and you, you had heard about it through the city promotion and stuff like that. But, um, I, I, I thought it was interesting to have you. I wanted to have you on the podcast just to kind of catch up as somebody who lives here in Fremont. But in our discussions and everything, what is your position when it comes to speaking for your commission or for the city or anything like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I absolutely do not speak for the city. I don't speak for the Mobility Commission. Everything I'm sharing is just my own personal thoughts and opinions.
Speaker 5:Um, yeah, yeah, so I like the distinction, then, that you made between cycling and then, uh, you like riding your bike, or bike riding or whatever biking, um, so what does that mean for you? What does that look like for you? Like, um, um, if it's something that you fell in love with, you have a passion for, like, what kind of things do you love about riding your bike in the city? I know you said you like going to the grocery store and all of that, and then, like, maybe, coupled with that, like, what are some of the things that you find to be a joy about riding in the city of Fremont versus things that maybe are not so great about riding in the city of Fremont versus things that maybe are not so great about writing in the city of Fremont?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I fell in love with just the idea of, like being able to get around, you know, powered by myself, my own two feet or my own two legs, you know. And I like the idea of you know, obviously being good for the environment, right, like being good for, you know, safety, public safety, you know air pollution. Those things are very important to me. I also just like have been, you know, kind of had my eyes open to the you know the negative effects of of car ownership, car, you know car use. I don't own a car anymore. Uh, so I I still own a motorcycle. Um, that's my backup. I barely ride it, I ride my bike everywhere, right, that's my, that's my main form of form of transportation. Um, that, and you know transit, bart, trains, etc. Um, and I think that's like a a good thing for people to have that option, right, I'm not saying everyone needs to sell their car.
Speaker 1:That's right, but I think I'm really passionate about thinking, hey, we should at least make that a viable choice for people, right?
Speaker 5:We'll be right back. You can hear the rest of this conversation in just a moment. I want to tell you about Minuteman Press in Irvington. They are your quality printer to go to here in Fremont. I have personally worked with them before and I find their services to be fantastic. Look no further than Minuteman Press in Irvington. You can find them at 44141 Fremont Boulevard in Fremont.
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Speaker 5:It's just interesting to see what's out there, and you never know what you'll find Treasures?
Speaker 4:Hey Van, if people want to contact you, how do they get in touch?
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Speaker 5:And now back to our conversation. I have a kind of a souped up e-bike that I use for getting around on, like, when I need to get somewhere fast and I don't have a vehicle because my wife's using the car, then I use this and I actually can take that onto the BART. I've taken that, uh out to Mountain View and Sunnyvale and other places just taking it on the on the transit lines, um, but then I can also get around here pretty well on it. But I also have a pedal bike that's just, you know, manpower um that I use for um, both exercise and for commuting if I need to. If the time is not the issue, then I enjoy riding that and getting the exercise in that as well. So there are certain places around Fremont that I think are remarkable when it comes to biking.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 5:But there's also some places we were just talking about before. We were even recording about. There were some places that were not so enjoyable when it comes to biking Absolutely, but there's also some places we were just talking about before we were even recording about there were some places that were not so enjoyable when it comes to biking. Yeah, so talk to me a little bit about, like, what are some of the things that Fremont has done that you've seen growing up here and as you've gotten into cycling? What are some of the things that Fremont's done that's been good for biking, for people who want to get out and would rather commute by bike than than drive cars?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean something that happened before you know. I was born before you know. Most of us were born as, like Alameda Creek trail, like that's a a, a gold star example of, like fantastic infrastructure that's. You know it gets it's a whole big long trail. Right, it has underpasses under highways and roads. It connects, you know it gets, it's a whole big long trail. Right, it has underpasses under highways and roads. It connects, you know, people very safely. Right, it's completely separated from traffic. Um, things like that very hard to build these days. Right, there's not enough room, there's not enough money to build, you know, big underpasses and bridges and that sort of thing. Um, so that's kind of the focus has been more on making the streets and the roads safer, and I make that distinction between streets and roads purposefully. You know roads are kind of the bigger ones, right, multiple lanes. The point is to get people from point A to point B right.
Speaker 1:Like.
Speaker 2:Mission, mission Boulevard, fremont, st Padre, maori, those kinds of things right.
Speaker 1:And we have have, you know, tons of them, but the thing is like they're not always very safe, so things have like walnut avenue right, that's been like that was a big project over five years ago.
Speaker 5:There's like a video out with like drone shots and everything of that being like a um kind of like an example of what like a good biking infrastructure would look like it really is yeah, so it that's.
Speaker 1:That's one of those things, right. It's on like the bikeways are elevated right so they're completely protected from from cars, just like a sidewalk is right and, more importantly, the intersections are protected, because you'll often see bike lanes, especially in um, in fremont. You'll still see them, definitely, but oftentimes and kind of cities that kind of want to just check a box yeah, let's say we put in a bike lane, they'll put in a bike lane on the on the roadways and then as soon as it gets to the intersection it just ends.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and intersections like the most dangerous parts right. So many crashes happen right at intersection or when people are turning and merging and all these sorts of things. So having protected intersections like we see on Walnut and they're building them in more places now in Fremont um, those make it really, really safe. Um you know, and we have tons of opportunities for trails that are you know that we could have, that we could build right on like water corridors, like water pipe or you know, electrical line corridors or old railways, that sort of thing.
