I don't mind the weather in Copenhagen where the amount of people who bikes every day exceeds the amount of people who take public transportation every day by around 50% (1). Weather in Copenhagen is rarely very cold or very warm. But Copenhagen weather is not "startlingly good all year-round". It rains quite often and temperatures are often close to zero or sub zero. And it's windy all the time. It even snows a few days a year.

I don't think it's a question of either or. It's a question of prioritizing both bikes, and public transportation, and electric cars and scooters.

Sadly, even in Copenhagen, where there are dedicated bike highways, elevated bike bridges, and generally very good biking conditions (mostly flat city), the amount of people who use cars every day far exceeds the amount of people who bike.

1: Page 11: https://www.regionh.dk/til-fagfolk/trafik/Analyser-og-rappor...

This "good weather" argument against biking is so bizarre and disconnected from reality... Have you ever noticed that the most biking friendly places in the world are in middle-to-northern europe? Copenhagen isn't a particularly sunny place. Many people don't care, if you give them good infrastructure they'll cycle with every weather.

> billions of dollars to spare on huge transport infrastructure projects that aren't cars

Cycling infrastructure is almost ludicrously cheap. You can build pretty good bike infrastructure for a decent-sized city with O(€100m). A single metro line normally costs O(€1bn). The reason that bike infrastructure doesn't get built isn't cost - it's political. Car users don't like having lanes and parking spaces taken away from them.

> startlingly good weather year-round

Not _everywhere_ has weather suitable for cycling. However, a lot of places do have suitable weather and yet no infrastructure. That leaves plenty of room for improvement. Many cities could be suitable for cycling with some effort - e.g. clearing snow from bike lanes (see Copenhagen) or adding shade.

> disabled people

Cycling infrastructure is actually great for many disabled people. It makes safe space available for specially-adapted bicycles and mobility scooters.[1]

> spry Euro-oldsters

As far as I know, there's not much of an inherent genetic difference between the Dutch and the rest of the world. Perhaps having an active lifestyle is what _causes_ you to age into a 'spry Euro-oldster' - and is something everyone should aspire to.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/jan/02/cambridge-dis...

I appear to have kicked off a frenzy of folks eurosplaining to me that they personally ride in deep snow, howling gales, and see no reason that people in hot climates (including hot humid climates with near 100% humidity, or extreme heat events) can't cycle everywhere at all times. Also they will all be happily cycling when they are 80 just like Grandpa Josef and Great-grandma Helga, etc. Congrats, but the statistics are not going to be with you world-wide.

As I said, I'm pro-cycling. Good for you, all you hardy souls. But it is a seriously boneheaded point of view to imagine that cycling is going to be more important as a mode of transport than public transport in most of the world under the conditions that exist now.

There's a large plurality - even in the totally cycle-happy countries - of people that don't ride, and that's a majority past a certain age. These people will get a small benefit (aside from cleaner air and fewer cars on the road, which is nice) from cycling infrastructure. Conversely, a drastic improvement in public transit infrastructure benefits almost everyone - cyclists are pedestrians and transit users some of the time, and they will also benefit from getting cars off the road.

Frankly a lot of folks are confusing their hobby with good public policy.

> that it should go to bikes and not public transport + walkability.

The article specifically talks about switching our mindset away from a strictly bike lane oriented world view to one that emphasizes diversity in micromobility solutions. That's why it wants the reader to "Dream Bigger Than Bike Lanes". Public transport and especially walkability do not contrast with this viewpoint.

It's not a zero sum game.

Improving bicycling also improves public transit and walkability usually because bicycles take up so much less room than cars so buses have more space, and it's extremely rare for a bicycle to injure a pedestrian, but it happens hundreds of times a day just in the US alone with cars.

Also bicycle infrastructure is way cheaper to build and maintain than car infrastructure. And even when bicycle infrastructure is totally busted for awhile, people find a way around, where as with cars if there is any blockage it becomes an incredibly high priority emergency.

Wether is mostly a clothes and a comfort problem. I grew up on the countryside in the Alps and used the bicycle the majority of my life to commute, and that includes rain and snow. The days where cycling are impossible or dangerous depend on where you are living, but in my case it was around 4 days a year.

However I think when citylab is writing about the balance between cars and bicycles, they are refering to cities, where you (A) wouldn’t ban cars completely because of delivery and people with mobility problems and (B) the usage of cars by everybody has very tangible problems attached to it (space, noise, pollution, air quality).

And when we are talking about balance we are usually talking about one that is extremely on the side of the car anyways. Even in european cities there is are often two 1 meter bicycle lanes for six 3 meter car lanes and as a cyclist who often rides on crowded bicycle lanes while the streets next to me are empty, I can just dream of the things that could be done with the space of one car lane.

I have also lived for some time in Denmark and the Netherlands, where cycling is extremely widespread and I know what difference the infrastructure makes. When you cycle in a big german city you have to be constantly on the watch to not get overlooked by motorists, in the Netherlands nearly everbody cycles and the infrastructure is so much better, that cycling feels (and probably is) much less dangerous. This is also why it is more popular there.

That beeing said, I don’t believe that cycling alone will be the solution of the cities of the future. Cheap and good public transport systems and a clever network of delivery routes will also be needed.

And those who really need a car will certainly be granted permissions to use them (as they are now when it comes to all european historical city centers/pedestrian areas). The spry Euro-oldsters you mentioned seem to swear on E-bikes, because they can use electricity when they have to go up steep hills or just feel like it. Gives them the security they will make it even if their powers are running out. They would probably say sth. like: “There’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes”

Yah... Bad weather isn't an argument though.

I'm faster with my bike no matter the weather. Especially when it's snowing outside. Gosh, snow slows cars down massively. I love this time of the year: no one tends to speed any more since drivers are afraid of crashing their cars.

You could visit Amsterdam or Copenhagen, they aren't exactly tropical cities. And the situation isn't binary. Because switching to something else than individual cars as the default mode of transportation doesn't mean there's no way for disabled people to get around.

I've been living in Amsterdam for a few years now, and with the bike lanes it feels like disabled people are SUPER included.

You can see a lot of people in the bike lanes with mobility problems, in their electric wheelchairs, scooters, etc. Completely impossible in my car oriented city, specially because these people often cannot afford a car in their situation. It's so nice to see an old lady going in her electric vehicle in the bike line.

The point is not to ban cars completely, but to also accomodate other means of transportation as well. Also in city centers only limit cars to a strict minimum (delivery, disabled people, etc).

Honestly, I feel like a broken record bringing again countries and cities where it's working, they're not magical countries but real countries where different choices have been made.

German interest rates are below zero right now. There actually are hundreds of billions of dollars flying around the world chasing the slightest hint of return. So yes, we do have the money.

Also MMT.

Earth, a few decades ago, before the dominion of cars?

Earth, today, in Denmark / Netherlands.

Kneejerk reactions like yours, without looking into the issue at all, are the main hurdle.

OK that public transportation is essential. But your climate argument is a bit shaky. Denmark and the Netherlands have comically bad weather all year round, yet bike transportation thrives on their cities. I'd say that an important factor of the viability of bikes is whether the city is flat. For example, biking in sunny and hilly Lisbon can be very tiring.

Public transport and bikes can both be important, the key is cars have been first everywhere for 100 years and both public transport and bikes are massively harmed by the huge incentives given to cars.

If people biked more then there would be less disabled people. No one who spends a couple hours a day on a bike is losing a leg to diabetes. Or getting hurt in a car accident, if they aren’t near cars.

> startlingly good weather year-round

In Sweden people take the bike even when it's minus 20 degrees and snow everywhere.