Any bike experts?

[Jonathan Whatley]

Hey – and this brings to mind to the Ikea "hacking" culture Johann discussed – there's an apparently earnest and active webboard bigboxbikes.com. "Support for those who ride BigBox Bicycles including WalMart and Target You don't HAVE to spend $1000 to enjoy bicycling!"

In other news, there's an excellent path for bicycling, inline skating, walking and jogging that crosses my hometown east to west. This happened there this week:

Mattie McPhee was peacefully jogging along Martin Goodman Trail on Friday afternoon when a car ad beneath her feet stopped her cold.

“NISSAN, 4 DAYS ONLY,” said the red and white letters on the pavement. “AUG. 22-25, ADDITIONAL $1000 OFF, LIMITED TIME.”

Just above the letters, an arrow pointed McPhee towards a nearby promotional event by the car brand being held at Ontario Place.

The 20-year-old, who doesn’t drive, was aghast.

“They’re wrecking this beautiful path,” she said. “We’re supposed to be enjoying nature and they’re corrupting it with this ugly Nissan sign.”

At least eight Nissan ads promoting a car sale were seen plastered along the trail Friday — the same day the city unveiled a new mural inside the rainbow tunnel along the Don Valley Parkway, meant to discourage graffiti in public spaces.

The city says Nissan was never granted permission to advertise on city parkland.

“The installations were not authorized,” said Wynna Brown, the city’s manager of media relations and issues management, in an email. She added the manufacturer could be fined for the ads. “Staff are investigating and they will be removed.”

Way to represent car culture there, allegedly defacing a park.