Speaker 5:Um, that's actually one of the things that I've enjoyed.
Speaker 5:I mentioned it on a previous episode, I'm trying to remember which one I mentioned it on but, um, one of the things that I enjoy about, uh, going the bike route, like riding a bike from a place to place is that when I, when I put my phone up and I pull up the GPS and I put in the cycling option, even coming back from Mountain View or Sunnyvale or even going out to I've been out to Union Landing here in Union City and I'm like, take me to Union Landing on a bike.
Speaker 5:There's this whole San Francisco. I don't know what it's called san francisco creek trail or something like that. I didn't even know it existed and like it says nick, you know, on the on the gps it was like take this, um, this shared trail or this you know creek, san francisco creek trail, and I was like this is the coolest trail, like I really really, really, really fun. But then when I got down to, like, um, Santa Clara and Sunnyvale and stuff, there's like all these aqueducts that have these trails along there that are just super fun to ride on and they're just really safe and comfortable to ride on.
Speaker 5:And so I think you're exactly right me to.
Speaker 1:creek trail is a gem that we have where a lot of people can get out there and ride and walk or you know whatever, and have it be a protected area that gets you around, if I mean, if you're wanting, if that's where you if it happens to be on your route, right, if you're trying to go through central fremont like you're going to be on a road, yeah, um, because even the streets, the smaller streets, you know they don't really connect right, we're all we're kind of little islands of neighborhoods connected by these big roads and so, you know, seeing things like Walnut Avenue is a really really you know awesome um development and I know the you know the city has been, you know, working on on those kinds of things all throughout Um, and I you know I've heard a lot of opposition to it, but I think once people actually start to use it and start to write it, it really sells people on it.
Speaker 5:Yeah, you know it's interesting. There's like an organization called Blue Zones. I don't know if you've heard of it, but it was something that another person that I interviewed on the podcast a couple years ago, liz Ames she is the current. She just got re-elected as the bart director for this particular area. She worked for palo alto and helped design, like their walking pedestrian areas, their cycling areas, the city layout. She also worked for a little while in union city but now she works for the. Now she works for BART, but she was really influenced by the Blue Zones and the people who write for Blue Zones.
Speaker 5:But I say all that to say they do big studies about these Blue Zone cities and these are really really happy places where people just are.
Speaker 5:They love living there.
Speaker 5:Like for like one of the cities if I can't remember I remember correctly one of the cities that they focused on that was just like a really great place for people to live.
Speaker 5:I think it was like Pismo Beach or like Santa Luisa Bisbo or something like that. And one of the things that they highlight, that they say that really makes a happy place for people to live, is the ability to get around on a bicycle. Like riding a bike is like a big thing that helps make the people that live in a particular city like happy, and so I think it is interesting that, even though we've been ranked the happiest city in America for you know, however, city in America for the last three years, I do think that it's interesting that we still get opposition about creating the kind of infrastructure that would allow for better bike travel around the city, because I do think that would. If we really leaned into that and I'm getting into some opinion here, but we really leaned into that as a as a city, it might actually continue to fortify that opinion that we are a happy that one of the happiest cities to live in in America.
Speaker 1:You know, I think being, you know being a city where someone or a lot of people are feel safe riding a bike. I think that's not necessarily the thing that makes people happy. It might make someone like me happy, right, but I'm I recognize I'm an outlier, right, but I think a city where people feel safe riding a bike, that's like an indicator of like other things that are harder to measure, of how how happy that city is yeah, I think yeah it's great yeah, I would say probably the same thing, as you know, being a walkable city, right it's the same thing.
Speaker 2:It goes hand in hand.
Speaker 1:If you're somewhere that's easy to walk, it's also going to be somewhere that's easy to bike as well.
Speaker 5:Which I'm going to throw this out there as one of my own opinions, but it's one of the reasons why I think that Fremont ought to lean more into helping their districts develop as a city of districts, as opposed to trying to unify us around like one particular downtown area, like I think we ought to give strength to our individual districts, districts let the people be able to walk around Niles, which I think Niles is probably the best example of one of our districts that's really owned that. But then you know, the people live in Mission, san Jose. Let's really lean into that being a hub where people can walk and bike to and get to all the places that they need to get. And what about same thing with Centerville and warm.
Speaker 2:Springs and Irvington yeah.
Speaker 5:If we were to help make those hubs like really strong places where people can walk, foot traffic, ride their bikes and all of that, I think it could. It would actually do good for our city absolutely um and trying to build up that ability to walk and commute and um and feel safe doing all of that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly, you know, I, I think, um, you know we we started as those five little villages. You know small little towns, right, and I think you can still see the bones of that um left. If you go through irvington or through centerville, like through that like you know main streets of those little villages you can. You still see the remnants of that kind of like small, dense, bustling little town where you know people were because people weren't driving their cars around in 1901 or whatever right.
Speaker 1:Whenever those cities were around? Yeah, before World War II, right.
