This week’s round-up features a curious commute crossover opportunity, a look at London’s super popular superhighways, a woman on a mission to raise the amount of female cyclists, and changes to Finland and the Netherlands’ cycling culture.
It’s also a special fortnightly round-up because most of the team were away on the Rome to Bari Pioneers ride (you’ll hear more about that in the coming weeks!).
The top image is from a Reddit post by user Spinistry. It caught our eye as a particularly striking place to ride, although as the people in the comments were discussing, it’s no good for KOM prestige on Strava!
Take a look at this:
It’s a bus full of exercise bikes, and is a concept being explored by companies like Ride2Rebel (who have 4,300 people interested in testing it, at time of writing).
We can’t decide whether it’s inspired (an intense and uninterrupted exercise-based commute) or ridiculous (just get on your actual bike and ride there!). It reminds us of Bill Nye’s observation that “there’s something wrong with a society that drives a car to work out in a gym.” What do you think?
More information on the concept can be found in an article at Bicycling.com.
Following the commute theme, and despite dramatic warnings from some Londoners (large amounts of taxi drivers amongst them) about the apocalyptic implications of the new Cycle Superhighways, they’re proving to be incredibly popular.
The image above is from a Reddit post by user Js425 and shows apparently typical scenes during rush hour in London.
The numbers aren’t just anecdotal, either. Road.cc has reported that 1,200 cyclists per hour are using the routes, and that bicycles outnumber other vehicles on two of the routes.
TFL (Transport for London) confirm this:
.@miroirdufou Nigel: We're yet to complete formal counts, but initial observations show 1200 cyclists per hour during am/pm peaks on E/W.
— TfL Taxi & Private Hire (@TfLTPH) May 25, 2016
Super stuff!
According to TFL 610,000 cyclists per day rode in London last year, but only a quarter of these were women.
The Standard spoke to Caren Hartley, a rider on a mission to increase this ratio by building handmade bikes to give women a more comfortable, bespoke ride. Her background is in jewellery and metal sculpture, but after discovering cycling she found a new outlet for this skill-set.
Finland’s capital has integrated its bike-share system into its journey-planning service, meaning that residents and visitors will automatically be given the option to use these as part of journeys around the city. This varies from other cities, London included, where the bike-share and public transport systems are considered separate systems.
The press release about this development includes a picture of a Finnish cyclist looking suitably smug about the efficiency and sensibility of his country’s public transport:
It seems like common sense to us, but the Dutch government is considering a formal ban of mobile phones while riding, The Guardian reported this week. It comes after it was found that mobiles factor into 1 in 5 accidents involving ‘young’ cyclists (no exact age was given).
This raises an interesting question about whether phones used for navigation purposes will be included in the ban. Calling or texting while riding definitely seem to not be a great idea, but the device’s role for apps like Strava can’t be ignored.
What do you think about riding and using your phone?
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