So I have had this love affair with bicycle transportation since viewing the lovely bikes in Copenhagen and realizing that it is a primary mode of transport for some. Nothing is more lovely to witness than folks biking to work, carrying their groceries back home or beating the stop and go traffic by pedaling right by. Don’t get me wrong I love driving my car, but sometimes I want to savor those drives versus the chauffeuring and chore it can tend to become. However, after a week in Cape May one summer with a cruiser at my disposal and morning rides along the beach, I fell in love again with a bike. My husband subsequently purchased a baby blue “Cruiser” for my birthday and I love to pedal about the tow path with my bike basket in front going to and fro.

Last month was Bike to Work month, now I work from my house, but I understand the concept and set the intention to pedal as much as possible, until the flat tire.

In any event, while my bicycle aspirations are set on hold until the flat is fixed, I wanted to see if the raising gas prices and increasing costs to maintain cars etc would create a “Peddling Revolution” such as Jeff Mapes wrote about in his book- “Peddling Revolution: How Cyclists are Changing American Cities”.

Yes I see more spandex clad bicyclists in my area, but not many of the commuting to work type. I guess as I glance over the street/road infrastructure in my area we are really not safely set up to accommodate bicycle transport as a means of transportation. No shoulders on the road, and no bike paths= not much of a safe incentive to cycle.

So my hope is that the folks in the city planning and transportation universe realize that there are people who want this option. Mapes book provides details to how cities from Amsterdam to Paris to New York have developed policies encouraging cycling in recent decades and how other towns are beginning to make way for bikes. All this information is great ammunition for those of us would like our community’s to adopt more bike friendly options.

Check into your local community, biking is a great option and cuts down on the Co2 in your community while also suppressing traffic while raising the community’s level of general fitness as biking performs a function (commuting to work) as well as exercise. Who knows with our auto industry in peril, maybe we will become more of a Bike Country versus the Car Culture of the past few decades. Get your local government and urban planners on the “bike bus” and help make the idea of cheap, effortless transportation a viable option for one and all!