RAGBRAI Roadshow - High Trestle Trail Madrid

The Arizona-based mountain bike company partnered with a local nonprofit to refurbish bikes for families in need.

In the summer of 2019, Daniel Limburg, a planning and product manager at Pivot Cycles, got lunch with Michael Sullivan, agency director at the Welcome to America Project (WTAP), a nonprofit that helps resettled refugees make a life in the Phoenix Metropolitan Area. As Sullivan described his work at WTAP, Limburg’s interest was piqued. It was when Sullivan mentioned the nonprofit’s newly launched bike nights, however, where volunteers refurbished donated bikes for refugees, that Limburg saw an opportunity to get involved. 

Founded in 2001, WTAP was the natural outgrowth of one couple’s desire to help a newly resettled refugee family from Afghanistan. A refugee, as opposed to a voluntary immigrant, refers to a person who has been forced to leave their country to escape war, persecution or natural disaster. Phoenix consistently ranks among the top 10 cities for refugee resettlement in the U.S., and what started with one family soon blossomed into the 501(c)(3) nonprofit WTAP is today.

For the 2021 fiscal year, the Biden Administration has set a refugee cap at 62,500 people. Once refugees are accepted into the U.S. and placed in a new city, they have just 90 days to assimilate and find a job (they're given six months to pay the U.S. government back for airfare costs). Although refugees are provided housing, many show up with nothing more than a suitcase and a rudimentary grasp of the English language. 

“Imagine if you landed in Tanzania and had six months to figure out housing, food and work,” said Sullivan, who served as a WTAP volunteer for more than a decade before coming on as director. “Our goal is to turn fear into hope — and it goes both ways.”

Volunteers with WTAP form a welcoming committee, greeting new arrivals and working to make sure they feel accepted in what can be a hostile environment. By providing used and new donated items — everything from furniture to computers to clothing — the organization helps refugees set up their apartments and find work. Recognizing that transportation is a key factor when it comes to accessing essential services, WTAP also provides donated bicycles. For many refugees, a bike might be their only way of getting to an English class or a job, especially during undesirable shift times when transit is less frequent.

“I realized I could make a difference by repairing and helping people get on bikes,” said Limburg (pictured above), who first attended one of the nonprofit’s bike nights in August 2019. “When I first decided to volunteer, I shot out a quick office email asking if anyone wanted to join me.”

The first night, three Pivot coworkers helped alongside Limburg. In September, a few more attended until eventually, there was a rotating crew of Pivot employees showing up every month. The group would get dinner beforehand at Boulders, a bike-friendly bar and restaurant, before setting out to work for a couple of hours repairing and tuning up bikes at the WTAP warehouse. The bikes are primarily sourced by Shelley Brown, who runs Phantom Cyclist, an organization she started with her husband, a National Interscholastic Cycling Association (NICA) coach and son, a NICA rider. Brown was independently sourcing and fixing up bikes for refugees when she partnered with WTAP in 2018.

By the time Limburg and the Pivot community entered the scene, the bike operation was relatively well established, with Phantom Cyclist and WTAP providing refurbished bikes to families most weekends. Still, the Pivot employees brought a new level of expertise, training volunteers on basic bike mechanic skills, as well as tools and bike stands, which helped accommodate a greater volume of bikes. When Limburg realized Phantom Cyclist was buying bike parts at Walmart, he tapped his network and secured the organization a KHS dealer account and wholesale prices from Biketube, as well as donated cables, housing and brake pads from Shimano, bike components from SDG and tools and cleaning product from Pedros.

“Pivot’s been a true miracle force,” said Sullivan. “They’ve given us a continuity that we didn't have before.”

When the pandemic happened, many refugees were among the hardest hit, often the first to lose their jobs and become isolated. Although WTAP was still delivering bikes, there were few options for volunteers to gather safely and the repair nights came to a halt. By May, when it was clear COVID-19 precautions wouldn’t be lifted, Limburg offered to pick up bikes and repair them at Pivot headquarters. Roughly every other week, upwards of 12 people would get together after hours to work on bikes. Even Chris Cocalis, president and CEO of Pivot Cycles, got involved. 

“My favorite thing about being in the bike industry is giving people a new perspective of how bikes can help,” said Limburg. “Bikes are something that can truly save people, allowing them to find jobs, learn the language and assimilate into society.”

