It is North American mentality at its worst - they just don't seriously consider cycling anything other than sport.

In addition to commuting, we try to do most of our shopping and errands by bike. I've made a utility bike from a 20 year heavy duty old steel framed 26" wheel 21 speed. Front rack/basket, rear rack/large basket & collapsable rear side baskets. Our friends think this is crazy - one person said I looked "homeless" and they all ask "WHY?" Or they suggest that its not going to save much on gas, as our big box shopping district is only 6 blocks away and my reply "Exactly - makes it perfect for biking to shop!"

Following Steely dan's post it's almost zilch in the Chicago Burbs. Unless it's in the 60's-70's and prefectly dry, My bike is the only one in the bike rack.

I'm not sure where to find reliable statistics.

Keep in mind that I'm living just outside Portland, the bicycling Mecca of the United States, so you're going to be green with envy over these numbers, right?

Here's what I found on city-data.com (though the data is from 2008):

Drove alone: 74.8%
Carpooled: 10.4%
Public transit: 4.2%
Bicycle: 2.3%
Walked: 3.4%
Other means: 0.6%

That's right, almost as many people bike to work here as walk to work! Also, if you add in the number of people who are unemployed (on the assumption that they're likely to walk and bike a lot), we'd be well over 10%.

So, yeah, we're smug about our environmentalism here in Oregon.

Not sure you should be so smug... your "Driving alone" + "Carpool" is more than Edmonton's Driving stats (which includes both alone and carpool), and your walking + cycling is only 0.5% greater than Edmonton's. And even though you have 2X as many cyclists, Edmonton has over 2X your transit usage. Very interesting.

That's funny! I live in N. Raleigh and bike commute to downtown, and I rarely ever see other cyclists. ... except for the Jimmy John delivery guys downtown.

Yeah, sorry, it was sarcasm.

The American Fact Finder site puts our bicycling share at 0.9-1.5%. It's sad really. If that number is right, the percentage of people living below the poverty level in Beaverton is nearly 10 times the percentage of people who bike to work. What does that say about us?!

Oops, sorry, my sarcasm detector wasn't working!

You have a bike rack? I don't know of one where I live. I never see another cyclist on my commute and rarely see one on my 25 mile training rides.

I probably just live in the best part of the triangle for commuting. I lived in Chapel Hill / Carrboro for 4 years while in school where everyone rides a bike or a bus, and now i live near RTP and cycling is a good option for folks who work at nice campuses such as SAS or IBM. I don't know how it would compare to the masses driving though.

My city has fallen from 10.8% bike commuters in 2009 to 7.3% in 2011. Are there any other cities in America that have had a decline in bike usage over the past few years? (And does anyone know when do the 2012 numbers come out?) However, in my local neighborhood, we have 20% bike commuters, 20% bus commuters (six times the city average), 15% walkers and only 45% using their cars.

The bad news is that the people living in the suburbs are nearly all single occupancy car folks. So, even if my entire city got switched over to bikes, our streets would still be dominated, as in the majority of the people, by cars.

Wikipedia says that 0.6% bike commute in Los Angeles as of 2006. That's pathetic considering our weather.

I rarely see anyone commuting here. Mostly I see lycra clad geeks. (That's for you Joey.)

Yeah but people in Los Angeles shoot each other on the freeways. I can only imagine how vulnerable you must feel on a bike.

In Seattle we have gone from 1.5% to 3.7% in the last 22 years. Yikes, that's some slow growth, but it's growth none-the-less. We have these cool bike counters on a couple of our bridges so you can actually see trending.

Spokane Street Bridge: https://www.seattle.gov/transportatio...er_spokane.htm
Fremont Bridge: https://www.seattle.gov/transportatio...er_fremont.htm

As a society we have developed policies and incentives that favour car drivers, and thus promote sprawl, smog and other pollution, gridlock, traumatic deaths, social stress, waste, higher taxes, land degradation, and and poor population health. So Walter S is right (as we all should be) to be embarrassed that more of us aren't cycling. We all should be promoting or advocating for cycling (or walking or using public transit) in one way or another, for our own and the common good.

It's actually worse than that. When a motorist sees you they don't think that you're an athlete, they think that you are a grownup playing on a child's toy in the street instead of the sidewalk where you 'belong.'

GT, It sounds like you are already doing the most important kind of advocacy & promotion there is - getting your family out on your bikes and using them. Actions speak louder than words.

I love those things. There's one on the Hawthorne Bridge in Portland that's putting up some pretty big numbers (though Seattle's Freemont Bridge is looking pretty good too!).

https://portland-hawthorne-bridge.visio-tools.com/

I think that it is more accurate to say that as a society we have developed policies and incentives that favour sprawl and thus promote cars. pollution, gridlock, deaths, social stress, waste, poor health, these are all just added bonuses.

I don't think for a second that we as a society are going to willingly turn away from the automobile culture that we have so completely embraced. We're like monkeys with our hands stuck in the trap because we cannot let go of the shiny object. Sooner or later it's all going to have to fall in on itself.


I really try to limit the amount of personal embarrassment I feel on anyone else's behalf. That's a prescription for the crazies.


I'm not sure what you precisely mean by promoting and advocating - I will most likely never join a political action group or attend a critical mass ride, but I do make a point of getting out on my bike and using it. To me, actions speaking louder than words. If just one other overweight middle aged guy passes me on his way to or from work and thinks to himself, "If that fat bastard can do it then so can I!" and extends his life in the process, then I have done my job. We'll never know how many people if any we touch that way.

I don't feel vulnerable on a bike. You have been influenced by over blown media.

It's extremely localized. I work 10 miles from Ann Arbor, and I have gone entire years without seeing another cyclist of any kind, even recreational. I also think that survey likely is counting anyone who cycles to work even once during the year as a bike commuter, not that 4.9% of all commuting trips are made by bicycle. There are few enough people cycling to work in the winter that they do newspaper articles about them.

It's a good thing I wasn't drinking something when I read this. Man, I gotta watch Austin Powers again.

And...if more of the sport/rec/athlete cyclists would incorporate more utilitarian riding into their day to day lives, the public would start to take note. Maybe its something that comes with age or adopting lifestyle changes after a medical "close call".

I also believe that many younger (under 40) people have no sense of value or inflation - With current Canadian gas prices around $6.00/gallon and vehicles selling for double or triple what my first house cost. My calculations over the past year prove that savings on gas has paid for a few new bikes; with added health benefits and lower vehicle maintenance.

Everything I know about Los Angeles comes from L.A. Story.

Do you vote?

I see commuting cyclists and walkers all the time in my rather small town. I went over to Factfinder and it turns out that 3.6% of Carson City walks to work, and 3.3% use other means than public transportation. Pretty good for a town of around 60,000!

My public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion.