I'm fairly anti-car myself, But factor in cycling is not practical transportation for most people. It targets a certain demographic, people who have the physical ability to actually cycle. What about those who cannot, what about disabled people? Even if you are fit, anything more that 10 miles a day is difficult.
I'm a massive fan of public transit, however, as an American this means I can only live in a handful of cities, but it's worth it .
When I lived in LA I was miserable, driving to work every single day, driving in a city is not enjoyable. So I moved, but it's impractical for someone like me to ride the bike to work. My office doesn't offer gyms, and I can't bike in sweating.
As for safety, riding the Metro can't be beat. The worst of both worlds is our current system where bikes compete with cars for a limited set of roads.
If I could build my own city from scratch, I would ban all cars completely. Design something like a 5 mile circle, and build upward.
24/7 slow metro lines allow for commutes within the city. Then have side walks and bike paths covering other commutes. Have every pathway so well lit, 3am is as safe as 3pm.
Then have garages on the city outskirts if you need to own a car to commute out of town.
I can imagine this already existing in Europe. Amsterdam felt very close.
> cycling is not practical transportation for most people. It targets a certain demographic, people who have the physical ability to actually cycle.
That's… most people.
Like I get it, we have an obesity epidemic, but fat people can ride bicycles. It's not unusual. And a lot of them start shedding pounds fast once you get them out of the automated wheeled easy-chairs we call "cars."
For myself cycling takes about twice as long. Assuming a peak physical condition, then driving.
Taking the metro is a bit faster than cycling, I consider myself to be an okay shape. I still need to lose about 20 lb to get to where I want to be, and I still don't think I'd be up to the challenge of hopping on a bike for all my commuting needs.
If you want to propose something, you have to factor in what people are willing to actually do. The typical overweight American, it's not going to be open to biking 4 hours a day to get to and from work.
This hits on an interesting fundamental that is often skipped when talking about bike infrastructure. Zoning. If you live in a country/area where living, working, recreational activities and shopping all happen in distinct areas, like it does in most cities built for cars, the distances traveled are often too far for the average person. In this case you are kind of right that investing in public transport might be more urgent. To become a true cycling city, municipalities also have to allow for more mixed use development to shorten distances.
This might be the only comment that address my point. Imagine if we had mixed use high rises, 1st floor is retail , 3-5 floors are apartments and 5-8 floors offices.
I could live an elevator ride away from work, and still buy groceries without ever going outside!
Unfortunately in America we have business zoning and residential zoning, ensuring we all have to commute miles to do anything. I want mixed zoning. I want to walk to work, and then walk to the bar afterwards.
Hell, biking would only be for longer commutes in this dream.
Get an electric bike or scooter. The fact that the government is willing to offer thousands of dollars in subsidies for electric cars, when that amount could buy the best of the best electric bike or scooter is insane.
What are the subsidies up to now, $12,500 per car? I haven't spent that on bikes all my life, and it's been my primary transport. Paid retail for all of it, too, of course.
I was referring to the assertion that "most people [cannot] ride a bicycle." Nobody, overweight or not, is going to bike 4 hours a day to get to and from work, that's outside the scope of what we were discussing.
It's not necessarily about physical disabilities. Think about 1 parent with 2 young children and 3 bags of groceries. And that roughly fits a LOT of folks. Maybe if both your house and the grocery store (or other destination) are within 1-2km of a mass-transit stop you can use that - otherwise it's pretty much personal car/bus. And if that's the case for one particular trip, you still need to have this option for the others.
It's a norm to see mothers riding two children on a bike here in Tokyo. Grocery stores are typically in walking distance, so no need for the bike ride for that.
Note that reliance on cars leads to grocery stores not being within walking/biking distance, and less cars (and denser cities) leads to more livable cities.
The goal is to make it possible to bike places safely, which makes it easier to transition from reliance on cars to better forms of transportation. No one is suggesting that we switch everything over to bikes right now.
This is such a weird argument.
Many people can't drive (minors, elderly, handicapped, health issues, etc.), and we still shade a ton of money on car infrastructure.
This is not a zero-sum game; more cyclist means fewer cars, which means better services/life for people who need to drive.
And we are talking about $280 Million; that's a piss in a bucket for a city like Milan.