Bikes are currently being repaired roughly twice a month at both the WTAP and Pivot warehouses. Looking to the future, Pivot is working with WTAP to launch skills instruction programming for refugee children and repair workshops for adults. To date, WTAP estimates that it’s been able to get upwards of 500 bikes into the hands of refugees. Since one bike is often shared by multiple people in a family, the ripple effect is much greater. 

Limburg and Sullivan both note the story of a Syrian family, refugees of a war who were shell shocked and suffering from PTSD. Hoping to encourage the family to get outside, WTAP delivered a bike and the family’s young son Aziz, who didn’t speak English, began pleading with his dad to learn how to ride. A few of the volunteers, including Sullivan, took the boy outside and taught him the basics.

“I forgot you had to run alongside a bike rack,” said Sullivan. “At 60 years old, I'm not used to doing that, but the kid learned to ride.”

Five months later, the volunteers were back at a neighboring apartment complex when they heard someone yelling at them. Aziz pulled up, alongside a whole crew of new friends on bikes, and started speaking in perfect English—that day, he even helped serve as a translator for a different Syrian family that had just arrived. Learning to ride and having access to a bicycle allowed Aziz to learn English, make friends, explore the community and start dreaming big.

“The trajectory started to change when that bike got into his hands,” said Sullivan. “It’s not just a bike, it's freedom for the newly free.”

Pivot Cycles Is Welcoming Refugees to America

The 12 projects utilize everything from community art to electric bikes and span the country from New York to Hawaii.

The Better Bike Share Partnership (BBSP) awarded $89,970 in mini-grants to 12 projects that will reach and engage traditionally underserved populations through shared micromobility. This is the sixth round of grant funding that PeopleForBikes will administer through its partner role with BBSP. 

“Better Bike Share mini-grants allow us to support and share lessons from small, innovative projects," said Zoe Kircos, director of grants and partnerships at PeopleForBikes and manager of BBSP. "We look forward to learning from these grantees and seeing how their strategies help more people access bike share systems.”

The following projects were selected to receive funding: 

Reddy E-Bike Library Ambassadors | $10,000
Shared Mobility Inc./Reddy Bikeshare, Buffalo and Niagara Falls, NY

Reddy Bikeshare, in partnership with Independent Health, will join with East Side Bike Club and the Create a Healthier Niagara Falls Collaborative to use this funding to hire, train and support four community ambassadors to help underserved residents access electric bicycles through a new bike library program.

Bike-N-Ride: Linking Bike Sharing With Transit Through Art Tours That Highlight Community Narratives | $10,000
City of Fort Lauderdale – Transportation and Mobility, Fort Lauderdale, FL

The City of Fort Lauderdale will partner with local community-based organizations to host three bike tours featuring storytelling and art. The rides will coincide with and end at a local monthly art walk event.

Savvy Cycling | $10,000
Midwest Bikeshare, Inc./Bublr Bikeshare, Milwaukee, WI

As Bublr expands into historically marginalized neighborhoods with 26 new stations, system ambassadors from those communities will offer urban bike skills classes, free helmets and a complimentary 30-day pass to local residents.

North Tulsa Expansion/African American Community Outreach | $10,000
Tulsa Bike Share/This Machine, Tulsa, OK

Five new This Machine stations will be installed in North Tulsa, a historically Black neighborhood. The expansion will be matched with promotions, events and other activities offered in partnership with community-based organizations located in the area.

People for Mobility Justice ElectroBicis in Pacoima  | $10,000
Community Partners, Los Angeles, CA

People for Mobility Justice will work with Pacoima Beautiful to make 100 electric bikes available for long-term rental to residents as part of a pilot in the Northeast San Fernando Valley. PeopleForBikes’ grant will fund classes on safe bicycling and bike maintenance, along with safety equipment such as helmets and lights.

Justice on Wheels 2021 | $8,600
Family Matters, Chicago, IL

Practice rides and events, geared towards helping residents build endurance and community, will culminate in a 15-mile intergenerational ride through the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago. Speakers at stops on the route will explore themes of transformative justice and transportation equity, with a celebration at the end. 

Biki Ambassador Project | $7,770
Bikeshare Hawaii, Honolulu, HI

Biki will focus on outreach to Native Hawaiians and other underserved communities with the launch of a new Ambassador program. In partnership with a local organization, the bike share system will recruit, hire and train 10 people from the community to promote bike share and provide feedback.

The Way We Move: Making Biking Accessible for All in Raleigh | $6,500
Oaks and Spokes, Raleigh, NC

Reaching and engaging older adults in underserved communities is the focus of the events and activities in this new program. AARP and senior living facilities will serve as partners and an intern will be hired from a local HBCU.

