It’s sleeting outside, which means I’m riding home from work on a cold, wet bike seat, but at least the seat is there. Several months ago I left work and discovered that someone had stolen it during a midafternoon storm, even though it was parked along Michigan Avenue. I pedaled home in a steady downpour, standing up during the entire 30-minute journey.
But that didn’t dampen my will to commute to work on my bicycle, and that’s about as bad as it gets, unless, of course, your entire bike is ripped off. Or you’re assaulted by a car door. Or you’re pelted in the back with a bagel by an angry motorist as you veer around a pothole.
These are the risks we face every morning, in addition to other complications, such as the lack of showers at offices and the daily wardrobe dilemma. (Is it inappropriate to show up at a press conference in the federal building wearing Lycra?)
But ask any biking commuter, and he or she will say the worst day biking is far better than the best day on the elevated train. Or stuck in traffic. Biking, even with its inconveniences, is one of the most efficient, rewarding forms of transportation.
I have a car, but sitting in stalled traffic, searching for parking spaces and paying to park are unnecessarily stressful. The creepy, crawly bus takes about an hour to my office downtown. The elevated takes 45 minutes, including the walk to and from the station. While walking to the “L” you freeze. Inside, you sweat. It’s grimy. And running or rollerblading with a backpack full of clothes is just too slow, too labor intensive. Virtually impossible in the winter.
My trusty black commuter bike, an unimpressive Schwinn Woodlands mountain bike that is often mocked because of its kickstand, on the other hand, gets me to work in 30 minutes flat from west Lakeview, give or take a few minutes depending on the headwind. I can park it almost anywhere, from parking meters to bike racks to street signs.
And I can go anywhere. Along the lakefront bike path, when the sun sparkles on the water, the scenery can be breathtaking. It’s peaceful. It’s my time for me. By the time I get to work, I am awake, alert, and a few endorphins are even bouncing around.
Plus, with air pollution reaching intolerable levels and since we’ll likely run out of fossil fuels earlier than many people anticipate — at least one study estimates that United States oil reserves will last only 12 years — cycling is going to become increasingly important for our environment.
England, one of several Western nations looking for environmental solutions, launched a National Cycling Strategy in July to double the number of bike journeys within three years and double it again by 2012. The plan calls for 3,500 miles of new bike routes by next summer. “Can we become a nation of Lycra loonies?” wondered writer Richard Morrison in The Times of London.
In the U.S. about 76.7 million people over 16 ride bicycles, but only about 4 million of us ride to work, according to the Bicycle Council, something bicycle coalitions across the country are trying to change. Car-choked Los Angeles is building a bicycle tollway called the Arroya Seco Bikeway, linking part of the city with neighboring Pasadena. And in hilly San Francisco, major thoroughfares have bike lanes.
Despite all the challenges, surveys by Bicycle Magazine say the number of people bicycling to work has grown more than 20 percent in the last five years. Nine years ago, when Chicago’s Pam Gordon began riding to work, she didn’t have much company. “Back then people thought I was totally strange,” said Gordon, 32, who works for J. Walter Thompson. “But I’ve noticed a difference lately. My bike used to be the only one in the bike rack. Now it’s packed.”
And Chicago does rank as one of the better large cities for bike commuters. Mayor Richard Daley’s Streets for Cycling Plan is expected to triple the number of bikeway miles to 300-350 by 2001. We now have 35 miles of 5-foot-wide bike lanes.
While people say they’d like to bike to work, actually getting them to do it is a different story. True year-round bike commuters are a rare breed. Generally speaking, there are five main excuses people give for not biking to work.
Road rage
We are sworn at, splashed with soda and startled by horns. Tim Dull, an environmental engineer, used to commute from his home Oak Park to his office downtown, but one evening children pelted him with rocks. Another time he tried a new route and ended up in an undesirable neighborhood. “It’s not bad in the morning, just scary in the evening,” said Dull.
Then there was Carnell Fitzpatrick, the crazed SUV driver charged with murder after he allegedly slammed into Tom McBride, 26, and ran him over after McBride fell off his bike last May in Chicago. Traffic can be terrifying. We’re banned from sidewalks, and our meager bike lanes are frequently blocked by cabs, delivery trucks and double-parked cars.
“It is scary, especially if you aren’t used to biking,” said Amy Callner, project manager of the Chicagoland Bike Federation. “Ride visibly and wear a helmet. Ride with traffic. Take the lane if you need to. Signal. Have lights on your bike to be seen.”
Travis Garth, who once deliberately plowed into someone’s door when it was swung open, has mellowed. “When I started riding and someone gave me a hard time, I would behave the same way I did when I drove: I’d call attention to their rudeness,” said Garth, who lives in Rogers Park. “Little by little I realized discretion is a better part of sanity.”
Miserable weather
In Chicago, it’s either raining or snowing or the wind blows you off your bike, or it’s sunny in the morning and sleeting when you’re trying to ride home. For cyclists, there is always some unforgiving element threatening the commute. The upside is when you do get in your car, or even a bus, it feels like a luxury. And there are ways of coping with inclement weather.