Speaker 5:When, like Fremont, was founded. I think that Niles actually just celebrated it or they have, like, their birth date. I can't remember, but it's like close to 150 years old or something like that.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, you're exactly right, I mean nowhere is it more obvious than Niles, right, because here it's not just the main street that still has, that you know, remnants of density. But you go out, you know out, two or three blocks, all the way to the park and it's the house lots are small, right, and it's there's, you know it's dense. It's not these giant parking lots and giant, like you know, super wide streets, right, it's, it's actually meant for humans right, it's a human scale, not just purely prioritizing, like the movement of cars as fast as possible.
Speaker 1:That's good.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I love that. I love that. So, um, so, one of the one of the areas that we talked about as being problematic. I like to come to Niles, but to ride my bike with my family, if I take Mallory all the way down, I have to go under these two railroad underpasses that are they're horrible, for I mean, even driving a car down there can be feel a little scary, if you know.
Speaker 5:but to ride a bike down there and especially, you know, I have kids that I'm trying to protect, so it's not easy to get from where I live. I mean, I'm probably less than a, I would say for sure less than a mile, but probably less than half of a mile from where I live right now, but it I have to go way out of my way to find a way around in order just to get down to Niles here.
Speaker 5:Um, but the reason I'm bringing that up is I just want it to be noted that it's problematic and that it's frustrating, but the other thing is is that when I was saying that, you made a note to me that, um, this was something that we were talking about before we started recording. I said you know, I either have to go all the way down to the the, you know the walking bridge or the bike bridge that's down across the elmita creek trail, down by quarry lakes, or we have to go all the way, uh, down walnut to mission and even coming down mission crossing down that way just gets really sketchy, for uh you know young kids riding their bikes yeah, but then you said who suggests a different route, and like that was news for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So I wanted to kind of give a little shout out to an organization called Bike Fremont. So they're like a local advocacy organization and there's another one called Bike East Bay. That's also kind of on a more broad level. But yeah, bike Fremont, we were just talking about that and the route they recommended and it was shared for the Niles Canyon Stroll and Roll. No-transcript.
Speaker 5:And then from there you can catch, like the Alameda Creek Trail or something from there Exactly, yeah.
Speaker 1:Or you can just go down Niles Canyon into Niles. Yeah, it's longer, but at least it's a safe alternative yeah. Yeah, and that's definitely something that, like we have barriers in freemont, right, we have the highways, we have the creek, we have railroads and they kind of, you know, become these barriers that, if we don't do anything about it, like it really narrows down to points where you can cross those barriers. Yeah, yeah that's cool.
Speaker 5:So um kind of back to your story. You got from, you know, cycling to biking yeah and then like, um, but one of the things. So when we ran into each other at Billy Roy's the other day, I found out that you're a part of a commission, part of the city. What you're doing volunteer work for the city. What exactly is that you're doing?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I'm on an appointed commission called the Mobility Commission. So it's like it's purely volunteer, no actual power, but it's appointed by the mayor of a citizen commission to kind of help promote all forms of transportation. It's not just bikes, it's walking bikes, transit drivers and people in wheelchairs or other accessibility issues. And you know we meet with the city staff and we, you know, share our thoughts, our opinions, our experiences. You know we have some input into, you know, things that happen, you know what projects get prioritized, that sort of thing. And yeah, I feel very lucky to be on that. Yeah, on the commission and um, um, yeah I just what was?
Speaker 5:what was it that? What was it? What did it look like? Or what was it exactly that got you to the point where you're like I want to be involved in a commission like this.
Speaker 1:Yeah um, you know, I've I started. I kind of it happened. It started when I moved out of my out of my mom's house, yeah, moved to Brookvale with my girlfriend.
Speaker 1:And you know, it was just an area that was very slightly more dense, more you know, more things around that I could walk to or bike to. I started biking to the train station to go to work in San Jose and I kind of just, you know, started noticing a lot more um riding on like a bike, not not cycling, and I I want to be clear, not everyone makes that same distinction, and I do both.
Speaker 5:I'm glad that you do. I'm glad that you do.
Speaker 2:I wear Lycra on the weekends and I ride at 20 miles an hour, and then I put on a t-shirt and on Monday I'm I'm riding my bike to work, um, but you know, I started noticing those.
Speaker 1:You know kind of things like hey, there's a gap in this bike lane, like this bike lane just ends when we're coming up to this intersection. Or hey, the way this is designed is, you know, it's not safe. Or you know someone drew it up and they thought it was good, but no, no one actually ever, you know, test rode it after they built it and hey and hey, this actually doesn't work very well, or there's all these sorts of things that I just started noticing.
Speaker 1:I started having suggestions and I started participating in all those community outreach events and surveys, and the city does a pretty good job of doing community outreach at all these events the Fremont Arts and Wine Festival or whatever. And I started just talking to them, asking questions, kind of getting more involved. I started going to like city council meetings and that sort of thing good, that's cool.
Speaker 5:Yeah, good for you, that's great. So then the opportunity came up for you to be on this commission.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, one of my, uh, one of my, one of the people I know pretty well, who's, uh, the mother of a bike racer? Okay she was on the commission and she was moving to Sunol and she was like hey, you know this, uh, slots opening up, you should apply for it. Um, and I did, and um, that's cool, yeah, that's awesome, very good.