Roll to Recovery | $6,000
OneFifteen, Dayton, OH

Through a partnership with Bike Miami Valley, OneFifteen, an addiction recovery campus, will support the mental and physical health of patients and staff by helping them ride. In addition to placing a bike share station on the facility’s campus, the nonprofit will offer helmets and annual passes to those who complete a free cycling safety class.

Allen County Micromobility Education Program | $5,000
Thrive Allen County, Allen County, KS

With this funding, Allen County’s free bike share system will hire a local ambassador to offer free bike repair workshops to residents countywide, addressing a common barrier to increased bicycling.

Segundo Barrio Mural Bikes | $4,300
Camino Real Regional Mobility Authority, El Paso, TX

Local artists will paint seven bike share bikes inspired by the murals located in the historically significant Segundo Barrio, introducing more people to the artwork and bike share. Once completed, the painted bikes will be part of a bike share demo and gallery event in the featured neighborhood.

Share Boxes for Bike Share Racks | $1,800
Green Apple Bikes, Inc., Manhattan, KS

This completely free, volunteer-driven bike share system will add share boxes to stations in select locations, offering donated items including bicycling safety gear with funding from this grant.

Better Bike Share Partnership Awards $89,970 in Grants

The $547 billion INVEST in America Act offers promising funding for connecting our nation.

On Friday, June 4, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee released the INVEST in America Act, a five-year, $547 billion transportation reauthorization bill. This is the House counterpart to the Senate Environment and Public Works’ Committee’s Surface Transportation Reauthorization Act (which we wrote about here). There are some differences between the two on what federal investments and commitments they propose for bike infrastructure, so here’s a finer look at some of the details.

A massive win in this bill is the inclusion of $1 billion for a brand new program that will build connections between bike lanes, sidewalks and trails to create complete active transportation networks. This is similar to the proposed investment in the Senate’s bill and will be a critical tool to meet the rising demand for safe, connected places to bike nationwide. You can read more in an op-ed we co-wrote in The Hill alongside our partners at the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy and America Walks. This $1 billion in new funding for bike networks is an increase from the $250 million offered in the House last year (which we wrote about here), thanks to the growing voice of active transportation advocates across the United States. 

This bill also matches the Senate’s when it comes to increasing funding for the Transportation Alternatives Program, the largest source of federal funding for bike infrastructure. A main difference with the House bill is that it’s not bipartisan like the Senate’s. Questions on how the two committees, parties and chambers eventually negotiate the differences in their bills, and how to pay for these policies and programs, certainly remain.

Beyond funding, the INVEST in America Act updates classifications for electric bicycles within two important programs for bike infrastructure. PeopleForBikes has been working at the state level to update electric bicycle definitions for more than six years, and more than 30 states have adopted model, three-class electric bicycle language in their transportation codes.

Bringing that advocacy to the federal level, we are pleased to see the three-class electric bicycle definition included in the INVEST in America Act under the Transportation Alternatives Program and in a critical classification update in the Recreation Trails Program. 

As the use of electric bicycles grows for both transportation and recreation across the nation, our policies need to adapt and evolve to make it easier to build trails and define access. We’re glad to see the INVEST in America Act meet the increased demand with updated definitions and classifications of electric bicycles. 

The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee will hold a markup for this bill on June 9, and we’ll be watching to see what amendments are offered and what the committee’s vote will look like. We will be sharing our analysis live on Twitter, @pfbpolicy, for anything related to bike infrastructure and electric bicycles, and we’re optimistic that the bill will advance out of committee. 

House Committee Transportation Bill Makes Big Strides for Bikes

From 2020 to 2021, the Minnesota capital’s City Rating score increased significantly. Here’s why.

At first glance, St. Paul, Minnesota, doesn’t seem like a particularly impressive city when it comes to bicycling. With a 2021 City Ratings score of 46, the midwestern capital falls just below the threshold of a score that translates to high ridership, improved safety and considerable access. However, St. Paul residents who responded to our Community Survey, a major component of every city’s overall score, believe St. Paul is a great place for biking.

Why the gap? Well, the community score accounts for residents’ insights regarding how often people ride, how safe they feel, how well the local network serves them and if they’re aware of nearby bicycle resources. In a place with a strong bike culture, like St. Paul, respondents might skew in favor of those who ride the most (those who don’t ride at all aren’t likely to respond to a survey about biking), as well as those who ride recreationally (our scores account for the transportation experience). Add in new, highly visible infrastructure and St. Paul’s efforts to take a Complete Streets and Vision Zero approach, and folks may not realize how much better bicycling in the city could be.