With a helmet, your hair will stay relatively dry. In the winter, wear a hat, gloves and Gortex. Layer. Get a little tougher.
Dull used to work with a man who put spikes on his tires so when the lakefront became icy he didn’t slide into the lake.
Garth bikes to work year-round, as long as it’s not snowing. Attorney Roger Grimes bikes until it gets below about 20 degrees. Gordon stops biking around November, not necessarily because of the cold but because it gets dark earlier. Her husband, Marc, is the year-round biker in the family.
Hygiene, or `no place to shower’
Perspiration is one of the biggest excuses, and quite legitimate. Few people want to walk into the office in a sweat-stained shirt and risk offending colleagues, bosses or clients for the entire day. Some lucky commuters have health clubs nearby or showers at their offices. Other people effectively wash up in the sink. Grant Park has public showers. But Callner pointed out that a bike commute isn’t supposed to be a workout ride. “It’s a different pace,” she said. “If I leave on time and I’m not booking, it’s no more strenuous than walking.”
Wardrobe is another tricky issue. Some people bike in their work clothes. The brave ones arrive in tight black shorts and colorful bike shirts and change at the office. This inevitably results in forgotten belts, socks, shoes or worse: bras or underwear. I once forgot a very necessary slip and had to buy a new outfit before I could walk into the office.
Grimes, who has been biking to work since 1994, said it changed his style of dress. “I hardly ever wear a suit coat anymore,” he said.
Parking and bike theft
Grimes parks his bike in an indoor garage in his office building. Not all of us are this lucky. I leave mine outside, rotating spots, depending on my mood, the route I’ve taken to work and recent stories I’ve heard about theft.
Because my bike is so cheap, I leave the wheels on and lock the front wheel and frame with a u-lock. (A lesson I learned after I naively locked the wheel — but not the frame — to a post and had my bike stolen.) I still leave my seat on the frame, even though it was ripped off, but it no longer has a quick release.
Sometimes I lock it in the Tribune’s designated bike area, behind the building on the loading dock, but bikes are stolen from there in spite of security cameras. I used to regularly park it a plaza along Michigan Avenue next to Walgreens, but that proved to be bad judgment.
After I was assigned this story, someone removed my back wheel and ripped out my inner tube in broad daylight. The day before, someone plastered a Mancow sticker on my bike frame, which was almost more annoying than losing the tube and having to take the “L” home.
“It’s not always obvious where to park your bike,” said Callner. “If you have a good solid u-lock, lock both the frame and wheels. It doesn’t hurt to have two locks. Replace your quick-release seat. Bring it inside or buy a clunker. A commuter bike only has to get you from point A to point B.”
Chicago, unfortunately, is the fourth worst city for bike theft, according to Bicycling Magazine, behind New York, Phoenix and San Francisco. But if you look around, you can find inexpensive indoor parking. Garth, a graphic artist, found a parking garage at Illinois Center where he pays $50 to park for six months. He takes the computer odometer and pump off his bike. “It’s better than leaving it locked up outside,” he said.
Takes too long
This is one of the biggest misconceptions, but of course, it depends where you live and where you’re going. For city dwellers, speed is one of the main advantages.
“The average bike commuter rides 10 miles per hour. In traffic in urban areas, cycling takes less time than driving for three miles or less,” Callner said.
Speed is, in fact, the overriding reason why I bike to work. But in the course of riding, I’ve discovered other benefits, like biking is thoroughly invigorating. There’s the fresh, sometimes biting wind on my face, the easy movement after sitting at a desk all day, the smell of the city, the lake and the seasons. But most of all, I’m part of the environment and its elements, not a sealed-up observer.
Bikes are, after all, where many great things started. The Wright brothers were bike mechanics. Women of the 1890s rode bikes to proclaim their independence. And Albert Einstein’s Theory of Relativity? He said he thought of it while riding his bike.
TIPS TO TAKE THE BUMPS OUT OF YOUR COMMUTE
Chicago bike guru Dave Glowacz, author of “Urban Bikers’ Tricks & Tips,” has advice for both rookies and hotshots on everything from how to keep a helmet from messing up your hair to conquering nerves associated with riding next to two-ton hunks of metal.
“A bandana worn pirate style helps alleviate the crushing bowl effect of the helmet, and certain shampoos work too,” said Glowacz, who traveled across the country while researching his book. To get comfortable with traffic, Glowacz suggested riding around cars in a quiet parking lot and peering inside, practicing for that awful moment when a door might swing open.
Other tips for bicycle commuters include:
– Don’t try to do everything at once. Separate the challenges. For example, try riding to work on a day you don’t have to work, like a Saturday.
– Don’t try riding to work as a first commute. Try riding to the store. Then you don’t have to worry about dressing or being on time.
– Find someone who already commutes to work and pick his or her brain.
– Learn how to lock well. “Practice uglification or making your bike unattractive,” Glowacz said. Also practice cross locking or using two sets of locks. The thief will see double locks and move on to the next bike.
– Don’t get discouraged. It’s hard to be a cyclist in a car-drivers world, but plenty of people do it, and do it happily.
