The women commuters are here
 

Not many here on the forums, but in the office park I work at. There are two of us who commute every day, the other one is woman. There are two women in my building that commute about twice a week. One building over is another woman or two who are fair weather commuters and our administrative assistant rides a few times a week.

I just found it interesting that in spite of the statistics of men to women commuter ratios that this little corner of the world beats the odds. Yesterday afternoon when I left for lunch I counted bikes, and after a few years here I know what bikes belong to whom. I was outnumbered 5 to 1, on any given day in the summer that could be as much as 9-1, but I never see any other men. I do see several who pass by in both directions but dont know of any who park here. A rough guess at total population would be about 120 people total for all the buildings in the office park, as far as I know the men to women ratio is about 50/50, but I have no idea what the actual numbers are.

Cheers,

Though I can't quote statistics, my sense is that once a region reaches are certain critical mass of commuters, the number of women who decide to become commuters themselves increases dramatically.

Outside of winter, there are probably more women than men who commute in my office. A large part of that is that we're a non-profit that specializes in energy efficiency. We have a significant number of female employees who are relatively young, live in the city, and appreciate the low impact that cycling has on the environment. It's not just young women though. Until she retired, probably the biggest cycling advocate in the organization was a woman in her 60s. There are also a lot of male commuters.

I have observed this. Here in NYC, the fraction of bike commuters who are women is increasing and approaching half.

Lots of female commuters here in SoCal.

The more the merrier... :beer:

i agree it's been on the rise here in NYC but there are many times where i'm the only one i see :( i joined a couple of women's cycling groups in NYC (finally! who knew? many of them just came into existence in the past 1-3 years). looking forward to seeing more of us out there :)

Everyone in my office commutes, but I am the only one who does it on a bike. (sorry, couldn't resist)

One other guy in my building also bike commutes. 100% guys!

Just don't give yourself bicycle face

in my 8 years for bike commuting, i am noticing more women bike commuters on my daily rides these days, at least when the weather isn't quite so harsh.

In my city the number of female commuters is around 40%. Errand running and transportation are probably even.

I always smile when I see a woman on a bike. I know, it isn't some revolutionary thing, but IMO more women should ride bikes. It normalizes an activity that has traditionally been seen as something men do - which is totally untrue. The more normalized cycling is, the better for everyone.

Not here to stir the pot but just the fact that we think it's fascinating that more women are (insert thing here) is in my opinion a problem.

Women are people too. They do things. Get over it. :p

In your rush to stir the pot (don't lie ;)), you may have missed that all of the posters were supportive of it, and every movement benefits from allies. :)

If there are relatively few women relative to men participating in what should be a gender neutral activity, that could be indicative of a problem.

So lets say your community has a goal of increasing the number of bike commuters (many do) and someone figures out that 80% of existing commuters are men, that might be something you'd want to investigate further.

That brings up a good point. Why did cycling become a male dominated thing? I think it's because society puts a lot of pressure on women to be perfect and as we all know cycling leaves you sweaty and dirty.


I didn't miss the support it is just I feel sad that there is cause for celebrating something that should just be. I don't know if that makes sense. I'm sorry for raining on the parade.

I agree -- I wish that the topic of this thread weren't noteworthy. :thumb: There are a couple other things that I wish were common and no big deal, but we're working on it. Discussing the issues is always a good thing, and if I jumped on you, it's because I'm wary of PC efforts to stifle discussions that can be uncomfortable at times. Y'know? ;)

I think men are fascinated with things that a lot of gear (no pun intended) and lends itself to a lot of tinkering around with said gear. It's part of our cavemen past when we would tinker with a piece of wood and stone to fashion some kind of tool. We are gearheads. Embrace it.

Women aren't into that. Never have been.

It makes sense to celebrate something that should just be, if usually it just isn't.

I've encountered two women at my work who occasionally bike-commutes, vs half a dozen or so men at various frequencies.

On the road, you never know where people are riding, but judging by kit and cargo, there's lots of recreational riders, plenty of women but a clear minority (20%?). Apart from the women at my work, I've only ever seen one woman out on the road whose load and lighting clearly indicated her as a bike-commuter.

True, but I fear that by asserting a categorical difference between men and women, you're asking for a flame war...