Still, St. Paul is among the top 10 large U.S. cities for bicycling and the most improved compared to 2020. Championing bicycling in St. Paul’s is Mayor Melvin Carter and his Chief Resilience Officer Russ Stark, who’ve made a dedicated bike network a top priority. The city’s overall bike plan, adopted in 2015, lays out an eventual 346-mile network, although the city is currently at 207 miles with no set timeline for completion. And like just about every place in America, St. Paul has work to do when it comes to making transportation more equitable. Luckily, its diversity is well-represented amongst city officials, going a long way to help people feel like their viewpoints are being represented and advanced.

There are two major factors that led to St. Paul’s 2021 score bump, one of them being a series of infrastructure improvements that came to fruition in 2020. Those include critical improvements to the city’s downtown area and a significantly improved network by way of several brand new Regional Trails, the term the Twin Cities uses to describe bikeways that link neighborhoods throughout the metro area. The second, relatively easy action St. Paul made was to lower its default speed limits, switching from 30 to 20 mph on residential streets and 25 mph downtown. 

“It was important to us as owners of the rights of way that the speed limits we post be reflective of the speed limits we want people to drive,” said Reuben Collins, transportation planner and engineer with the city. “The first step in getting people to drive slower is setting the expectation that you want people to drive slower.”

Excessive speed is a chief cause of crashes and fatalities on U.S. roadways yet the issue doesn’t often get the national attention it deserves. More than 10,000 people are killed in speed-related collisions each year (the number of which has increased during the pandemic), a statistic that’s in line with alcohol-related crashes. Lowering speed limits is a matter of life and death: A person hit by a car traveling 35 mph is three times as likely to die as someone hit at 25 mph. When the Minnesota state legislature changed its laws in 2019, allowing cities to deviate from the state standard and set speed limits on their own streets for the first time, St. Paul saw an opportunity.

Due to the fluid movement between St. Paul and Minneapolis, whose adjacent borders are separated only by the Mississippi River, it made sense for the cities to coordinate lowered speed limits and a “20 is Plenty” educational campaign. From the beginning, both municipalities agreed that increased enforcement was not the desired method, deciding it wouldn't be sustainable, effective or equitable. The changes were primarily communicated through a public awareness video (available in Hmong, Spanish and Somali), press releases and newspaper articles that emphasized safety.

Not wanting to post signs on every single residential street, the Twin Cities collaborated on a strategy to target key areas. Utilizing relatively inexpensive lawn signage, stickers and “gateway signs” at various entry points to each city, St. Paul and Minneapolis were able to communicate that a residential speed limit of 20 mph was now in effect. In the end, St. Paul still installed or changed more than 725 speed limit signs on city-owned streets (Minneapolis’ number was more than double). 

“The fact that Minneapolis and St. Paul moved together with the same program, implementing it at the same time — I think it made the system stronger, more resilient to criticism and easier for the public to understand,” said Collins, noting that the cities leaned heavily on NACTO guidance. “The response has been universal applause that lowered street limits is a good thing.”

It’s certainly good for bicycling. In 2020, St. Paul’s Bicycle Network Analysis (BNA) score, a key factor in determining our City Rankings, was nine. The infrastructure improvements completed last year, combined with the citywide speed limit changes, bumped St. Paul's BNA score to 42. It’s a dramatic increase and only adds to PeopleForBikes’ position that slow streets are safe streets.

St. Paul’s network map in 2020 (left) and 2021 (right). Lowering speed limits on residential streets transformed the city from majority high-stress thoroughfares, represented in red, to low-stress ones, colored blue.

There is a growing trend to reduce speed limits on residential streets within and outside of the United States. Despite residential speed limits being relatively high across most of Canada, Edmonton and Calgary reduced them late last year, resulting in stronger BNA scores. Still, speed limit reductions can be useless without larger design changes. Memphis, Tennessee, also lowered its residential speed limits to 25 mph but resulted in a BNA rise of just six points due to other network limitations — a good example of how speed limits might help, but must also be combined with other infrastructure improvements. 

In St. Paul, the slower speed limits have only boosted an already strong bicycle culture. Many neighborhood commercial areas are based on old streetcar networks, making shops or restaurants an easy bike or walk from most people’s homes. Plus, there’s the Regional Trail Network, considered the backbone of cities’ bike infrastructure, and a parks department that truly supports it. Add in the fact that St. Paul has already reduced off-street parking requirements along some transit routes — and is considering eliminating parking space requirements for new construction altogether — and the city has a lot going for it when it comes to bicycling.

