Tag: Wellness

7 ways to choose the right route for your bike commute

On June 8, 2018

Sometimes, getting around on a bike requires some advance planning. Photos by Tom Babin.

Veteran hard-core commuter cyclists are good at many things. Telling you exactly how much mileage they’ve logged far this year, for example. Clip-clopping in their stiff-soled cycling shoes in places where that is totally inappropriate. And offering the simplest advice to anyone who has ever expressed interest in riding their bike more: “Just get out there and do it, man. You’ll figure it out.”

This is, actually, pretty great advice. Cycling needn’t be complicated, especially if you’re style of cycling tends toward the utility side, rather than the athletic side. You don’t really need any special gear or advice. Just give it a try.

OK, got it? Great. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, I’ll offer you some hard-won advice that took me years to figure out. Choosing the right route for that urban bike ride can be uber-important, especially if you live in a city with minimal safe routes for bikes.

Most of us have built up a mental map of our cities. Unfortunately, most of us have built that map while driving a car, which means our mental map doesn’t always include the things we need to know for a bike ride. Does your mental map include information about the width of the shoulder on a busy route? Does your mental map include a tally of left-turns across multiple lanes of traffic? Then it might be time to adjust that mental map in a bikeward direction.

Before you get riding, stop and think about the route, especially if you’re still coming to grips with the fact that much of your ride will be beside fast-moving boxes of steel that can kill you. Here are a few things to ponder in that moment before you kick off:

There’s a hierarchy of bike infrastructure to take into account.

Traffic volume

In general, choose the roads that have the fewest number of moving vehicles. If you must venture on to a busy road, at least bookend that time with some quiet routes that offer some decompression time.

Road width

This may be counter-intuitive, but the narrow streets are often preferable. While a wide street feels like it should give you more room to avoid being flattened by a car, wide roads also encourage drivers to go fast. Narrow streets, particularly those full of parked cars in residential areas, are a car driver’s worst nightmare – conjuring those old driving-school images of children darting into the street after a ball. As a cyclist, this is a good thing. It means drivers may actually slow down. They may even pay you respect on the road. Maybe.

Off-road

Your car-driver mental map probably has blank areas for things like parks, schoolyards and wooded areas. Your bike map, however, needn’t be so. A shortcut through a park on a bike isn’t just efficient, it’s safe and fun.

Roads with sharrows

Sharrows are those roads that have designated to be shared by automobile drivers and cyclists (the word is an amalgam of “shared right-of-way), often marked with road paint or signage of a bike with a couple of arrows coming out of the sky. Lazy city planners love sharrows because it makes them feel like they are accommodating bikes without actually doing anything to accommodate bikes. Don’t be fooled: sharrows suck. Don’t think of a sharrow route as a safe route. It’s the same as any other road and, in fact, may be more dangerous.

Bike lanes

Yes, of course you’ll choose routes that have been designated for bikes, right? These are the safe and direct routes, right? Aw, you’re so cute when you live in a fantasy world. Down here the real world, cities are full of badly planned, badly marked bike lanes that do little to improve safety. So get your city’s map of bike lanes, but use it to plan your route with a grain of salt. Create a hierarchy of bike lanes in your planning with the safest routes at the top of the priority list, like this:

Bike lanes separated from traffic with a physical barrier, such as concrete or bollards. Parked cars also work as a good physical barrier, if cities are smart enough to build this way.
Bike lanes with a buffer of some sort, such as a metre or two of space between the car lane.
Painted bike lanes. Having a designated route is nice, but without a barrier between the lane and moving vehicles, painted lanes are bit like watching the latter Police Academy movies – better than nothing, but they just don’t measure up to the ones with Steve Guttenberg.
Community bike routes: These residential roads that have been designated as bike routes go by many names, but they are all versions of the idea that calling a quiet road a bike route will somehow make it safer. This can be true. If the road is embraced by cyclists and becomes busy with bikes, car drivers tend to slow and the road will be safer. Sometimes cities even install traffic calming devices such as speed bumps or roundabouts. Great! But if this is just a regular road that’s been decorated with signs featuring bikes, don’t forget: this is just a regular road.

Busy roads

OK, you’ve exhausted all of your bike lanes, quiet roads and safe choices, but you are still forced to venture on to a road with all kinds of fast-moving cars. This is the sad reality for many of us. But there are a few things you can do to ease this pain. Minimize the number of left turns you must make. Keep your time short. And finally, as a last resort, do something I never thought I’d advise: Pick up the skills of a vehicular cyclist. This idea, that cyclists should ride in the same manner as automobiles, was the dominant idea in cycling in North America for much of the 20th century, but has now been thoroughly debunked. Why? Because it didn’t work. After 40 years of trying, we’ve realized that riding a bike like a car is really hard, and most of us are too scared to do it. Yet, vehicular cycling still has skills to teach us: Be visible, keep up your speed, ride with confidence, signal your intentions, be predictable. These skills take time to develop, but if you find yourself on busy roads, you will thank those grumpy old vehicular cyclists for showing us how it can work.

