Why do bike-friendly public transit options always seem to cater to the roadie crowd, with their fancy bike racks and secure storage compartments that are just a fancy way of saying we dont trust you to bring your bike on board? Meanwhile, the rest of us are stuck dealing with cramped, poorly lit bike cages on buses or the thrill of trying to squeeze our bikes onto a crowded train car.
Cant we do better than this? What about designing public transit systems that actually prioritize bike accessibility, rather than just paying lip service to it? For example, why not have dedicated bike cars on trains, or buses with built-in bike lanes? And dont even get me started on the so-called bike-friendly cities that still manage to make it impossible to get your bike on public transit without a PhD in contortionism.
Its time to rethink our assumptions about what it means to be bike-friendly and start designing public transit systems that actually work for cyclists, rather than just pretending to. So, what are some real-world examples of bike-friendly public transit options that dont just cater to the spandex crowd?