Speaker 5:Well, I think you'll have to um share some of what we talked about uh with with the uh with with whoever um.
Speaker 5:I think it's great that great that people who are really, truly invested and people who don't just have opinions but actually are the people out there riding their bikes are people in those positions to be able to help influence those decisions that are being made. I think that's really cool. If you need help navigating the local real estate market, contact Petrocelli Homes on Niles Boulevard. Jennifer helps her clients make smart real estate decisions that benefit them in the long run. Reach out to Jennifer today and discover why Petrocelli Homes is the right choice for all of your real estate needs.
Speaker 4:Fremont Bank has been around for 60 years and they sponsor a lot of stuff, and now included on the list of things they sponsor is this podcast. Thank you, fremont Bank. Hey, ricky, so you're going to want to get onto Walnut and you're going to want to head toward the hub? Use the bike path to go past the BART station and then you'll go past the Kaiser and the Raley Shopping Center. Then you'll cross over the intersection and you'll pass by the Smart and Final Shopping Center. Keep going over one more intersection and you'll be able to turn right onto the State Street Plaza. Go through it and that will put you out on State Street. Go up State Street for just a little bit and then turn left onto Capitol Avenue, and that is the best way to bike to one of our sponsors, banter Bookshop on Capitol Avenue in downtown Fremont.
Speaker 1:There's actually a local bike racing team in Fremont called Team Fremont and they were kind of recruiting new riders and they're like hey, you're into cycling, Come join us. And we're definitely amateur level, not pro racers or anything. But I started riding with them and I'm still with them to this day.
Speaker 2:That's cool.
Speaker 1:So I raced bikes um from like 14 or 15 until I was like 18 or 19 so I, I was uh racing, I mean bike racing was brutal, like I was training six days a week wow to keep up in like the lowest level, like amateur.
Speaker 4:How old were you when you?
Speaker 1:were doing that like like a, like high school, like 15 oh, wow like 18 or 19 um yeah, it was, um, it was crazy. Uh, I I love bike racing. Okay, it's probably the most difficult, most like exhilarating thing I've ever done, right like your shoulder, shoulder with like 40 other people going like 25, 30 miles an hour through corners.
Speaker 5:What's the biggest race you've?
Speaker 1:done Like, in terms of like the most people or the most.
Speaker 5:The race that you look at and you're like that's like my pinnacle so far, like that was the race that I felt, like this was just an awesome experience or just felt, I don't know. It's the one that you want to tell people about first um, oh man.
Speaker 1:So I would say how about this, the only race I've actually won? Okay, because I was never, I was never actually all that good okay, I was I was, you know, very into it but I wasn't like to be a like a successful bike racer is pure genetics but yeah, okay, it's probably true there's a yeah, yeah, it was it was down in salinas and it was a a criterium.
Speaker 1:Which is a criterium is like a type of race where you're basically on like a short course I mean like a mile long or so when you're doing laps, um, for like an hour or so, um, as opposed to like a road race, which is like a longer, 50-mile loop or 100-mile point-to-point race, that type of thing. So it's flat laps around some abandoned business park or something.
Speaker 1:It's usually nowhere exciting. Sometimes they're cool downtown criteriums, but this one was kind of boring and on a whim, being the immature 17-year-old. I was like I'm just gonna gun it off the line, just to you know. Play around, you know like, yeah, it wasn't anything that like I wasn't that those types of moves and do not win right.
Speaker 5:You don't win, that's right.
Speaker 2:That by like sprinting from the line.
Speaker 1:But somehow no one reacted in time and I got away and I held that lead lead. It was 30 seconds right and when you're in cycling, like if you're not drafting behind someone, you're at a huge disadvantage. So a big group of people that were, you know there's one person in the wind, it's kind of like a flock of birds right sure you're much more efficient than a solo rider yeah that's, you know ahead of you, um, and somehow I just kept it going for 45 minutes, or however long it was, and they were barely right behind me.
Speaker 1:I could, you know, see them, see the, the, the, the front of the chase group, like you know, around the corner every time I, you know, was on a long straight piece of road and, and you know, it got closer and closer and the last lap, like they were right on me and somehow I still, uh, eat out a win.
Speaker 2:But that was probably.
Speaker 1:That was probably a highlight.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Um.
Speaker 1:I've done some, some cool races. You know there's some road races around that are, um, you know, in, really scenic. You know mountain areas, um, there's another cool criterium in San Francisco on. You know tight streets, tight course, um, anything with hills, that's cool. It's always a lot of fun.
Speaker 5:So my brothers and I, we, so I have two brothers. One is about seven years younger than me and the one's almost 15 years younger than me, and we found ourselves quite a while back. It's actually been seven years, because I just saw Google Photos memories pop up and remind me that this was seven years ago. But we wanted to do visit all of california's national parks in nine days, so it was eight national parks in nine days. We wanted to like do this massive road trip and we started. It was very ambitious and we could have done it. We had planned out.