 “I think we’re at a place where our infrastructure is starting to catch up with our culture,” said Collins, although he notes this year won’t be as big a year for new projects. “Over the coming years, we’ll be investing almost as much but in shorter projects with more complex engineering. So the money isn't quite going as far in terms of mileage, but we’re still creating important and critical connections.”

These seven European cities are role models when it comes to great bicycling. Here’s what U.S. cities can learn from them.

New this year, our annual City Ratings program scored 30 European cities across nine countries, including Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and the United Kingdom. Whether they have a long history of bicycling, like Copenhagen and Utrecht, or have just turned their focus to bicycling, like Paris and Barcelona, most cities on this list outscore their U.S. peers by double digits. What’s their secret? We’ve identified key lessons from seven European cities that are integral to building great bike communities anywhere.


Every day, more than 125,000 people bike to work, school, public transportation, shops or home in Utrecht, a city just south of Amsterdam in the Netherlands. With a total population of just under 360,000, it’s easy to see why the Dutch city ranked number one overall in our 2021 City Ratings.

Like other wealthy European cities, Utrecht was incredibly car-friendly in the 1950s and 1960s. However, the rising gas prices of the 1970s, combined with an uptick in traffic-related child deaths, led to national policies that re-prioritized urban spaces for walking, biking and public transit. Today, 98% of Utrecht households own at least one bike, and nationally in the Netherlands bikes outnumber people. 

Utrecht spends an estimated $55 million per year building and improving its bike infrastructure and facilities. By comparison, Portland, Oregon, a city nearly twice the size of Utrecht, only spends about $30 million annually. According to the local Dutch government, however, the benefits of a healthy, biking population far outweigh the cost — the estimated annual savings from reduced air pollution and healthcare costs related to increased bicycling in the city is $300 million. But It’s not just bike lanes that get and keep more people riding. In Utrecht, an emphasis on the entire cycling experience, including bike parking, is key to its massive success. 

In 2019, the city unveiled the world’s largest bicycle parking garage under Utrecht Central Station, the city’s main transit hub. The massive, three-story structure can house more than 12,500 bikes and is easily accessible from both street level and the train station. Across the city, digital signs point bike riders to the nearest available bike parking, including the number of available spots. All municipal bike parking in Utrecht is free of charge, too, highlighting the city’s commitment to prioritizing the use of bikes.

What American cities can learn: Making biking better means more than just building bike lanes — it’s about improving the entire bicycling experience. Massive investments in safe, convenient and free bike parking ensures riders are prioritized on and off their bikes.

Between 2005 and 2010, Sevilla, a city of nearly 700,000 in the southwest of Spain, created a 120-kilometer (75-mile) network of protected on-street bike lanes, eliminating 5,000 parking spaces along the way. The result? A fivefold increase in cycling trips. In 2006, approximately 13,000 trips were taken by bike daily. By 2011, that number increased to 72,000. 

Rapid network expansion with a focus on connectivity are key to Sevilla’s success. The city went from having almost no dedicated bike facilities to a citywide bike network in just a few years. In 2007 alone, Sevilla built 40 miles of protected bike lanes, a 542% increase over the existing network miles. This high-speed buildout didn’t come as a financial burden to the city, either. Sevilla’s entire bike network only cost the city $40 million — a fraction of the cost of proposed car-centric highway projects, with far more benefits to locals and tourists alike.

Recently Sevilla drafted a new bicycle plan, complete with expansion plans for the network, as well as new, in demand bike parking structures in neighborhoods, workplaces, schools and public transit stations across the city. Aiming to double the rate of bicycling by 2022, Sevilla is now focusing on making bicycling a safe and convenient option for more residents.

To learn more about how the Spanish city accomplished its rapid infrastructure buildout, check out our feature on Sevilla in our Advocacy Academy series “Lessons From the Best Biking Cities.”

What American cities can learn: It doesn’t necessarily take a lot of time or money to build out a high-quality network. Focusing on the creation of safe, protected bike lanes can lead to a massive increase in ridership in just a few years.

The Danish capital of Copenhagen is known for being one of the safest, greenest, most prosperous and most egalitarian cities in the world. But this transformation didn’t happen overnight — Copenhagen is the product of more than 50 years of dedicated investment and hard work. 

