Hacker News Reader

Comment by mellosouls | Hacker News Reader

significantly faster if parking is taken into account for most trips

This sounds unlikely for the average cycling commuter if parking alone is making the difference- cyclists (as motorcyclists) need to change (at each side) and shower etc; I think that is often forgotten in these calculations.

View on HN

I could probably count the number of times I've changed or showered after cycling on one hand, and cycling has been my main mode of transit for 10 years.

When your trip is like 3km you don't even have time to work up a sweat, especially if you're limited to just going at the speed of traffic. (Yes, on my own I could probably ride faster, but I'm limited by car/infrastructure speed)

Sure, there are always going to be anecdotal exceptions ("parking isn't an issue for me, I just park on site"), but I think fans on either side can have quite rose-tinted views when assessing the pros and cons; I was just pointing out an omission in one of the examples.

I live in the highest density cycling city in North America (Montreal) and this is not anecdotal. A huge portion of my office cycle-commutes to work, and the vast majority do not shower. This was doubly-true before I worked at my current company, where there weren't showers, and still most people used bikes to commute.

At what point do anecdotes from people who actually live this experience day to day become more useful to listen to than theories from people who don't?

I used to commute by bike myself (and would still if logistics allowed), so you should probably not presume.

The fact is, short of linking to professional analysis and reporting we are all here relating anecdotes - and that's ok.

When your trip is 3km you can easily walk. Bicycle commuting is very hard in warmer climates, because you will get sweaty. But motorcycles solve that problem at least. Then you have those cold climates with awful weather, where bicycle commuting is pure misery, compared to riding a car or bus. So it is all very location dependent.

Bike commuting during winter is fine as long as you have the right clothes. I have commuted in a -55F wind chill in perfect comfort. I will concede that it takes a few weeks to calibrate clothing if you're not used to it, but it's not some huge barrier if it's something you're interested in

Snow cover can make it impossible. Frozen rain means you need somewhere to store your wet clothes, and they will not be nice to put on when going back. Somebody who isn't a huge biking freak will prefer the car.

Do a google image search for 'Dutch on bicycles'. None of those people in the pictures need to change or shower after their ride. Same thing were I live. We only wear special cycling clothes if we go out cycling on a road bike or mountain bike in the weekend. And of course then you need to shower afterwards.

I have to shower at least once a day anyways, so it doesn't really make a difference if I do that before or after my commute. In fact when I drive to work I usually spend the first couple minutes in the shower just staring at the wall waking up- when I bike to work I'm much more efficient.

The only downside is that on warmer days if I have something going on in the evening I'll sometimes need to shower again when I get home, but IMO it's still worth it considering that my roundtrip commute is maybe 60 minutes by bike vs 50 minutes by car, and if I commute by car I don't get the free workout

>cyclists (as motorcyclists) need to change (at each side) and shower etc;

Excuse me? I have literally never done that in my life. I just bike in my normal clothes. It's light exercise, you don't have to shower afterwards.

My guess is that even if you drive to work, you shower at home in the morning. I instead shower at the office when biking. So same amount of time use.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com