Speaker 5:Well, it's just that when we got about four parks into it, we were realized that we, um were not really able to enjoy the parks themselves. Like we were just driving the whole time. We'd get to the campsites late at night and then, um, we would get up and do an early hike and then we'd head out. Um, but we brought our bikes with us as well, um, so, anyway, we ended up doing six of the eight national parks. So we did Redwood National Park, lassen, volcanic National Park, yosemite, sequoia, kings Canyon, channel Islands and then Pinnacles, and we decided to go back later and do Death Valley and Joshua Tree.
Speaker 5:But we. It's stupid, stupid is like very stupid. But when we were went to Death Valley and I don't know if you've been there, if anybody you know people listening have been there but we went to Death Valley. There's this place where you can enter the valley when you go going down into Badwater Basin and it's like this 16 mile downhill ride from from the top and you're just going all the way, you're just going downhill for forever. And my brothers, um, got on the bikes and they just rode downhill, um, and we're they were not like good bikes as far as like their road, you know road worthy and stuff, and my brothers were not wearing helmets, I mean it was. It was like the like all the dangerous things that we could have done. And I actually have it on a time-lapse video of coming down from this high part all the way down to the Badwater about 16 miles of just downhill coasting that's awesome and it was a lot of fun.
Speaker 5:Yeah, they did it, not me. I just filmed them so I had it on record in case something happened to them. You said you grew up on Mission near Morrison Canyon. Yeah, right off of Morrison Canyon. I lived there since I was like five.
Speaker 1:My parents moved here right before I was born.
Speaker 5:Okay from Russia, yeah from Russia, Wow.
Speaker 1:What brought them here? Opportunity.
Speaker 5:Work, yeah, work.
Speaker 1:I mean Russia in the 90s wasn't exactly a great place to be, that's right.
Speaker 5:Yeah, yeah. So have you ever visited Russia then?
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah, I used to visit every other year up until I got a little bit yeah. Yeah, not the best place to be now either.
Speaker 5:Okay, okay.
Speaker 1:So I haven't been back in about a decade, but I speak fluent Russian. Wow, yeah, that's awesome when you were living off of near Morrison.
Speaker 5:Canyon there, okay, okay, so I haven't been back in about a decade, but I speak fluent russian and wow, yeah, that's awesome when you were living off of uh, near morrison canyon, like, um, what do you remember as being enjoyable about that neighborhood to live in?
Speaker 1:you know, one thing I really liked about the neighborhood was um I mean it was kind of really quiet, you know, not a lot of things going on really residential, but um the abandoned railroad tracks okay uh, that go up uh, from. You know like they go that big bridge across mission um, and then you know it goes out north up to niles canyon. You know there's no tracks there anymore. It's been abandoned for forever. But it's like a unofficial walking trail that's cool.
Speaker 1:It's like right by my house. That's cool, my old house, old house, and yeah, yeah, I really love that when I was a little kid in.
Speaker 5:So I was born in Wisconsin and um lived there until I was about nine or 10. Um, but there was a railroad tracks that was near my house that we would go. So we would. There was a store that we would go get our groceries at and we would walk up the road from our house and take the railroad tracks on. They were not abandoned.
Speaker 5:So there were many times that my parents would be like, okay, get off the tracks. And we'd have to get off in order for the trains go by. Uh, but we didn't have to in order to get to the um, in order to get to the grocery store. We didn't have to stay on the tracks very long, but I do remember as a child like the railroad tracks being a fun place to like take a walk as a family, to go to the store and stuff. But you had the fortune of not having or having abandoned railroad tracks to walk on. So that's great. Tell me a little bit about your life, how you grew up here in Fremont, what were some of the things you know that brought you into REI, that when I first met you.
Speaker 1:And then let's go from there, yeah, uh, so I was born and raised in Fremont, um, I had. I feel like I have had a pretty normal childhood all things considered. Uh, when we met at REI, I was um at alumni college and. I was working at Campo de Bocce, right across the street from. Rei at the Italian restaurant Bocce Place. It's unfortunately closed now. And just like REI is now, unfortunately.
Speaker 5:I know Pour one out for that. So you worked there at Campo di Bocce? Yeah, okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and just while I was in college, while I was at Ohlone, I was just on a huge hiking and backpacking. All the stuff all kick. Yeah, I was just on on all of that where did you like to?
Speaker 5:where did you like to go? What were some of your favorite places to hike or backpack? I?
Speaker 1:mean all time go is mission peak okay, I got it like I know some people hate it like some, like some people. You know it's hot. Yeah, not a lot of shade.
Speaker 5:Yeah, you know it gets windy at the top, but I think a lot of those it's amazing well, the wind maybe not so much, but I was gonna say a lot of those other things are are due to the people's choices as to what time they go yeah, that's true too, because I've been there in all those conditions as well, but I think most of the time, if I was ever up there in a hot, exposed day, it was because I made the bad choice of leaving late in the in the in the daytime when it was going to be hot anyway yeah, you gotta go early in the morning.
Speaker 1:You gotta go on a weekday, if you can. You gotta go, like you know, maybe sometimes even in the evening it's good yeah, that's right it can be a good time um, actually there was a.
Speaker 5:There's another rabbit trail, but there was a russian group that used to meet up there, like on wednesday nights. It was like dude, did you go?