Starting in the 1970s, Copenhagen gradually began replacing parking lanes and parking lots with protected bike lanes and public cafes. Traffic speeds fell, and the city became quieter and cleaner, a place where Danes wanted to live and work and tourists wanted to visit. Today, nearly 300 miles of elevated cycle tracks, carefully planned intersections and convenient bike parking prioritizes biking above all other forms of transportation. Bicycling is the fastest, easiest and most convenient way to move around the city.

Copenhagen has normalized bicycling as a primary means of transportation for people of all ages and abilities and made the city a better place to live in the process. By building an entire city with business districts and entertainment hubs that don’t have to be surrounded by parking lots, Copenhagen has made its streets safer and more alive. Today, bikes outnumber cars six-to-one, and Copenhagen is one of the happiest and healthiest cities in the world.

Copenhagen has an annual budget of $12 million specifically dedicated to bicycle infrastructure, much of which has recently funded bicycle and pedestrian bridges. And even with more than half of its residents commuting by bike, more and more people continue to take up biking — in 2016, for the first time, the number of bicycles crossing the city on a daily basis surpassed the number of cars. Copenhagen is living proof that even the best can continue to improve.

Want to learn more about what makes Copenhagen a model city for great biking? Hear from Marie Kåstrup, head of Copenhagen’s bicycle program, in our Advocacy Academy series “Lessons From the Best Biking Cities.”  

What American cities can learn: Normalizing bike riding is key to building a great bike city. Breaking down stigma starts with building great infrastructure and creating a network that’s easily accessible to people of all ages, abilities and backgrounds. This leads to safer, more livable cities.

In 2015, newly elected Mayor Anne Hidalgo announced big plans to transform Paris into a more people-friendly city that caters to bicyclists and pedestrians. Her initiative to improve bicycling, Plan Vélo, included doubling the size of the bike network from 435 miles to 870 miles, fixing the deteriorating local bike share program and creating 10,000 new bike parking spots across the city, all within the span of five years. 

Since then, Paris has invested $178 million in projects to incentivize residents to bike, including pumping $23.8 million into a subsidy program that helps pay for bike repairs and tune-ups for local residents in September 2020. In response to COVID-19, the city turned 31 miles of traffic lanes into dedicated cycling lanes, and while originally temporary, local leadership announced plans to make the changes permanent last June. Mayor Hidalgo also recently pushed forward a proposal that would ban vehicle through traffic in the city center, creating a Limited Traffic Zone that prioritizes bicyclists, pedestrians and other non-motorized road users. Another pledge by the mayor promises to remove 140,000 on-street parking spaces throughout the city, taking street space back from cars and allowing more room for bike lanes, bike parking, green spaces and other public amenities.

All of this hard work is paying off. Since the beginning of the pandemic, bicycling rates across Paris have soared, with 6 out of 10 users on the city’s new bike lanes having never biked before. And importantly, thanks to specific requirements for gender equality outlined in the Plan Vélo — protected bike lanes but also better street lights and more access to electric bike share — the number of women bicycling has risen. 

What American cities can learn: Strong buy-in from local female leadership combined with comprehensive plans to reshape how people move around in a city can lead to tremendous outcomes, including less traffic, cleaner air, healthier citizens and an uptick in female riders.

In spring of 2020, the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, released “Streetscape for London,” a detailed plan outlining projects and other initiatives to create more space for people to safely walk, cycle, scoot and wheel their way around the city, helping to mitigate the effects of the pandemic. Soon after, Transport for London, the governmental body responsible for implementing the projects, got to work. By design, the main projects were quite simple: Build out a network of temporary cycle lanes and routes, widen sidewalks, and create Low-Traffic Neighborhoods (LTNs) by restricting vehicle through traffic on low-speed side streets.

As hoped, these projects helped satiate the increased demand for places to safely walk and bike, as scores of Londoners turned away from the city’s well-established public transportation options amid social distancing requirements. Will Norman, London’s walking and cycling commissioner, shared that the city saw a 200% increase in cycling compared to pre-pandemic numbers, touting the 100 kilometers (62 miles) of new bike lanes and 70 LTNs as reasons for the increased ridership. 

As the effects of the pandemic begin to wane, Transport for London s beginning the process of gathering public feedback on whether to make permanent, amend or remove the infrastructure and traffic calming measures installed in 2020. While there is pushback about certain bike lanes and whether or not the money involved in Streetscape for London was well spent, initial research suggests that the LTNs are popular. The main complaints are around inequitable distribution and the lack of public outreach prior to implementation.

