Official Coli Bike/Cycling thread
Something special is happening in Barcelona. It started last month when some parents organized a bike ride to school for just five kids. Now entire neighborhoods are joining. They call it Bicibús – or Bike Bus.
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Erica Pandey, author of What's Next
A cyclist on Commonwealth Avenue in Boston. Photo: Jonathan Wiggs/The Boston Globe via Getty Images
U.S. cities have long lagged behind counterparts in Europe when it comes to biking infrastructure, but some metros are making a push to build more lanes and boost bike commuting.
Why it matters: Transportation is the leading generator of greenhouse gases, the Urban Institute notes. Still, just 0.5% of Americans commuted on bikes in 2019, reports National Geographic.
- Compare that with the Netherlands, where 27% of the country commutes by bike.
- The difference is infrastructure. Per a recent National Geographic survey, 70% of people in the U.S.'s 50 biggest metro areas say they're interested in biking, but half of them say they're too afraid to bike in the street.
- Oakland added nearly 130 miles of bike lanes to go from 56 miles in 2000 to 183 in 2020. The share of commutes that were bike trips jumped 40% in that same period, Bloomberg reports.
- Boston, Chicago and Austin also boosted their rates of biking by 59%, 53% and 19%, respectively.
What to watch: Even with big gains in a smattering of cities, rates of biking in the U.S. remain quite low. The rise of remote work is taking some cars off the roads, but many more cities will need to build many more miles of safe bike lanes for biking to boom.
got any good miles in on the 4130 yet @Macallik86 ?