Speaker 1:there. So I, I I've been there once but my mom is like like, not like the lead organizer or anything, but she's like part of the core group there.
Speaker 5:Okay, yeah, that's so funny, yeah, no, I I. I kind of put it all together just because it was one time I was hiking back and all these people are russian and then I stopped one of them and I was like they're like, yeah, we go up there. I think at the time this was years ago, but it was like at the time it was like every wednesday night they go up there, and they were still going is it every, every wednesday?
Speaker 1:I mean, I don't want to say rain or shine, but like those russians are crazy man so what do they do like?
Speaker 5:what is that they?
Speaker 1:go up there that you know the little bathroom where the two trails merge. There's like some benches there. Uh, they uh bring a bunch of food up. They play like guitars and sing songs and like that is so cool. It's wild it's crazy, it makes no sense, but uh, yeah, uh that's awesome, yeah, so yeah.
Speaker 5:When you were saying, uh, mission peak, and you're russian, I was like, wait a minute. I have a vague memory of that. That's funny. I'll have to go up there on a Wednesday night. We'll have to get some footage for the podcast of them up there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know what time the park technically closes, so no, one said anything.
Speaker 5:That's right. Well, you know, the thing is is there's actually and I've never actually camped there, but there is backpackingground, yeah, campsite, like right behind the peak, like yeah, I think it's called like eagle, eagle spring, I think, eagle yeah, something like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've I've actually camped there. Okay, um, how was that? Part of is amazing. Part of the reason I like mission peak so much is because it's actually the first part of my favorite backpacking trip which is the ohlone trail del val, and have you done that a couple times. Yeah, I've done it twice. I've done it once solo in two days like one night, and then I went with some friends for two nights. Okay, so I think from.
Speaker 5:I was just talking with some friends about this. So this is one of the things that I did when I worked for REI is I would help everyone get ready for their trips, wherever they would go, and so I'd help them. I'd pull out a map and plan it. I think I planned a number of trips for people doing the Ohlone Wilderness Trail and you can go from Del Val to Sonol or all the way to Mission Peak, or you can do the opposite you can go from Mission Peak all the way out to Del.
Speaker 1:Val. I've done it from Mission Peak to Del Val of want to do. I was actually thinking about doing it um this weekend oh really yeah and then uh it, it rained, so I was like no, so saturday was horrible.
Speaker 5:Yeah, it was terrible, so I was actually camping at del val on on um. We went out thursday night and I had I had campsite for th Thursday and Friday night at DelVal and we stayed late Thursday night or Friday night. But I had been looking at the forecast and I was like I'm not gonna be packing up in the rain, so we we stayed Thursday night and then late Friday night and it got out before the park closed and then it poured rain on Saturday. But I don't think I'd want to go uh in the rain either.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm not that kind of crazy.
Speaker 5:So so, yeah, so Ohlone, the Ohlone wilderness uh trail, you can get there from um Michigan. I've never done it, but I've seen pictures and I've talked to people who've done it. Uh, what are some of your favorite things about that?
Speaker 1:trail. Um, I mean, I like first first of all how close it is like you know I don't want to drive three hours out to wherever to go on a backpacking trip. That just doesn't seem sure to me. Yeah, I like being able to just like, basically, you know, go right outside and start hiking, that's right I love the. It starts with a big challenge. Right, you start with mission peak. It's a nice little intro to it.
Speaker 1:And I love just how freaking empty it is Like once you're out there, once you're past Sunol, Sunol Regional. Wilderness it's just there's I. Literally the first time I went, I went solo. I don't think I spoke or saw a single person for like over 24 hours.
Speaker 5:Wow, that's awesome yeah.
Speaker 1:I camp like right in Sonol and I woke up and I like, basically after Sonol regional wilderness, you don't see anyone until you're right at like, right at the lake in Del Val.
Speaker 5:That's cool.
Speaker 1:And that's like, that's awesome, because you're like, you're right there, you're like you can see your house from there, basically.
Speaker 5:That's awesome. Middle of nowhere that's cool, I think. The one, two things that I would note, in case anybody's listening to this and gets the idea that they want to go, which I think they should. But number one, it is those campsites you have to get registrations for. So you can't just like I'm going to go tonight and go without preparation. I think they've changed it to an online yeah, service.
Speaker 1:Well, kind of I would say. The only way you can do it if you want, if you don't have reservation, is you're ready to go 30 miles in one day yeah, that's actually is, they do an ultra marathon, or at least they did oh yeah, I remember that they used to do an event yeah, um from mission piquedale valley that's right in one day and my mom actually did that oh wow man your mom yeah, she's like leading all the the Russian crazies and then also running.
Speaker 5:That's awesome.
Speaker 1:Yeah, her first ultra marathon was more or less on a whim, and the longest run she did before that was a half marathon. Wow.
Speaker 5:Wow, that's really cool. Yeah, that's a great. I think it's a great trail. Yeah, I actually had a friend of mine that did it in one day because she wanted to do it as like a personal challenge. I think she was turning 30 or something like that. She was like this is my goal. I want to do the Ohlone Wilderness Trail in one day. So I think from Del Val to Senol is about 22 miles, and then I think the extra.