What American cities can learn: Acting quickly and prioritizing all road users can assist in larger public health initiatives. While not every initiative is going to be a massive success, implementing projects equitably and soliciting community engagement throughout their lifespan is key to making sure infrastructure actually serves residents. 

Antwerp, a Belgian port city with a history dating back to the Middle Ages, has 700 kilometers (435 miles) of bike lanes, which account for nearly half of its municipal streets. That expansive network has paid off with an astonishingly high mode share for bicycling: nearly 30% of Antwerp residents commute by bike, 36% bike to school and 28.6% of all trips in the city are taken on two wheels. And the city is continuously improving.

In 2015, Antwerp released its long-term bicycle policy plan, which focuses on the completion of a safe and well-connected bike network. The plan targets missing, weak or unsafe connections within the existing network and includes specific details on what bike infrastructure is needed depending on the speed of the road. For example, 30 km/h is suitable for mixed travel with cars, 50 km/h calls for dedicated on-street bike lanes and 70 km/h requires separated, protected infrastructure. Antwerp has also set a long-term goal of lowering speed limits to 30 km/h on 95% of all city streets.

For those looking to travel around Antwerp by bike, the city offers a route planner where riders can choose from one of four different route options. “Shortest route” is based solely on kilometers, “fastest route” follows the city’s bike network as much as possible, “comfortable route” avoids cobblestone roads, unpaved paths and roads with fast traffic and “junction route” offers scenic rides. Additionally, Antwerp is expanding its Velo bike share system and upping its bicycling education programs for youth and adults — ensuring that biking remains accessible to everyone. 

What American cities can learn: An expansive, well-connected network combined with low-speed limits helps bicyclists feel safe and comfortable no matter where they need to go. Route-finding services, educational initiatives and bike share ensure journeying on two-wheels is an option for all residents. 

Barcelona, situated on Spain’s northeastern coast in the Catalonia region, is one of Europe’s most densely populated cities. With around 1.6 million people, Barcelona has the EU’s highest density of cars, resulting in some of the worst air pollution and noise pollution levels in Europe. When the pandemic hit, it spurred conversations around the importance of natural environments and clean air, forcing city leaders to begin drafting plans for improvement. 

The Catalonian capital recently published its 10-year plan for making the city more green, prioritizing pedestrians, bicyclists and other road users over cars. The main focus of the policy centers around “superblocks,” which groups together regions of the city by nine square blocks, closing them to through traffic and promoting outdoor wellness with the inclusion of bike lanes, play areas and green spaces. Although cars aren’t banned completely from the superblocks, most parking spaces are eliminated and the zones as a whole give priority to people. 

Six superblocks currently exist across the city, with 11 more planned for the next three years. That number could exceed 500 if the plan is completed in its entirety, a number that would correlate to the prevention of 667 premature deaths annually and a 200-day extension on the average life expectancy of locals, according to the Barcelona Institute for Global Health. While Barcelona is far from that goal, the project has gained widespread support from locals.

What American cities can learn: Public space is public health. Open, green spaces throughout a city provide residents with places to recreate, relax and take a breath of fresh air, correlating to a happier, healthier population. 

How does your city rank? Check out our 2021 City Ratings and learn how to improve your score.

Want to advance bicycling locally? It’s time to reconsider how we apply our messaging around bicycling and bike infrastructure.

If the 24-hour news cycle and partisan politics of the last decade have taught us anything, it’s that messaging can make or break even the best policies. If you’re reading this article, you’re likely in agreement that more biking is a good thing. But maybe you’re short on staff, lack funding for infrastructure or don’t have strong community support to make it happen. Cities of all sizes across the country have overcome these and other obstacles — the key to success lies in the strategies and tactics used.

After years of helping communities build up bicycling, our Local Innovation team wrote a playbook for city leaders working to construct safe, convenient and attractive places to ride. Drawing from that comprehensive document, as well as PeopleForBikes’ funded research and  first-hand experience, we landed on five strategies every bike advocate needs in order to start garnering wins. As the leaders in the fight for building better communities, the responsibility for messaging falls on us. To win over diverse groups and achieve a bike-forward agenda, we need to shift the conversation.

Bike advocacy work is challenged by perceptions that bicycling is a niche activity, meant for a select few with minimal potential to improve mobility or reduce traffic and air pollution. Too easily, biking is dismissed as a special-interest activity rather than a populist solution. Although we know that’s not the case, in order to change public perceptions and move bicycling into the mainstream we need to rethink our collective definition of “bike advocate.”

