Having grown up in Boulder (Niwot) and still going there several times a year to see my parents, and currently living in San Francisco, I laughed so hard at this it is not even funny.

Someone in LCF needs to get from Denver to Loveland on his bike. I couldn't come up with anything decent for him. "back in the day" I would ride 287 from Niwot to Loveland. No way in hell would I try that now. I've ridden from Boulder to Loveland in the last couple of years and it involved 119, 36, 66, before finally getting some backroads.

I can get from San Francisco to work in Mountain View - 45 miles, with a dozen or so traffic lights and mostly on low traffic roads or roads with excellent shoulders. Saturday I rode from SF to Healdsburg, 85 miles and aside from the bridge crossing (scary only due to tourist cyclists) it is on small roads with little traffic.

I ride around SF daily, and can give excellent routes to anywhere in the city that avoid routes I consider "dangerous" and even can usually avoid "steep frickin hills". Cycling around Boulder is going to involve something gnarly comparitively. Bike lanes and shoulders sure, but much higher speed traffic.

Granted I know SF like an almanac as a cyclist and have done far more driving than riding in Boulder. But most of the "improvements" (Foothill/etc...) have made things much better for cars and much worse for bike access since my misbegotten youth.

And the number of "trucks with gunracks" is a lot lower around here. Comments in the paper are far less hostile.

Don't get me wrong - I bring my bike everytime I come out. Even as a recreational cyclist it sucks because there is usually "one road". You go up Left Hand Canyon and share it with cars. Around here there always seems to be a parallel backroad with little or no traffic.

Beats Houston with a stick though.