Just do it

If all of this seems like too much thinking for a simple bike ride, then take the advice of those wily veteran cyclists: “Just get out there and do it, man. You’ll figure it out.”

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Tom Babin is the author of Frostbike: The Joy, Pain and Numbness of Winter Cycling.

The health benefits of e-bikes should kill the idea that riding them is ‘cheating’

By Sponsored Content

On May 21, 2018

In Bikes

E-bikes are one of the fastest growing segments of the bike world. Photo courtesy of Bikeberry.com.

Ever since electric bikes were introduced and started gaining popularity, there has been an ongoing argument among traditional bicycle riders and those who prefer electric bikes about whether riding a motorized bicycle counts as an exercise and has health benefits as a traditional bike.

Some traditionalists claim that riding an electric bike is almost like “cheating” and has little or no health benefits.

Here are some facts about the important health benefits of electric bikes, which will hopefully rebuke this idea:

Riding an electric bike counts as an aerobic exercise

There are so many studies that have proven that regular exercise can significantly improve our well-being and health, as well as reduce the risk of serious illnesses which are usually associated with sedentary lives and unhealthy diets.

Chronic illnesses such as metabolic syndrome, diabetes type II, hypertension, heart disease, stroke and others are known to be the leading killers of the population of the U.S. The U.S. government has officially recommended getting about 2.5 hours of aerobic exercise with moderate intensity, or 1 hour and 15 minutes of intensive aerobic exercise, per week in order to reduce the risk of developing these life-threatening diseases.

Cycling is an excellent way to meet these recommendations. For the many people who struggle to ride for long distances or extended periods of time because of health or age-related issues or low fitness levels, electric bikes are a great alternative to get pedaling.

They do make the job easier thanks to the motor and throttle which helps the cyclist along the way, especially when climbing hills or riding against a strong wind. But riding an e-bike still involves some pedaling, so when people use them for commuting, for running errands or for fun, they still get moderate amounts of aerobic exercise.

For people who usually lead sedentary lives, riding an e-bike three times per week for about 40 minutes can add up to two hours of moderate aerobic exercise, which is much more than they usually do.

The heart rate of new electric bike riders rises by an average of 75% of their maximum which equals the rate during an easy jog or brisk walk.

This type of exercise helps reduce body fat and reduce blood-sugar levels, plus it strengthens the heart and improves lung capacity.

Plus, e-bikes are fun, which encourages people to ride. For average non-athletes, riding an e-bike will definitely help improve your fitness level and your health.

For cyclists with problems related to mobility, age or simply fitness, electric bikes can help motivate bike rides. Photo courtesy of Bikeberry.com.

People with e-bikes ride more

Studies show that, mainly due to the fun involved in riding an e-bike, people who choose this type of cycling tend to ride much more than those who rely on regular bicycles.

More people are using them to cover longer distances on a daily basis, such as for commuting or for running errands, rather than using their cars. Electric bikes also save a lot of time and money as compared to driving through heavy traffic every day, paying for gas, parking, insurance, and car maintenance.

Plus, with electric bikes, people can carry heavy cargo, groceries and their children as well, which is another reason why the army of e-bikers is growing on a daily basis.

More miles means more pedaling, and more pedaling means more exercise and improved fitness levels.

Your bones, muscles, and joints will become stronger too

Since e-bikes are quite heftier than regular bicycles, pedaling, steering and balancing on them requires quite a bit more effort, which can strengthen bones, muscles and joints. This can significantly reduce the risk of osteoporosis-related injuries and fractures.

Riding an electric bike helps reduce stress and builds up confidence

Yes, your mental health can improve once you start riding an e-bike regularly. Many people who feel intimidated about riding a regular bike find their confidence levels will grow along with their strength as they ride an e-bike.

You may even become ready to get back to regular cycling once again. This is especially true for people with injuries, disabled people or those who are not fit enough to ride a bicycle for miles and miles.

Once your stress levels decrease, and your confidence in yourself increases, you will feel much readier to face new challenges!

E-bikes are proving to be valuable transportation tools for urbanites looking for practical transportation options. Photo contributed by Bikeberry.com.

Conclusion

As you can see, there are some serious health benefits of riding an e-bike, especially if you are not all that active and fit to begin with.

Riding an e-bike will help you lose any extra weight you are carrying, it will strengthen your bone structure as well as your muscles and joints. Also, regular riding will make your heart stronger and less prone to problems and illnesses. Your blood pressure and blood sugar levels will get back to normal, and so will your quality of life.

