OK. There are a lot of pictures (and videos) here, but enough text too, so don't fall into the trap of reacting only to the cool bike models you see. Cite some details from the text as well.
Is this an encouraging trend? Do you think it will catch on here? Besides the ecological side, there also seems to be an aspect of this trend connected to individual expression. Does Slovak culture discourage people from expressing themselves and being rather eccentric? Are US and other English-speaking cultures more tolerant in this regard? Have some of the eccentrics in this article gone too far? Would you consider being carless, or trying to accomplish tasks like these without a motor? Should the city of Bratislava, or Slovakia in general, do more to become bike-friendly? Are there safety issues which need to be addressed here?
I love this article. I used to drive my bicycle a lot, so I know a little bit about cargo transporting bikes. I think that bikes generally are becoming more popular, as it is a very good way of traveling in cities with daily traffic jams. It also saves money for gas and is a very good fat-burning activity for people who want to stay fit. However I think that most of the cargo transported can not be delivered by human-powered vehicles of any type, including bicycles. This is simply because it would take too many people to transport large and heavy cargo. But as said in the end of the article, a certain sort of cargo can be transported by bikes. For example postal bikes can deliver mail by bicycles in cities or smaller towns and save a lot of time.
ReplyDeleteI think that in Slovakia, the cargo bikes are not used very much in the cities, rather than in villages in eastern Slovakia. As I’ve stayed there for a few months, I can say that a lot of people use a bike as a transport vehicle for hay, wood or agricultural equipment. The reason is simple. They don’t posses the money needed for gas or car. The other thing is, that they have hills there, so they use the gravity instead of human-power to transport cargo down to valley. People in bigger Slovakian cities don’t use bicycles for cargo at all. They rather use it for recreation and tourism. I don’t think that Slovaks are as eccentric as Americans, which are using bicycles as moving bars or picnic station. I don’t think it is because of the language, I think that all multicultural countries are simply used to other manners and accept something new a lot easier.
Even if Slovaks became more bike-loving and started using bikes much more, there are two problems that have to be taken into consideration. The first one is climate. In Slovakia only 3 months are warm enough to go biking. Of course people go on bike even in winter, but it is certainly not as comfortable and safe as in weather without snow or wind. The other thing is the infrastructure of roads for bicycles. There are only a few roads for bicycles in our capital – Bratislava, and almost none of them are in or near the downtown. Bikers simply have to use roads for cars or sidewalks. Both are dangerous.
As I mentioned safety, I think that it should be compulsory to wear helmet when riding a bicycle and it should be stricter when transporting cargo, as riding with heavy load lengthens the stopping distance and reduces dexterity.
I think that these cargo bikes are very useful things. They are useful in several ways. For example when you forget to buy some important thing like bread and the grocery is just few blocks away. It is too close to go there by car, but it’s too far to go by foot. I think the best solution is a cargo bike. With cargo bike there would be no problem with even bigger things to carry. In the article, there were much more examples for practical use of cargo bikes. Personally, I like the “pub bike” with two kegs full of beer and also with an audio system. But cargo bikes are not just for transporting things, but also for transporting people. I can imagine a nice family trip in one cargo bike. Then there are less useful but more attractive bikes like the picnic table bike or a bike with a grocery store shopping cart instead of the front wheel.
ReplyDeleteI think that cargo bikes are really useful but it depends on the locality. For example it would be very hard to ride a huge cargo bike in narrow streets of Bratislava Old town. On the other hand, cargo bikes seem to be designed for people who live in outskirts or villages. And it is not just the cargo bikes. It’s about all kinds of bikes. I think that people in villages use their bikes more frequently than in cities. In the village where I live, I see a biker almost every day. There are plenty of young bikers riding on mountain bikes, but the fact is that there are more elderly people using bikes than the young ones. They go to work, then to a pub, and at the end they go home. But back to the cargo bikes. I think that cargo bikes would make our lives easier and more varied.
Tomáš Langer
@Enrik
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that the cargo bikes are very useful for transporting a small cargo. In the village I live many people use them. For example mailmen use them or builders use them as well. Even I go to shop sometimes and carry my shopping on the bike. I think the reason why they are so popular in small cities and villages is because of better infrastructure. There are also only a few or none roads for bicycles both in villages and in larger cities, but the traffic in villages is a lot less frequent and thus safer for bikers. It is a completely different experience when you ride your bike in Bratislava during rush hour or in a village on a completely empty road. I think the only big downside for many cargo bikers is the weather. As you said we have only three warm months ideal for biking.
Responding to: Tomáš Langer
ReplyDeleteIt seems to me that you were repeating a lot of things and that you weren’t really giving a variety of reasons on which the cargo bike usefulness depends. You just mentioned that locality is important, with which I undoubtedly agree, but I think there is a lot more to it. For example you could have mentioned that although cargo bikes are really useful and have a lot of advantages, such as more space, comfort and a higher weight capacity, they are often really heavy as opposed to an ordinary bike, which is smaller,more compact and a lot lighter. Cargo bikes also might be more expensive, which makes them unavailable for people who don’t have enough money.
Mária Dudáková
I think that cargo biking has almost no chance of arising in the larger cities of Slovakia. As the comments above me said, we have very few bike roads in Bratislava and those that we do have are by the Danube and lead outside of the city. In addition, in downtown we have paved sidewalks which would be uncomfortable for any biker, let alone someone with some kind of cargo attached. I don't think that we are in some way less tolerant to bikers that other countries. It's just that we don't have as much opportunities. Given better bike roads, I'm sure a lot more people would start biking.
ReplyDelete