> Many people can't drive (minors, elderly, handicapped, health issues, etc.), and we still shade a ton of money on car infrastructure.
Most of those who can't drive also couldn't get very far on a bike on their own. They can, however, ride in a car (or bus) driven by someone else, making use of that same infrastructure. Bikes are not typically designed to carry passengers.
> Most people between age 7 and 16/17/18 can ride a bike, but not drive a car.
In most of the US 16-year-olds can get a full driver's license and drive a car on their own, assuming they have access to one. Most parents these days wouldn't let a 7-year-old travel far without a chaperone by any mode of transportation even if they are physically capable. (Lack of "safe" biking infrastructure is far from the only risk factor.) But yes, in the very short window in the early teens between not being trusted to be out on your own safely and acquiring a driver's license and car a bike can be more accessible when traveling solo or with others of similar age and maturity.
> Younger children can be a passenger on a bike.
One younger child can be a passenger on a bike, at the expense of extra effort on the part of the rider providing the propulsion. Perhaps two if they are both small. (Don't forget that you'll need to bring extra cargo as well—especially if the passenger(s) are very young.) Beyond that you're going to want a larger vehicle with its own power supply, unless your goal has more to do with riding bikes than getting to your destination.
How many American 16/17 year olds can afford a car? Perhaps more than I realized.
In Britain the insurance cost is so high it's prohibitive for many teenagers. Although based on a quick search, it's significantly less than the average American teenagers pay. Perhaps that shows the lack of alternatives Americans have -- "Teenagers pay an average of $371 a month for an individual car insurance policy" yet "Nationwide, 76.3% of high school students aged ≥16 years reported having driven during the 30 days before the survey".
In the UK, "people in the 17-to-19 age group ... pay ... an average cost of £752 a year" ($1000/year, $85/month), yet only ~20% of licensed school/university students use a car to get to education. (I can't find statistics just for 17-18 year olds. Driving to "high school" would be extremely rare, maybe 1% -- it's not even mentioned in the surveys.)
Nowadays, many people in Denmark using bicycles to carry a child have upgraded to e-bikes. Larger bikes (e.g. "Christiania cycle") to carry multiple children have been electric a while longer, although these are expensive.
A cheap used car isn't necessarily a huge expense (they start around $3-4k in my area, despite the current shortages), and you don't necessarily need an individual policy or even your own car if you can borrow a family vehicle. It isn't free but many in this age range would have a summer job which could easily cover the expense.
When I was in high school some decades ago the upperclassman were allowed to drive themselves, and many did. I was not one of them, being rather young for my grade, but I can easily understand the appeal of a 16-minute car trip (never mind the prestige among your classmates) vs. the 45+ minutes I spent on the bus each way.
E-bikes are a nice middle ground but many have warnings discouraging their use by minors (sometimes backed by local rules—eight states limit unsupervised use of e-bikes to those 14 and older) and the decent ones (new) can cost almost as much as a used car.
> In most of the US 16-year-olds can get a full driver's license and drive a car on their own, assuming they have access to one.
No, in 4 states that's true (and while some states have 16½ or 16¾ requirements, it's still less than half where it is true at some point before 17.) A few decades ago before provisional driver’s license rules for younger drivers became common this was true, but full licenses have moved up in age a bit.
Okay, perhaps "full driver's license" was excessively optimistic. I was able to obtain my full license well before 17; I hadn't realized we'd regressed quite so far.
Still, the provisional or restricted license you can get before 17 in 49 states (or at 17 in New Jersey) is enough to drive yourself around without a chaperone, even if it falls short of the freedom of a full license. Depending on the state you may or may not be able to carry multiple passengers or drive at night. And a large majority of states (34 vs. 15—with no data on Vermont) do still allow full licenses at 17 or earlier, with the remainder making you wait until 17½ or 18.
There's bicycles made with accessibility options; tricycles, arm-propelled bikes (sometimes in the form of clip-on accessories for wheelchairs), e-bikes in all shapes and sizes, scooters, etc. I mean that doesn't make it an option for everyone, and a large percentage of people will continue to depend on cars, but at least here in NL with a good bike infrastructure, you see plenty of people on adjusted bicycles getting around, retaining their independence, and reducing their dependence on e.g. reserved parking spaces (which may still be further away from their destination than they can reach with adjusted bikes).
