BIKE COMMUTER HAVEN

With bike lanes on the busiest roads and full width bike lanes at the thorny intersections, bikes aren’t exactly ruling the road, but they have a place in London.

Barclays has teamed with the Mayor of London and is building brand new "cycle superhighways". They have implemented a bikes for hire program that is catching on in the Westminster and surrounding burroughs. I was  staying outside the zone and usually had two kids in tow, so couldn't make much use of them. I did see their bikes on Clapham, right down the street from our flat.

The bikes are locked in their rack, you pay a pound to rent them for 1/2 hr. The rate goes up quickly after that with steep fines for late drop-off. They are designed to be ridden from point A to B and their are enough of these kiosks around that the scheme makes sense for certain trips.

Check out their fun video at this site:

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/roadusers/cycling/15025.aspx

COPENHAGEN has it worked out on a totally different plane. BIKES=CARS. They have their own lanes, separate from pedestrians and vehicles. Bus stops are typically on islands between the bike lane and the car lane. Bikes, have street lights, turn arrows and these nifty rails on stairways to bridges and overpasses (when they don't have a devoted ramp).

Bikes are parked everywhere. The city can't keep up with the demand, but its not as if there is parking for cars and not bikes. I have seen one parking structure and literally thousands of bike racks.

The trains devote half of a car to bikes, strollers and wheelchairs. The car and the pavement on the platform are clearly marked. One or two residents saw fit to clearly mark this car for their own purposes.

I took a ride into Copenhagen city center this morning. The ride was safe. Drivers watched for bikers and there was little confusion as to where the bike lanes were routed. A susbstantial construction project is underway on the Town Hall Plaza (Radhus Pladsen). The bike lane is maintained right through the middle of the site and roped off as it emerges on to the street. 

This is a model worth replicating.

AMSTERDAM UPDATE - SEPT '11

As expected, Amsterdam was the penultimate bicycle Mecca.The temple is the bike storage shed by VMX Architects in front of CentralStation that reportedly houses some 7,000 bikes! There are bike paths to allparts of the city. Trains allow bikes on board, trams and buses do not. The busand tram are served by islands in the middle of the road. Passengers cross thebike path to board.

Of particular interest was the abundant use of motorizedscooters on the bike path. These obey the same traffic laws as bikes, but movemuch quicker. Some electric scooters are so quiet that they sneak up on youbefore you have time to turn your head. The other amusing vehicle on the bikepath is the electric mini car. Smaller than a golf cart and fully enclosed, thedrivers behind these chariots I saw were in the senior age bracket. 

As you canimagine these paths get quite crowded. There is an understanding and respect onthe road for all means of transport. Trams and buses know to look for bikes andpedestrians. Bikers respect traffic signals and the cars are seemingly anon-entity. This symphony of movement on a busy city corner can be remarkableto watch.