Gabe, that was great! It never ceases to amaze me how much money people spend on their bikes and how little they ride them. I'll only buy used bikes, so all these low mile bikes are a godsend to me, but as you mentioned, they're all the wrong kinds of bikes! I wanted a cheap standard to ride to work, that was as low maintenance as possible, because I didn't want to have to maintain it every other weekend. There are so few bikes that meet this criteria. Some cruisers did, but I don't want to have to clean all that chrome, and they're not so cheap used either. I ended up with a 1991 Nighthawk 750, possibly the most boring motorcycle ever made. The longer I own this thing, the more I appreciate it. When I rode it home from the old owners house, I'd thought I'd made a mistake. But after a few hours in the garage undoing his sloppy maintenance, and adding useful accessories such as saddlebags, a plexifairing, a backrest, a luggage rack, and god forbid, a centerstand, I've got an air-cooled bike, with hydraulically-adjusted valves, thats built like a tank. I change the oil regularly, lube the chain and thats it. I certainly don't lust after it, bikini-clad hot chicks completely ignore me (that could be me more than the bike though) but this bike really grows on you, because it'll do pretty much anything I ask of it, with a minimum of fuss. I take it out occasionally on a weekend, but I use it primarily for commuting, here in the Detroit area. I do about 10,000 mile a year on it. It never misses a beat. I get about 50 mpg, city cycle, it runs on joe-schmo dino oil, takes regular 87 gas, and cost me a whopping $2000. Cheap enough, in fact, for me to buy a used VFR, with the money I had left over from selling my previous bike!
As much as I like the VFR, I think I would much prefer something like the Nighthawk, only with a more powerful engine and better brakes and suspension. But, as you mentioned, those bikes are only really available in Europe. There are some naked/standards sold here, but few that are capable of having a windshield, bags and a centerstand fitted. Call me boring, but I want my bike to be as versatile as possible!
Maybe you can answer me this......Why don't all street bikes have a centerstand (makes maintenance 100% easier) and hydraulically adjusted valves? Valve adjusting is a time-consuming pain which most people are not going to do, and if Honda can put it on a 15 year old standard bike, why not on the latest crop of bikes?
Nice article, by the way. Alas, you're right, until us Americans look at motorcycles as being fun machines AND transportation, we are going to receive bikes here that serve up the adrenaline fix or the quest for more chrome and louder pipes. Practicality, for the time being, is being mostly ignored.