Oil Prices Rising, Bike To Work: 12 Tips To Get Started

The Green Guide :

Now that the winter snow and April showers have finally subsided, it's the perfect time to tune up the old two-wheeler and pedal your way to work. It just so happens that next Monday kicks off a national Bike-to-Work Week, and there's no better way to burn calories while cutting pounds of carbon emissions. How many? Cycling at the mellow rate of 5 miles per hour, you'll burn about 175 calories in an hour. Compare to that to your car, which releases about 23 pounds of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide for every gallon of gas burned.

Yet, there are even more reasons to drop the keys and hop on the saddle. "On a personal level, you'll save money, get good exercise and experience your city in ways that are impossible at 30 miles per hour," says Dani Simons, deputy director for communications at of Transportation Alternatives, a New York City bike, pedestrian and mass transit advocacy group. "On a broader, societal level, it'll cut local air pollution, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and help unclog the streets of congestion and traffic."

Read the whole story: The Green Guide

Comments

[Cathexis]

How to get started: If you live over 10 miles from work ... sell your house at a loss and move.

Yeah ... right. Like THAT's going to happen.

[mergina]

You know, if they would only come out with FLAT PROOF TIRES for bikes it would be sooooooo nice.

[Myshkin57]

They exist but they are incredibly uncomfortable and have a ton of rolling resistance. But, a GOOD modern set of bike tires will flat very infrequently. A good tire will have a kevlar belt and be relatively lightweight.

[paulbikes]

People have a habit of thinking that sporting goods stores carry good bikes :/

I'm no doubt a bicycle snob, but for your average joe looking to commute, go buy a trek 7.2, and get specialized armadillo tires or some equivalent. then get a good helmet, fenders and a good u-lock. you can keep it under $500-$600 easily. And Trek has 3 months 0 interest for a purchase up to $500 and 6 months 0 interest for purchases over $500

spend $550 or so to get a nice commuter setup, and you can pay it off 50 a month with 0 interest. done.

[wadenelson1]

Get your will in order before you start cycling to work. There are drivers like Unbias out there who would just as soon hit you as give you an extra foot of clearance. And they think it's funny.

[paulbikes]

This happens, no doubt, but don't be afraid to ride because of it.

More people are riding and the law will go after anyone who even fakes out a cyclist and runs them off the road. A friend of mine has had a car swerve at him on two separate occasions and both drivers were fined and lost their license for a year.

Honestly though, ive been riding for years and ive only had one or two incidents, no crashes. other people i know arnt so lucky, but hey. bikes are cool so ride em.

[wm1066]

It didn't mention that you will need to keep a set of clothes at work to change into after you get sweaty from the ride, and have a towel so you can wipe down before you meet your coworkers.

[Myshkin57]

It's not hard to go slow enough to not sweat and still get around pretty quickly.

[paulbikes]

true, if your in decent shape, or even if your not, 10 or 15 miles an hour wont get you sweating.

[jackpinesavage]

Or, you could just get on your bike and do it. I'm lucky, the 5 miles between work and home have a lovely bike path that cuts out the biggest hills and runs right along the edge of Lake Superior. To drive, i really need to leave 15 minutes of travel time in order to be at least 5 minutes early. To ride i need to leave 20 minutes of travel time. It's a no-brainer.

Some complaints about bikers mentioned here are valid. I often see other bikers (usually in spandex) eschew the bike path for the road next to it. For too many bikers, "share the road" means i'll take my half out of the middle, do whatever i want, and you'll just deal with it. An organized group of the jackasses nearly cause accidents in front of my house about once-per-week because they refuse to stop at the sign...all 30 of them. And when i bitch at them because an old man with the right of way nearly gets in an accident, they get offended. Riding a bike is not the same as moral superiority.

[paulbikes]

Some people take the road thing too far. Critical mass is another story, but unless im at mass the law is clear about 2 abreast or no further left than the middle of the lane, unless you feel it unsafe to be passed by a car then you can block. But even riding 2 abreast or towards the center of the lane will set off most drivers.

Critical mass is great though, payback for getting cutoff and screamed at all month while riding lawfully :]

[gloriasolideo]

No offense, but this is a completely predictable article, much like some of the "top ten ways to know your spouse is cheating" or "top ten myths about weight loss" articles that appear in Good Houskeeping. Good grief. The thing about bicycling is that if you DO it, you'll instantly figure out this no brainer advice. Get a bike that fits and ride. Take a look at this site http://www.copenhagencyclechic.com/ to see what a bicycling culture looks like. Normal people doing normal things. It's just another way of getting from place to place.

What Huffpo should publish is a guide for automobile drivers who need lessons on how to co-exist with bikes. Face it: 10 years from now, half or more of us will be commuting and running errands by bike. Help the dinosaur drivers (those using fossil fuels) better cope with the transition, e.g. 1) check for bikes before you open driver's doors; 2) do NOT be overly polite and stop dead in the middle of the street to allow a bike to cross an intersection when you don't have a stop sign; bikers don't want to cause a 10 car rear end pile up, just because you think you're being nice, and on and on. Some drivers act like bicyclists can't steer or are aiming to hit the side of their vehicle. Not true. But get used to us and stop the hostility. WE are the wave of the future.

