Cycling en masse

There were hundreds already gathered outside the Rooster Cafe in Costa Mesa by sundown the last Friday in April. Some chatted with friends over cans of beer, one guy rolled around on a 5-foot-tall unicycle, others compared the slick paint jobs and elegant simplicity of their fixed-gear bicycles.

There were no registration tables, no posters, no charity to benefit. The crowd of energetic, mustachioed 20-somethings had the appearance of a grown-up “Lord of the Flies” camp.

A group of self-appointed organizers were unmistakable. Clad in neon green vests purchased for the occasion, and toting a bullhorn they passed among each other, the leaders took charge, and got everyone ready to ride down the city’s main streets.

Tonight, as the sun goes down, hundreds of riders will congregate again in Costa Mesa for the Orange County Critical Mass, a monthly bike ride with a very distinctive counterculture and an international scope.

People who were alive when the atom bomb was dropped probably would get a little nervous hearing the expression “Critical Mass.” In fact, most of the Greatest Generation probably know the phrase refers to the amount of neutrons necessary to start a nuclear chain reaction.

But for the younger generations that expression has another meaning. It’s a happening organized by word-of-mouth featuring hundreds of bicycle enthusiasts taking over main thoroughfares once a month Fridays in towns like Costa Mesa around the world.

The ride initially became popular as a way to get cars to recognize cyclists, but since its inception in about the early- to mid-’90s there have been two conflicting schools of thought on how that should be accomplished. Nowhere is that schism more evident than Costa Mesa where some riders see the event as a platform to show how law-abiding and polite cyclists can be, and others see it as an opportunity to demonstrate the fearsome anarchy that a group of like-minded individuals can create.

“It’s raw. It’s unruly. They don’t care about anything,” said Steve Siglin, about the latter group.

Siglin, who has taken part in Costa Mesa’s Critical Mass since before its most recent incarnation — “back when it used to be a group of six or seven riders who would meet at airplane park” — now helps organize the ride.

For the past couple months the Costa Mesa police have collaborated with the ride organizers and sent out motorcycles, cruisers and trucks to monitor the participants. In March, the police were ubiquitous. Multiple officers waited at every intersection for the group to pass by, and others flanked the pack, cordoning them off from the car traffic. Sirens sounded, tickets were issued, riders felt stifled and suffocated.

Sgt. Vic Bakkila, who organized the police response, says the ride has gotten much more tame since then, and he’s gradually scaling back the police presence.

“The kids are very cooperative. There are a few guys who try to be a little more edgy and a little more radical, but the guys who organize it don’t want anything to do with them,” Bakkila said.

The first time Bakkila noticed the ride a few months ago, he and his staff had no idea what it was and were unprepared to deal with it, but now Head Organizer Mike Harris, a part-owner of Detroit Bar, works with the police every month to foster a cooperative relationship between both parties, instead of a combative one. Last month he sent out two motorcycle cops and a truck that kept an eye on the riders and occasionally blocked off roads to allow the riders to pass smoothly through red lights.

“I commend them for being as supportive and as accommodating as they are,” Harris said.

Harris was the man most responsible for reigniting the Critical Mass in Costa Mesa. He took the project on after his brother and a close friend were hit by cars while riding their bikes within a half-mile of each other, in a half-hour time period.

Some riders consider the cooperation with the police to be a betrayal of the ride’s true spirit, though. Riders need to be able to assert their own rights in traffic, without the help of the police, says Branden Burch, a dedicated Critical Masser and president of the OCC bike club.

“It’s not like Critical Mass happens every day. I think the police should be tolerating people running red lights so that the group can stay together. It’s a demonstration,” Burch said.

Many of the riders on March’s Critical Mass expressed the same sentiment, as the police forced the riders to stop at every red light, fragmenting the pack and slowing the ride to a grudging crawl. Angry riders could be heard voicing their disdain for the unwanted authority throughout the duration of the ride.

Costa Mesa’s Critical Mass is relatively mild compared with others around the state. In Santa Cruz, for instance, the group of riders sometimes cruises in circles in the middle of intersections, blocking traffic and frustrating drivers., In Los Angeles, there was an incident where a cyclist was hit by a police cruiser, and a small riot ensued.

ALAN BLANK may be reached at (714) 966-4623 or at alan.blank@latimes.com.