Anyway, e-bikes are great. My girlfriend (genetic joint issues) was able to join me doing ~20 kilometers on one of the islands thanks to being able to rent an e-bike for €25 for the day or thereabouts. I mean, there were even hills and the like there, she would not have been able to do even a quarter of the distance on a regular bike.
If more people cycle, then thoes with special needs that need a car will have less traffic and more parking space available, thus improving their experience.
People using public transit like busses will also have less problems since busses won't be stuck in traffic as much.
Disability comes in many forms. Many disabled people cannot legally drive but can cycle. Others cannot walk easily but can use a specialised bike. And yes, some can drive but not walk or cycle. But this idea that pro-bike = anti-disabled does not hold up.
More generally, if we want to make life easier for those who can only drive, we should get the able-bodied out of their cars to ease congestion.
I read these types of arguments a lot from people who live in places where cycling is not the norm. They tend to read like strange nitpicks in light of how common it is for people of ages to cycle in different types of weather. 5 miles doesn't seem like that far to cycle. I am by no means an avid cyclist myself - for longer trips I take public transport. But I see plenty of people cycling even while I am on the train, and that's the nice thing: good cycling infrastructure allows us to choose what is most convenient for us on any given day or destination.
"But what about people who can't cycle?" - Most people can cycle. Besides, what about people who can't drive cars? Why do we invest in extensive car infrastructure when some people can't drive cars, either?
"But what about the weather?" - Some people in my city don't like cycling on a rainy day, so they take a bus or drive that day. Tomorrow, when it's not raining, they'll cycle. This still results in less cars and more cyclists. Most of us don't live in perpetual rain or snow. Not to mention the fact that plenty of people don't seem to mind cycling in the rain or snow at all, so they utilize the cycling infrastructure year-round. "Sometimes the weather is bad" is not an excuse for avoiding bike infrastructure, in my opinion.
I agree on cities should be laid out in a way that encourages and enables cycling. I think building safe cycling infrastructure, such as dedicated paths for cyclists (separated from cars) is a good start.
I sympathize, but don't really feel like your comment addresses anything I said. Maybe I didn't get my message across very well in my comment, so I'll try to clarify it here:
My point is not that all Americans should suddenly start cycling everywhere at all times. That's unrealistic and undesirable. I get the impression that you're viewing this as some kind of all-or-nothing thing, where as soon as you build a bike path people will be forced to exclusively cycle and not walk, or drive, or use public transport.
My point is simply that building cycling infrastructure that would support people who'd like to cycle some or all of the time is a good thing. Me not wanting to cycle in snow doesn't mean my neighbor doesn't want to cycle in snow, and luckily he and others like him (of which there seem to be plenty) have a bike path to do so safely and easily.
I think it's relatively safe to say if people weren't worried about getting hit by a car, or falling into a pothole, or crashing into a pedestrian, or getting yelled at for being on the road, _more_ of them would choose to use a bike and experience the benefits of cycling.
As a sidenote, I'd also like to point out that you don't have to be super fit to cycle, although cycling can certainly help improve fitness over time. There are bikes built for a more relaxed ride, as well as bikes with electric assist. It is possible to pedal as fast as you want, and go for whatever distances one is comfortable with.
I'm on your side, infact I'm considering nearby bike paths for my next apartment.
At the same time, unless you radically redesigned American cities, cycling commuting won't work. City layouts take decades to change, even if people want change. I don't see a push for more compact cities in America ( luckily this is just one country, I already have work auth for at least 1 other place).
I plan on getting a cheap Fixie bike next, I had an insane amount of fun with a 100$ Big Lots bike a few years back.
I hope you enjoy your Fixie (and find an apartment with nice bike paths!) I have a little folding Brompton that's served me well over the years, and a beefier e-bike that was a life-saver last year when I didn't want to take public transport due to COVID.
Even if you're overweight, cycling a bike is very rarely a problem. I'm an active cycle campaigner so I am definitely more exposed to many types of cycle commuters, but I know many people who are overweight for whom cycling is their primary method of transport. At two of my friends have told me that they cycle because it is actually more comfortable than walking long distances for them. I personally have an injury which can make it tough to walk long distances, but which doesn't stop me cycling 10x that distance.
