Question for you urban area roadies

[Owlie]

How do you go about finding long rides? Riding around here is rather limiting because there's a traffic light every 500 feet or so and I hate the traffic density.

[chicagogal]

I go north out of the city, into the 'burbs, and the more rural areas in WI. Basically, eight miles of picking my way through traffic and traffic lights gets me out of Chicago city limits, and the "real" riding starts from there.

I just try not get frustrated with the city part of my routes, and just think of it as the commute to the ride starts and don't even count those miles (they are pretty useless anyway!)

[OakLeaf]

It's been a while since I've been urban, but even in our small town there are limited routes to get out of town.

Is there a bicycle map or posted routes? Are there bike paths you can use? Does the city have a bicycle/pedestrian coordinator? (Columbus has all three.)

Or, try the clubs - even if you don't choose to ride with them, you can learn the routes they use to get out of town.

[Catrin]

My bike rack has served me well in this department. There just is not a safe way for me to ride from home at my current skill level, so I don't even try to do so. I AM, however, moving in a couple of months to an apartment from which I can ride to the country

[ccnyc]

I do the same exact thing as chicagogal except I'm in NYC. I do the 8 "junk miles" to get outta town, but it's worth it. Now I just ride over the George Washington Bridge into NJ and NY or take the subway to the top of the Bronx and ride into wonderful, hilly, Westchester County, NY.

Join a local bike club. Before I did I spent many, many weekends going around in circles in Central Park, NYC. I did a couple of rides with a bike club to show me the way to the less trafficked roads.

When I had a car I used to drive over the GWB, to avoid the junk miles, and start my ride in NJ.

[bmccasland]

There's either the levee bike path OR, load bike in car, drive, unload and then ride. The local bike club does organized rides into rural areas, or a variety of charity rides plus the MS-150 training rides gets me most of the "country" miles that I want.

[Owlie]

I really wish I had a car up here, because there are some nice bike trails (a few rail-trails and the Erie Canal Towpath). There's a shared-use path, but as the part closest to me goes through a really bad part of town (shame, because the park is beautiful), it's "use at your own peril".

I have my rack with me, and BF and I have been looking at a car-sharing program, so we might be able to take advantage of some of these trails. I do have some of my undergrad institution's club's routes (and I've sent an e-mail asking for more), so we'll see. I'm modifying them as much as possible to avoid a thoroughly terrifying intersection. People who live here find it confusing! I also have a 20-mile route that a charity ride here uses.
(Well, it's actually 15, but my riding to its start point makes it 20.)

[Biciclista]

sounds like your question is dependent on a specific location. we can leave our house in a major metropolis and in 5 miles, we are surrounded by tree cover and there are trails and roads that can take us in many directions. So it really depends. often we take our bikes in the car to a starting point because of time constraints, but it is not necessary.

[Owlie]

sounds like your question is dependent on a specific location. we can leave our house in a major metropolis and in 5 miles, we are surrounded by tree cover and there are trails and roads that can take us in many directions. So it really depends. often we take our bikes in the car to a starting point because of time constraints, but it is not necessary.

In a way, I guess. I'm in a very "landlocked" area (older suburb), so I've been debating whether to suck it up or see about the car thing.

[shootingstar]

Owlie, hope you find some decent long routes for regular cycling. Can appreciate the terrifying, confusing intersection if it is an impediment.


We live downtown in high density areas with traffic lights....but we also live near some decent bike routes with lanes and paths. We actually live in a perfect area where it is possible to design a long route that runs through quiet residential streets, near park areas, etc. Getting out to the "country", the closest would be parks in the centre of metropolitan areas that have interconnected bike paths which hook into on-road bike routes throughout the city.

I have cobbled together several different interlinking routes of 100 kms. in our area and still be cycling within metropolitan city borders where about 70% of the route avoids high volume road traffic. It does help that my partner is a cycling advocate who understands quieter areas/safer sections for route planning --both for Vancouver and Toronto.

I also lived in Toronto suburbs near very busy roads, intersections, but cycled into a huge ravine park bike greenway system that connected over 5 different parks and also took one into downtown with high density. I avoided 50 traffic light intersections when reaching downtown from my home.

This is why I am not critical of MUPs: if you use these routes early in the morning and know lower-peak use times, they are wonderful.

Getting out to real country in Toronto (minus the waterfront) meant at least cycling for 1-1.5 hr. from its centre before reaching "country". But this was not necessary if one understood the city's bike route network.

[OakLeaf]

I feel for people who live in Columbus, actually. When I was in school, it was only like five miles to "out of town" to the west, the shortest way. Now it's complete urban sprawl at least another 10 miles from campus.

[PamNY]

Could you occasionally use a car service or taxi, just to give yourself a break? It sounds expensive until you compare it to owning a car.

Also, public transportation can work, but I'm sure you'd be doing that if it were an option.

Walking a bike across difficult intersections can make your day brighter. Sometimes I do it if there's ridiculous traffic, or police activity.

[crazycanuck]

Can you ride the side streets (I know in North America most cities have alleys behind the houses & that's not what i'm referring to..). For example, on one ride I can beat the wind and ride nicer hills by going in three streets into the residential area. The street I require to connect everything isn't hard to get to and all's well at the end. It's a nice area & haven't encountered too many bogans driving.

? Does that make sense?

I have no clue about how safe those side streets are in your city.

[tulip]

One of the main reasons I bought my house was it's proximity to great riding roads. Something to consider for your next move, perhaps. I'm in the city limits because I hate suburbs, but just a few miles from country roads. And a few miles from downtown, too. Best of both worlds.

[malkin]

Head out of town. There are country-ish roads and on Sundays the industrial roads are good too. During the week they're loaded with big big trucks.