Recreational & Family - How far do you live from downtown?

Some people like to ride in the middle of nowhere; other people (like me) prefer the city. If you like urban riding and you ride to the nearest downtown with any frequency, how far do you have to go to get there?

I have to ride about 11 miles to get to downtown Fort Worth. If our evil plan (sell our house and buy one in an older neighborhood) works, we'll be about 3 miles.

about 10 miles for me, but Reno doesn't have enough of a downtown to be fun to ride in--it's all big-box casinos (booooring). when I'm in larger cities (San Jose, tucson and portland recently), I sometimes do like riding downtown, though. Got stuff to look at, little shops, cab drivers to flip off...

Hmmm. Maybe I should have posted this to one of the busier forums.

Hmmm. Maybe I should have posted this to one of the busier forums.

Ya think?

I have to ride maybe 1/2 mile to be in the heart of beautiful downtown Sandfly. We've got a Piggly-Wiggly, a liquor store, two gas station/convenience stores, a gun shop and a Primitive Baptist church. I would ride there more often but the traffic is terrible.

It's about 25 miles to downtown Kansas City, and about 10 miles to downtown Overland Park (city where I live). I've only rode in DTKC once, and it was fun (about 10:30 at night, no cars). I don't think I'd take the family down there unless it was for ToM (should that happen again).

I'm in the heart of my downtown! I can bike/walk to everything. 2 Grocery stores, McD's/BK/Wendys, movie theater, drugstore and my job are all less than a mile from me!! Whooot

I live in the close-in suburbs (for lack of a better description) of Atlanta. When I was working in the midtown area of Atlanta I bike commuted almost every day. Now that I'm retired I have no desire to ride into town. Too many undesirables there. In fact there are more undesirables living in my part of town than I'm happy with. I encounter them too often when I'm doing my recreational/training rides. :notamused:

I live (and commute by bike) 9 miles from downtown.

I'm at the edge of the Seattle metro area. Downtown Bellevue is 12 miles, downtown Seattle about 20.

I am exactly one mile from downtown where I work and play.

I live 5.5 miles from town, but rarely ride there, because it is so small.

Four blocks.

It's a small town.

I live about 3 or 4 miles from downtown Portland, Maine. It's Maine's largest city and has a population of about 65,000 people. Despite the city's incremental accomodations for bicyclists and pedestrians, they don't seem to be enough. The "Share The Road" signs posted intermittently along the streets telling motorists and cyclists alike had the same rights seems to mean "Get Off The F-ing Road" from the motorists' point of view toward that of the cyclists'. That's why I do my bicycling elsewhere.

17miles as the crow fly’s, but I can take the lake front path and watch girls, O I mean scenery; that rout is 30 miles.
I asked a friend how comfortable he was riding in traffic; he said “I don’t care I’ll ride anywhere” When we got to State and Madison he said “I take it back, I want to live”! LOL

7 miles from downtown Montreal. In the middle of town there is a 17 km figure 8 loop over the moutain that is used for cycle races. Eddy M won the world championship on it in 1974 (with lap time somewhere around 22 mins). I sometimes ride it when I want to work on my hill climbing, but my lap time is more like 70 mins. My commute along the Lachine canal takes me close to downtown but I then cross over the river to the South Shore.

<2 miles

i stay in two places, one is literally just across the river from downtown manhattan, the other is 18 miles west of manhattan. since i picked up a bike 5 weeks ago, i ride in the city often and love it, 1-2 times a week. this weekend will be an offroader in western jersey though.

I'm about a 40 minute ride from downtown. Our suburbs just stink for any kind of good stuff at all. There's not a single good restaurant withing 5 miles of where I live.

prob around a mile from my downtown still like to go there every now and then

I prefer to run errands on my bike, so downtowns are a requirement. Keep in mind that almost all downtown areas forbid sidewalk riding - and signs are posted everywhere, a fact that we have to point out to motorists frequently, usually referring them to one of the signs - which is enjoyable.

There are about 5 downtowns within a 10 mile radius of my home. Most are easily accessible from our MUP system - in fact, the MUPs all go right into the heart of the downtowns.

I don't mind riding in traffic, but many of my riding partners prefer to avoid it - therefore, we take to the alleys once we arrive in the downtowns. (These are also handy)

I live in Downtown NY (financial district) and ride my bike away from it :)
During the week I ride for 16-18 miles on the west side bike lanes and on weekends I go to suburbs to ride - Westchester's North County trailway is awesome.

I live about 16.5 miles from the center of downtown Salt Lake City. In the Salt Lake valley, though, all of the outlying suburbs use the same street grid and continue SLC's street numbering, so it's as if it's all one big city. I don't have to go through any suburban areas before getting into the city, just different 'town areas' with sometimes different feels depending on the real estate prices of the neighborhoods.

I live and work in Irvine, a master planned bike community. The beach is 8 miles away. Close to everything in the OC.

It's about 6 miles to downtown Garland, about 14 miles to downtown Dallas. Although, I don't have much motivation to go either place unless there's some sort of parade or bike event or something. For riding, I try to get out of town, for shopping, there's a bunch of places closer than either downtown. Oh, and downtown Rockwall is about 13 miles and downtown Rowlett is about 5 miles and downtown Mesquite, maybe 9 miles, don't go directly there, though.

3 miles to downtown Vancouver (pretty sleepy downtown most of the time)
13 miles to downtown Portland (bright lights, big city, all that jazz ;)

I prefer the suburban action. Plenty of bike lanes, some farmland, fresh air, etc.

I'm not far from genuine country roads, but only like those when I get out on pre-dawn patrol on a Sunday. The country roads get a lot of 55 mph traffic, have zero shoulder and typically a 3 ft deep ditch for a big fertilizer truck to run you off the road into...

I live very centrally and am all of a few miles and a few minutes from the heart of our downtown (by bike)... it puts me close to everything that is important for my day to day stuff but my neighbourhood is also a rather quiet little corner of the city.

I used to live 4 miles from downtown, and it was literally one road (with bike lanes) into the heart of downtown.

Now, I still live 4 miles from downtown, but it's a huge pain in the butt to get there.

I used to love riding downtown, but now I can't stand it. Weird how things change like that.

I live about 11 mi. from downtown San Diego. A couple of decade ago, I commuted to work there (the waterfront). This commute was perfect, all down hill to work, and uphill back. This way I could work my frustrations of work on the way home.

Downtown Haverhill is right at the bottom of the hill. Now, why any one would want to go there...........

We live four miles from downtown Denver. Lovely ride through residential and parks. We almost always ride our bikes when we have to go downtown because parking can be a pita. However, my youngest isn't really ready for downtown riding and my oldest can do certain parts of downtown where there are better bike lanes and off-street bike routes.

I live in a place called Fair Oaks; about 22 miles from downtown Sacramento, CA, and just 1 mile west of Folsom, as close to a suburban cycling mecca as I've ever seen. A great bike trail connects Folsom and downtown Sac, running parallel to the American River.