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Comment by dbdjfjrjvebd | Hacker News Reader

Virtually no one bikes here in the winter.

As I said, definitely a lot of bikes in Munich in winter, but temperatures also rarely drop below -10°C or so (although there were some extremely exceptional winters in the last few years where it happened). Maybe that's different in Oslo.

Temperatures here are rarely under -5 but rarely above 0. The key is that they hover just below zero and the ice stays on the ground.

Ice is very different to snow to cycle on.

Does the city not put road grit onto the bike paths in Oslo? They certainly do in Munich.

They are not many bike paths. For example there are non on my commute.

Ah, that's the major difference then, I guess.

Road grid does little when there's several cm of snow on top of the ice. It's a very slippery combination.

During winter the sidewalks rarely get the snow removed. So unless there's dedicated bike lanes, which there are still rather few of, you'd have to bike in the middle of the road. Which, due to the topography, would mostly mean holding up the traffic big time.

Here are some news articles from last winter which contains some illustrative pictures: https://www.aftenposten.no/norge/i/m60VB0/Mer-sno-i-vente-pa... https://www.aftenposten.no/osloby/i/ka3kLj/Oslo-vinteren-har...

Of course it's not always that bad, but it's usually not a whole lot better either for most of the winter.

Yes, the difference seems to be that Munich has lots of bike paths.

They're building more here tho, so unless we get a shift in power next year (local elections), the situation should be much better in a few years time.

They've also said they'll focus keeping the bike roads clear during winter, currently a big issue for myself.

Between this and the property tax I can't see the current local government holding onto power.

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