I also know several people who have various form of physical disability who cycle either totally normal bikes or ebikes, or adjusted (to different degrees) bikes or ebikes.
If we had better cycle infrastructure where I live (a relatively small European city), many many more people would release that they can get where they're going faster and cheaper on a bike than in a car, and have more fun while doing it. Even when it's raining.
> Say it's raining, this makes riding a bike much more dangerous.
Wait what, why? Because I'm going to get a bit wet? The rain is no more a threat to a cyclist's safety than it is to a car on a wet day. You just might need to wear a rain jacket, too.
The Dutch certainly don't give a shit about rain, snow or shine, as the saying goes "there's no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes."
You seriously think inexperienced cyclist should ride in bad weather?
If you have a city of Lance Armstrongs , sure everyone could bike commute. That's not practical though.
I'd argue for building more bike infrastructure just since cycling is fun. I'm planing on working remote forever anyway, so I think we'd agree on alot. But I recognize my privilege here, if you need to commute to an office biking won't work over a few miles.
The average American is commuting 16 miles each way. Can you realistically do this on a bike , I know I can't.
Rain does not make in-city cycling significantly more dangerous, and is definitely fine for inexperienced cyclists. But if people cycle regularly, they aren't inexperienced, anyway.
In areas with frequent rain, people are practiced in carrying waterproof overclothes and such. Sub-zero temperatures, snow and ice can be a much bigger problem, of course, but good maintenance resolves a lot of that, too, as it does for cars.
As noted by drakonka, you continue to argue the infeasibility of something that works well for many cities/countries, citing things that those with experience know aren't a big problem. Sure, you can't just suddenly start cycling when your life/city is built around driving tens of miles, but a city/country can work towards biking in a way that has worked well around the world.
Sudden braking from a fast speed might be more likely to cause a skid (same as a car but scaled down), but if you're popping down to the shops or commuting to work, you likely will be cycling in a more relaxed style anyway. If you're uncomfertable with braking in the rain, I recommend finding a quiet strip on a rainy day and seeing what it's like. Actively try to skid so that you know what your bike's limits are - from decade of experience cycle commuting in a famously rainy city with some highly aggressive drivers, I've never found the rain to cause additional issues beyond getting wet if I'm unprepared.
The only time I have ever come off my bike by my own fault was skidding over a patch of ice about 9 years ago, so I would recommend higher levels of caution in the snow.
When you get a bad feeling about something, it's often an indication of implicit knowledge that you might not be consciously aware of. In this case, I'd suggest your brakes might need maintenance/replacement. As the sibling post here notes, you shouldn't be working near the limit of your brakes in normal use, anyway, and so a small reduction in their ability in rain shouldn't be a problem.
>You seriously think inexperienced cyclist should ride in bad weather?
I don't think inexperienced drivers should drive in the snow, but that doesn't mean we completely dismiss cars as a practical means of transportations in cities that get snow.
What should I wear for snow, or ice and how do I know if I would encounter those conditions?
Before covid, when I commuted, I used to cycle in 11 miles each way every day. Except when the temperature dropped below 5c. Not because I didn't have warm clothes, but because once I hit some ice under a bridge travelling at ~20mph and came off. It took a long time for the wound on my knee to heel from that.
I'm a massive fan of public transit, however, as an American this means I can only live in a handful of cities, but it's worth it .
When I lived in LA I was miserable, driving to work every single day, driving in a city is not enjoyable. So I moved, but it's impractical for someone like me to ride the bike to work. My office doesn't offer gyms, and I can't bike in sweating.
As for safety, riding the Metro can't be beat. The worst of both worlds is our current system where bikes compete with cars for a limited set of roads.
If I could build my own city from scratch, I would ban all cars completely. Design something like a 5 mile circle, and build upward. 24/7 slow metro lines allow for commutes within the city. Then have side walks and bike paths covering other commutes. Have every pathway so well lit, 3am is as safe as 3pm.
Then have garages on the city outskirts if you need to own a car to commute out of town.
I can imagine this already existing in Europe. Amsterdam felt very close.