[Ajita]

Thanks for the really cool link

[jasjohn128]

Good one, thanks for posting.

[paulbikes]

absoluetly, while some motorists respect the legal rights of a cyclist, others dont, and some are malicious.

After nearly losing a friend in a hit and run, whos girlfriend also has been victim of two hit and runs. And ive been hit, and other have been hit maliciously, we are petitioning the local government for share the road signs and lanes.

What we need is widespread change in driver education that includes a substantial amount of curriculum regarding bikes rights. There are drivers who dont think bikes are even allowed on the road, and that dosent fly. i can ride at 45-50mph down a decent hill on the road, not so much the sidewalk, drivers need to know whats up...

[Wilburrr]

5 mph? Good grief! I fall over sideways at 5 mph. At 24 mph I can usually get to work faster than I can in my car.... taking the "Bike Routes" recommended and published by the City of Phoenix.

[Wilburrr]

...and since there are no comments being allowed on the other bike article.... there is no such thing as an 'ugly bike.' Even a Huffy looks better than a BMW.

[Myshkin57]

Most people can't even stay upright at 5 mph. The average person can pull at least 10 without breaking a sweat on level ground. If you're in good shape, you can up that to 15 or 16 before any perspiration will appear.

[UnbiasView]

Message to all bike riders that wear spandex and think they are Lance Armstrong:

We paid millions to get you goofs bike paths . . . get off the roads and use them.

[thegreatgiginthesky]

I'd like to see your lard laden a $$ say that to the bike rider in person. Chances are that you will be picking up your teeth after that conversation.

[UnbiasView]

I do everytime I pass the morons, of course with a nice honk of the horn.

[Wilburrr]

I can tell which ones wear spandex.... how do you tell which ones think they/re Lance Armstrong?

[UnbiasView]

Yellow shirt

[wadenelson1]

Kate Hudson on a Bike-A-Long in the rear.

[Merckx]

Most adult bike riders drive cars and pay millions in taxes to improve our roads.
By riding bikes they don't pollute, reduce traffic congestion and lower our health care needs and by extension our health care costs. If every American rode a bike to work just once every ten days, rush hour traffic would be reduced by 10%.
The few dollars we spend of bike paths are cute, but really the answer is to recognize the laws as they a have always existed and obey them. Bicycles are vehicles on the road and if you can't pass them safely you need to hand in your driver's license.

[paulbikes]

Bikes have a legal right to the road, its drivers like you who put riders like me at risk.

Many of my friends and myself included have been maliciously ran off the road by drivers who think they are hilarious. and ill tell you what, i know for a fact that if an officer sees you honk at or swerve towards a cyclist you will lose your license for at least a year. And if it were up to me or any other rider you would lose it for good.

I dare you to say something that ignorant again.

[vipersdad]

a person can darn-near walk 5 mph. A beginning cyclist can easily average 8 - 10 mph, even when you consider stoplights.

If you can overcome the objection of distance as a factor (many people live a LONG way from work which is a valid concern when talking about bike commuting), then bike commuting has a TON of upside. Even distance should not be a huge obstacle. I know people who ride 22 miles each way to work 5 days a week. (I telecommute so my trip is about 15 feet) These men and women are among the most fit people I know. A friend of mine who rides 25 miles one way to work said that she saves money and time doing it - her 1 1/2 hour commute by bike is only 40 minutes longer than the drive would be because traffic is so bad.

Which gets to the other objection: which is the time it takes to commute by bike. The fact is that it's quicker to drive most places than to ride..... barely. if someone's commute is under 30 minutes by car, chances are good they can do it by bike in around an hour. So the time savings associated with being in a car are not all that great.... especially as the bike commuter gets more and more fit and starts riding faster and faster.

[rupert12]

You make some good points, and no doubt for some people biking to work is a great option. I used to do it when I lived closer to my office and was single.

You mentioned the distance factor. That's always important. The big one for me, however, is kids. If you can't afford to have a stay at home parent and your kids aren't in school, you need to get them to daycare. Maybe you could put them in one of those trailers, but that's not good for the kid in the winter. Also, many families are pushing the time factor in the morning and the evening already. Adding an extra 30 minutes on each end isn't doable. My company is doing bike to work day today. I would love to participate, but I have to pick up my son at daycare by 5:30.

The fact is, so many aspects of our economy and culture are built around the automobile. Our society has evolved with it, and now we are dependent on it. If you can bike to work, more power to you. Unfortunately for many of us, it's just not an option.

[trinity]

I would love to ride a bike to work but your two points...distance and children are the reason I cannot. I commute 35 miles each way, no way I can do that with a bike...I am not Lance Armstrong. Plus I would not trust riding with my daughter in tow with all the idiots on the road around where I live. Weather is also an issue. It's great to live in Southern Cal with all the sunshine, but living in the upper Midwest where there are two seasons: winter (where it gets below zero often) & about 2 months of summer...it's not as easy to commit to year-long commutes on the bike.

[paulbikes]

Ive rode for a long time, and i got into it for the fun. no matter if im riding bmx, mtb or road its for fun first.

Since its become blatantly apparent how much good riding can do for any person and the environment, if more people were committed to riding, it would make a serious impact. and who dosent want to be fit?