Speaker 5:I think it's an extra like six or seven miles to Mission Peak. So I think it's like overall like it's 28 miles I think, if you yeah, 20 is what I saw on the map.
Speaker 1:I think once you actually you know, do it and you you know, zigzag a little bit, you can get to 30 pretty easily.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but it's right around there. That's good you know, three-day hike.
Speaker 1:If you're, you know, okay, a moderate hiker, I think is great. Okay, very cool.
Speaker 5:I'm going to kind of wrap things up a little bit, but I was going to just kind of go a little bit different direction and I'm kind of curious. So I find that a lot of people move to the Bay Area for tech jobs. I find that a lot of people come from all over the world to come here to work for tech jobs and then I find that there are I think it's interesting to talk to people who've grown up here and have been here for a long period of time. I know that your parents you said your parents moved here before you were born for opportunity that maybe they didn't have in Russia, or more of an opportunity that they would have here than they did in Russia. But I always find it interesting to hear what it was like for people who, for kids who grew up here.
Speaker 5:And I think there's two parts to this. I guess question that I'm getting to is that you don't have to get into what you do for work or whatever, but you do work in the tech industry Broadly speaking yeah, Broadly speaking okay.
Speaker 5:So I just find it interesting that a lot of times people grow up here and tech is not what they pursue. Growing up here, they'll find retail work or maybe service industry or whatever. What was it that got you into what you're doing now? And then I think, secondly, I think one of the other, and maybe I should wait and ask the second part of this question, but I'll go ahead and throw it out there so you can be thinking about it.
Speaker 5:I think it's people your age, kind of that millennial generation, the younger, the 20s to early 30s. I find that when we've asked around, we've done minimal surveys or minimal conversations with people, they don't find Fremont to be a great place to stay. I think Fremont ends up being a great place for families kind of like, maybe older parents, middle-aged parents and then young kids. But when you get into that millennial age, gen z age, like I don't, I feel like a lot of those, uh, people your age just don't end up staying around fremont. And so I'm just curious what are your thoughts about, like, what is it that got you into doing tech? Broadly speaking?
Speaker 5:and then, what is it that you feel about being somebody your age living here in Fremont?
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, I grew up always being a tech-minded person. Right, I was, you know. I don't remember a time where I wasn't into technology of some sort. So it came naturally to me, I think, wanting to do something, you know, related to tech. I, you know, found my passion at Ohlone College with like networking. So, like you know, my passion at albany college with like networking. So, like you know, making better network.
Speaker 1:Uh, it's not, so not not not to oversimplify, but I basically, I basically do that, but for uh, a tech company you know, at events and at their events and trade shows and that sort of thing.
Speaker 1:So I get to travel quite a bit, which is nice. Um, you know, I think what kind of what's kept me in freremont so far is obviously like family, right, like my grandparents live here, my, my mom lives here. Um, like you know, all my friends live here. Um, so I, you know, I think that's a big part of it, like I would love to move to somewhere else and you know, kind of experienced that. But I love Fremont right, like it is quiet, that. But I love fremont, right like it is quiet, but also like bart's right here, and I can go to that stuff whenever I want, or down to oakland or san jose or whatever like it's always.
Speaker 1:It's not, it's not too far from anything um and it is, you know, pretty quiet and um and and calm. Yeah, for the most part right yeah, I think a lot it.
Speaker 5:I think a lot of those opinions probably depend on the type of environment that people are looking for. You know, if you are looking for something that's always hopping and always having, you have many options to choose from and you can, you know, do all these things. I think that Fremont does have options and I think there are great places for free for people to enjoy being, you know, out and about in fremont. But I think if you're looking for like a city life, like san francisco, you're not going to get it.
Speaker 5:But, like you said, you're close enough to where you can go downtown san francisco or you go downtown um san jose and enjoy um being in those kind of communities.
Speaker 1:Yeah, fremont's pretty quiet for the size of city that it is, but it beats your sleepy suburb that doesn't even allow commercial buildings at all. They're just purely residential, just like houses after houses. It's got character, it's got culture, it's got all these things going for it. I think still, even though I guess if you were comparing it to a city that's been around for longer, that's more urban, it doesn't quite compare. But yeah, I don't think it needs to right. It's not not everyone wants that and I I love that I'm.
Speaker 2:I consider myself an urbanist you know in every sense of that word.
Speaker 1:I love being able to visit, you know, Europe for work. Where I can, you know, you know, be in these like super dense cities that are super lively and bustling? Um, but you know, like I think, I think Fremont's great too.
Speaker 5:Yeah, that's great, that's great. So, um, I guess maybe final question, like what, um, as you look forward to the life ahead, the next five years, 10 years, 20 years, what is it that you hope to do? What would you like to accomplish with, with your life? What would you enjoy? Maybe, let's just say, you stayed in Fremont long-term, like what are? Some of the things that you would love to see happen around here.