Hopefully, these pointers will help traditional cyclists understand the growing popularity of e-bikes, begin to appreciate their health benefits, and get over the idea that e-bikes are not “real” bikes. Besides, anything that gets more people to ride a bike makes the world a better place!

This sponsored content was created in partnership with BikeBerry.com.

How your commute can contribute to a long and healthy life

By Tom Babin

On May 2, 2018

In Cities

You can turn your commute into a force for good in your life. Photo by Tom Babin.

You could drive a car to work every day. But then you’d be missing out on an opportunity to make your life both safer and healthier.

So says research from the team of Dr. Kay Teschke from the University of British Columbia, who looked at the relative safety of different modes of transportation. When it comes to fatality rates, which mode is safest? Here’s a hint: It’s not motorcycling. Check out the video for more.

And check out the research that inspired this video here and here. It’s fascinating stuff.

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Tom Babin is the author of Frostbike: The Joy, Pain and Numbness of Winter Cycling.

Here’s an idea to make cycling seem safer: Ban the crossbar

By Tom Babin

On October 11, 2017

In Bikes

Here’s a novel new idea for making cycling safer: Ban men’s bikes.

Seriously, this is a real idea, but don’t stop reading yet. Since the recommendation came out of the Netherlands, where they know a thing or two about biking, it’s worth a closer look.

It wasn’t exactly “men’s” bikes that were targetted, rather bikes with a crossbar — that horizontal rod that joins the seatpost to the headtube on a traditional double-triangle bike frame. Classic Dutch bikes ridden by many men feature have a crossbar, like this.

Bikes built in the Dutch style often include a crossbar or top tube, like on this bike.

While traditional Dutch-style women’s bikes don’t, like this.

These comfort bikes built lacking at crossbar are sometimes marketed to women.

Us North Americans who are older than six tend to call such bikes “step-throughs” because you don’t have to stretch your leg over that bar. And there is still be some lingering gender baggage around bike frame shape. Step-throughs were once seen as a “women’s” style, while crossbars were found on “men’s” bikes.

The recommendation came out of traffic safety organizations Veilig Verkeer Nederland (VVN) and TeamAlert. When you read the fine print (or, if you are sadly unilingual like me, infer from the fine print from a Google-translated report, after Lloyd Alter of Treehugger spotted the report), the recommendation is logical. Bikes with crossbars tend to force riders to lean forward to reach the handlebars, which means they are more prone to head blows in collisions.

Here in North America, this proposal is a non-starter. We’re just starting to get people on bikes, so I can’t imagine a serious movement to start banning certain styles.

But the dangers of crossbars are worth thinking about for another, more fundamental reason. The North American bike of choice for several generations for both genders have not just been those with crossbars, but those that are explicitly designed for speed and control. Both mountain bikes and road bikes force riders into low aggressive positions because that makes them go faster.

Such bikes have proven so popular that even those people who aren’t looking to ride for speed have defaulted to similar styles. Even bikes that aren’t targetted directly to the athletic crowd, such as “hybrid” bikes and “commuter” bikes, and even fixies, share the same geometry: rider leaning forward, off-kilter centre of balance.

Bikes like this, sometimes called commuter bikes or hybrid, because they blend elements of road and mountain bikes, often force riders into a more aggressive, athletic body position. That can be good in some cases, but not all.

Compare that to the traditional “womens” Dutch bike (if you’ve ever used a bike share, you’ve probably ridden a step-through frame of this style). Body position on this type bike is completely different. This is what that Dutch study was referring to. It’s easy to see how a collision while sitting upright in this position would be less dangerous to the noggin than one in which your centre of gravity is precariously hovering over the frame, rather than your feet.

You can see a difference in body position between the woman on the step-through frame at the left and those riding behind, who are leaning more forward.

Could this have something to do with the perception of cycling as a dangerous activity in North America? That may be a bit of a stretch (forcing people to ride bikes beside legions of car drivers who hate them is probably a tad more relevant), but if you are a casual, sporadic cyclist lacking confidence and all of your experience is on a frame built for athletics, I’m willing to be you’d be less willing to get back on a bike, especially if you were ever involved in a crash.

It’s subtle, but these experiences on a bike do colour our perceptions of cycling. If you’ve never ridden a step-through frame before, you probably have no idea how safe, slow and comfortable riding a bike can be.

The authors of the recommendation were wise enough to point to other studies have shown that one of the most injurious parts of riding a bike as people age is simply mounting and dismounting, a problem the step-though frame goes a long way to solving.

This isn’t a plea to ban crossbars or athletic bikes or anything like that. It’s simply a reminder that there are other ways to ride than how most North Americans do it, and it can be a completely different experience. So maybe swe don’t need to ban the crossbar, but it’s time to start thinking beyond it.

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