General Cycling Discussion - Where to bike in boston?

Where is a good place to bike in boston, i will be staying in downtown boston this weekend and want to take my bike.

Stay off the streets in downtown!! Boston was my first intro to road bikes, I did not fair that well (hit twice in one day) It is a weekend so you might be okay and I have not been there since they started the "big dig" so I really don't know how things have changed.

If you like to sight see and there is plenty to see in the downtown area but you might be better off walking. If you get out toward the river there are multi-purpose trails that take you through BC/Fenway/Cambridge areas.

As far as open road riding I don't have any suggestions (I lived in East and South Boston for a year, and that was 17 years ago and I only been back once since, so my memory has faded).

I'm sure you'll have more replies, but I will ad that Boston is one cool town and I have always dreamed of moving back, some day.

ehenz

Downtown Boston is a tough place to ride around, due to heaps of insane, rude drivers. If you're not used to riding in city traffic, Boston probably isn't a good place to start. Otherwise, you can ride out to Brookline, Wellesley, or Newton and find some good, quiet roads to ride on.

You can also take your bike on any of the T (subway) lines except the green line and easily get to some nicer places for riding. If you take the red line out to Alewife (the last stop), you'll get to the beginning of the Minuteman rail trail, which goes out about 11 flat miles through Arlington, Lexington, and Bedford. From any of these places you can get off the trail and have some good roads to ride on as well. You can also get these nice little laminated index cards ("pocket rides") from any bike stores in the area with some good routes.

you will be fine if you go out after 10pm at night. boston is really flat and you can get pretty much anywhere in the city in half an hour depending on traffic. if you go out in the streets be well aware of your surroundings as cars do NOT yeild to bikers. a good ride is to follow the "Freedom Trail" after 11pm or so. It takes you from the Common up to the USS Constitution and hits all of the major tourisity sites like Paul Revere's house, North Church, Faneuil Hall, etc. Stay away from Chinatown and South Boston and you will be fine. Ride around the North End, Back bay down Newbury st area are good neighborhoods to ride through.
If you have transportation and your on a MTB, take your bike up to the Middlesex Fells in Medford or LynnWoods up on RTE 1 in Lynn. Some good trails there and both are less than 20 mins from the city.
IM me for more info and I can point you in some other areas to hit

It will be early 4:30-5am

that early on a weekend you should be fine. not too much traffic around then. all of the touristy folks come out around 9-10am. plus the red sox are in toronto, so you should be fine even riding over to fenway area too. if you are still around on sunday, cambridge closes down memorial drive which goes around the charles river. its a nice ride that goes from the mus of science past MIT and Haavid.

I have never been there, where should i definetly stay away from? Any good hills around?

no good hills. you can ride up and down beacon hill 30 times but other than that its all flat. definately stay west of Huntington Av and North of Mass Av. West of Huntington is the Back Bay/Fenway area which is good for riding.
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid69/p2906fc3527fb790d52532ad9d5001791/fbb392f2.jpg

anything below the red line is bad news

I will be moving there in Late August/Early September, where should i look for decent housing, i dont know anything about anywhere except rent is crazy expensive right in boston.

whats decent? are you looking in the city, student ghetto, the hood, highbrow??? unless you live in da hood, you wont be able to find a decent 1br for less than $1300

below that red line isn't ALL bad. some areas of JP are good, like down center street is good.

the other bad thing about downtown boston is the financial district. umm...it's just...bad. 1) the streets don't follow a grid pattern, and a lot of them are one way, so it's easy to get confused and end up in a part of downtown that you just don't want to be in. 2) since a alot of the streets are one way, and most are quite narrow, they don't do a lot of the maintenance that they should do, so they can be quite rough to ride a road bike on. i try to stay out of there as much as possible when i'm i'm not forced to go in there. how long are you going to be in town on sunday? if you get in touch with me, i may be able to show you around a bit, but i usually only come out at night.

I would recommend you ride out and back on Commwealth Ave (AKA Comm. Ave). It should be easy to find from where ever your staying in downtown Boston. You can stay right on Comm Ave and keep going West as far as you want. It eventually turns into Route 30. As you head west you'll pass Boston College. At that point your on the Boston Marathon route going in the opposite direction as the marathon route. When you turn around you can do "Heartbreak Hill". I would turn around at Route 128. You'll recognize the highway overpass. Rt 128 is a 4 lane highway in each/both direction. I used to live near Boston College. Comm Ave from Boston College to Rt 128 and back is probably 45min.

Obivously, Comm Ave in downtown Boston is very congested.

It is a pretty nice ride after you get beyond Boston College. You will see many bikers and runners at that point. It also seems the easiest ride for keeping with the directions. Just get on Comm Ave - stay on Comm Ave - turn around and come back.

There is a USCF training race every Sunday morning in Newton which borders Boston and is fairly close to Comm Ave. If the Crit is slow, I ride the Comm Ave loop after the race. It takes about 1 hour.