Speaker 1:You know I would love to, to kind of see a city that's more, um, less, car centric. You know, I think that's that's something that'd be great for me. Personally, I love that, but I think it'd be great for just our community, our society as a whole, right, having more places that we can, you know, meet and gather and, you know, enjoy our life in. I think we are on our way to, you know, being a very safe city, um, in terms of, you know, our, our, our, streets. We're doing a great job. We're already a very safe city compared to, you know, the people around us.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:Um, I think you know continuing on that path, um, and I would love to see more. You know more options for transit, right? I like our bus system is not very good, not very great it's true.
Speaker 1:No, you're not going to use it unless you're you're stuck, unless that's your only option yeah, although I did actually take it to mission peak this weekend. Okay, uh, yeah, I live right on fremont boulevard and nice took me all the way to mission peak, so that's great, you know, I I try to, I try to use the bus nice uh, sometimes, you know, but I think we need more options too, I was just in a city in Germany for work, uh, last month, and it's a city slightly larger than than Fremont, but they've got full Metro and tram system everywhere.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's like, well, why can't we have that in Fremont? Yeah, yeah, that's good, that's good.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I actually. The other night it was cold and windy and my wife was trying to get some stuff done at the house, trying to clean up a little bit. My son was kind of reading, and then I have almost a two-year-old so not quite two years old, but he was super rambunctious and you know, my wife was like maybe you could do something with him. And it was cold and windy outside so he wanted to go outside and the space inside was a little too small. So I just said let's go for a train ride, let's just go. You know he loves Thomas the train, and so I was like let's just go for a train ride. So we rode over to the BART station and hopped on the train and I was like I don't even know where we're going, like I don't know what we're going to do, but all I know is that we're going to ride on a train and he's going to love it, and you know. So we hopped on.
Speaker 5:This was like I'm going to go down to the Embarcadero, go down to San Francisco, and then come back, you know, and just ride the train back and forth and point out all the cool things on the way down there.
Speaker 5:Anyway, we ended up going down to San Jose, to our friend's house, and I, like rode the BART that you know. Here I am with my toddler. We rode from Fremont station down to uh Milpitas and then hopped on the VTA and took that over, you know, towards like, um, uh, great America, and I got on another VTA and went down to Japantown. It took us, I don't know, maybe an hour and 20 minutes to get there, but we rode the whole way and had a good old time. Um, yeah, it took a lot of time, but I think it was a lot of fun being able to just say I took my baby in a train down to San Jose and then we spent some time with them, maybe an hour down there, and it was dark by the time we left the house, and so they were like, do you want us to just take you to the Berryessa BART station?
Speaker 5:And that way you can just shoot back up to Fremont. I was like, oh man, that would save a lot of time. And so anyway they did, they gave us a ride over to Berryessa and we rode up. But you know, I do think that having that transit infrastructure whether it's a BART or whatever it is around here would be fantastic, and I think maybe stepping up the bus opportunities as well would be really good, Exactly, yeah, I can't wait for the San Jose extension of BART right once it goes into downtown, they're going right down to Santa Pedro Square, I think right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're going through downtown all the way to Dyrton Station, which is like the main train station Amtrak.
Speaker 2:yeah, cal Train.
Speaker 1:Amtrak go, you can go anywhere that's cool from there, yeah, that'd be great. Uh, it's going to be awesome yeah, I think it's great, daniel.
Speaker 5:Thanks for joining me, man, this has been really cool thanks for having me, yeah it's been good catching up with you from years ago and, um, hopefully we it's not years before we see each other again. We'll get to cross paths along the way, so so thanks for joining me. Keep in touch.
Speaker 3:This episode was hosted and produced by Ricky B. I'm Gary Williams, andrew Kvet is the. We had to catch one more thing before we go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm like Steve Jobs. One more thing. If it's still May when this comes out. Happy bike month everyone. May is bike month and City of Fremont, you know, does some cool things, uh for that.
Speaker 5:Yeah, what are some of the things that come to your mind, that, uh, that people could take advantage of?
Speaker 1:that uh three things. First of all, actually today is a city council meeting where they're gonna, you know, do a quick like ceremony for uh celebrating bike month. Okay, um, this saturday, may 11th I don't know if it's too late you know what?
Speaker 5:I'm planning on putting this out on May 10th. So okay, perfect.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so people are listening to it when it comes out on May 10th, then they can catch this Perfect May 11th, there is a ribbon cutting ceremony for Fremont's latest protected intersection at Liberty street and Walnut Avenue as part of the extension of Walnut out towards Fremont. So that's exciting. I think that's part of the extension of walnut out towards fremont, um, so that's exciting. I think that's in the morning and there's a bit of a bike ride tour of bike infrastructure as part of that.
Speaker 1:Um, I think info is on the city website and may 16th is bike to wherever day, nice, formerly known as bike to work day. Yes, bike to wherever For those who still bike to work, yeah, or anywhere yeah.
Speaker 5:That's awesome. Well, that's good, happy Bike Month.
Speaker 1:Yeah, happy Bike Month.
Speaker 5:Yeah, enjoy getting out and finding places.
Speaker 3:Scheduling and pre-interviews by Sarah S. Be sure to subscribe wherever it is that you listen so you don't miss an episode. You can find everything we make, the podcast and all of our social media links at thefremontpodcastcom. Join us next week on the Fremont Podcast.
Speaker 2:This is a Muggins Media Podcast. You.