I think the top two US cities when it comes to women cycling are Minneapolis and Portland and they are in the 40% range. So those of you who are claiming near parity are almost certainly mistaken.


Nationally, cycling by women and children appears to have been decreasing for some time:

http://www.gluskintownleygroup.com/d...w%20Report.pdf

I would love to see this trend reverse but I think the media and advocacy drumbeat that exaggerates the dangers of cycling has had a very negative impact on more cautious riders.

Nah. I think most intelligent people recognize that there are such differences. No one will start a flame war over this.

I love my gear(s); my wife, no so much. She's into books, yoga, coffee with friends at Starbucks...

I feel like as men we tend to be more materialistic. My girlfriend is always hounding me about traveling and vacations. In my opinion they are a waste of money. if you have the money to spare then sure going on a vacation is great but if i had a choice of getting a new laptop or going to France for a week, I'm getting a new laptop. I look at it as an R.O.I question. That laptop will return way more hours of use than a trip to France will.

As a counterpoint, I'm the one trying to get my fiancee enthusiastic about coming with me to France for a week while I ride PBP. :p

Our county has a bike commuter contest every May and the 2 guys who always win it ride like 2000 miles that month every year because their wives take over all the kid-shuttling duties, so those 2 guys biking that much put their wives in the minivans the whole rest of the month.

But we do have plenty of other women who bike-commute.

I'm trying to get my GF to learn how to ride a bike. I'm going to search the forums later for tips on teaching adults to ride. But riding in France sounds great.

oh oh, I know the answer to this one! Ever since cycling was popular at the turn of the last century there was a huge push to make it unappealing to women, to the point they had "doctors" come up with made up diseases like bicycle face. Bicycles provided women with too much freedom. Fast forward to modern times and professional cycling is dominated by men, with a refusal to have a full women's TdF, podium girls to show women as a prize to be won instead of trying to win themselves and other social injustices. If professional bike racing, already a complete joke, were to embrace female teams I bet the industry would reply with more WSD bikes, maybe more women would work at bike shops, and you would see more female riders

I'd be surprised if Minneapolis is 40% for transportation bicycling. My guess is maybe 25-30% (1 woman to ever 2 or 3 guys). Recreational riding may be 40% based on what I'd see on trails and the greenway. There was a count last year on the bridges in to Manhattan by gender and I believe it was about 15% female. Citibike had said that 24% of trips in 2014 were by women.

Netherlands is about 55% women for all trips or slightly more than gender parity. Germany, Sweden, Finland, and Denmark are about 45% or slightly under gender parity. Keep in mind as well that commuting is low on the bicycling scale for all of these countries with trips for eating, school, and shopping making up the majority of trips. The Netherlands also has age parity while other European countries are mostly 14 to 55 year olds.

Re: tinkering with gear

Not all women hate gear. I do not like to build stuff but spent most of my life tech obsessed. I have now toned it down some. I no longer need the latest and greatest, but I want to have something "nice" when I get it.

If our goal is for women to do "everyday bicycling" why is it so freaking hard to find a bike equipped with the "every day necessities?"

I just got a new bike. It is nearly done, there are few final details to work out. Going to bike stores wasn't that great because since my needs were not "sport or recreation" I was steered to "multi purpose hybrids" that did not ride well, didn't solve my concerns or match my style. I ended up doing a semi-custom build since what was in the shops was not right. And I am no bike expert, but it was the best choice to meet my needs and wants.

Where are the women on bikes? It is complicated. Some women do not ride because they do not think they are fit enough. Others are worried about looking polished. Others fear maintenance. Some feel like the streets are unsafe: from cars and the general public. Some people feel too "exposed." Some do not think it fits in their life: too much to carry.

Many of these obstacles are solvable if we pay attention.

Rates of women conmuters
 

I live in Oakland, this is old data but we are at roughly 50% in 2012. This matches closely to what I witness on the streets, particularly in my hood. (Nice chart in there)

Cyclelicious » Bay Area bike commuters transportation mode share and gender split for 2012

Tinkering with gear is another big difference in the U.S. and elsewhere. The majority of bicycle riders in northern Europe aren't 'cyclists'. They're not in to gear or tinkering. They don't have computers or gobs of lights on their bikes. They're not too concerned with weight. Their bicycles are for transportation.