The typical bike advocate is often portrayed as quirky, condescending elitist — a wealthy, white male who shows up to work or a public meeting clad in spandex. Our work will be more effective, however, the more people we bring in, including families, people of color and even folks who don’t bike at all. Biking is actually one of the most income-diverse activities in the United States, but those who it’s most important to — the lowest-income commuters who often have few other options — are many times left out of advocacy discussions altogether.

By listening to diverse communities and cultivating partnerships with neighborhood organizations, you can reach people you might not otherwise. Create safe spaces where people can talk openly and then act on what you learn. If you hear that trash on neighborhood sidewalks is more pressing of an issue than bike lanes, tackle that first and build trust. Position bike lanes as an important part of increasing mobility and opportunity, something that will help residents access jobs and move around faster.

Position a “bike advocate” as someone who wants to better their community and create opportunities for other people to get involved, even if it doesn't involve bikes at all. For example, the Providence Streets Coalition in Providence, Rhode Island, offers mini-grants to fund projects that aren’t specifically related to bicycling, such as murals, pop-up art events and culture tours. By emphasizing projects that utilize and benefit from public space and bike networks, you can bring more people together around the common cause of building better communities. 

There’s no denying that we live in a car culture — the vast majority of commuters in the U.S. (around 76% of people) travel alone in a vehicle and it’s important to respect their choice to do so. For drivers, any proposed reconfiguration of public roads and adjacent space can be perceived as a threat to car use, and there’s often concern that creating safer spaces for biking will reduce convenient parking options and hurt businesses. However, we know those bike lanes are actually better for business, contributing to positive economic development, boosting retail sales and even encouraging tourism. 

Bike lanes also fight congestion and can help alleviate traffic for those that choose to drive. In our research, we found that many people would support bike infrastructure if it also meant improvements for better roads and parking. Bike lanes — separate, protected bike lanes  in particular — make bikers less of an inconvenience for drivers and make the roads safer and less confusing for everyone, including pedestrians. Careful planning and smart construction can help everyone can get where they are going in the safest, easiest way possible.

Positioning safety as the responsibility of all parties, bikers included, will go a long way when it comes to getting drivers onboard with bikes. Advance the idea that we can have peace on the road when everyone has a piece of the road, and don’t be defensive when it comes to safety — we’ll all be safer with better infrastructure and once all parties are educated on how to share the road. Emphasizing a Vision Zero approach, or a strategy for eliminating all traffic fatalities and severe injuries, should win over anyone concerned about traffic fatalities.

While bikes have amazing implications for the environment, public health and the economy, it’s important not to oversell them as a cure-all. Communicate how bike infrastructure adds to communities but acknowledge that bikes won’t solve all societal problems. In almost every case, infrastructure changes need to happen in conjunction with other important initiatives to truly benefit people. 

For example, many Black and brown people have vastly different bicycling experiences than their white peers and are often unfairly targeted by an enforcement-centric approach when it comes to safe streets. For these populations, a strategy that reimagines traffic enforcement will be more compelling than one that solely promotes bicycling. In many cases, working to tackle other community issues first will set up a more receptive environment for bicycling down the road.

Make a point to talk about how bicycling infrastructure improves the lives of all, whether or not people bike. By increasing opportunity, relieving congestion and improving recreation, bike infrastructure has economic benefits, adding resources to a community. Continue to emphasize how bicycle infrastructure makes streets safer for everyone, benefits people’s health and provides crucial transportation access to jobs and essential services.  

For decades, U.S. traffic engineers assumed that people on bikes could almost always share the road with cars. But a shoulder — even a striped bike lane — on a street with fast traffic isn’t an appealing place to bike for most people, especially women and less experienced riders. Putting a bike symbol in the middle of a busy thoroughfare does little to make it a place where parents will ride with their children.

We now know, based on both U.S. and international experience, what kind of infrastructure designs give people of all ages and abilities the sense of safety, comfort and enjoyment that makes them want to ride. This includes protected bike lanes, which are located next to the road and physically separated from traffic, as well as things like better lighting, traffic-calming barriers and well-marked crosswalks. While sharrows might have a place in small towns or on low-stress streets, protected bike lanes should be the default for roadways with speed limits above 30 mph. 

As a rule of thumb, if something’s not going to be comfortable to ride for people of all ages and abilities, then don’t build it.

Most cities have built bits and pieces of good places to ride bikes: A path or two along a river, some appealing neighborhood streets and maybe a protected bike lane. The trick, however, is to move from individual projects to clusters of connected networks. Complete bike networks offer bikers the flexibility to travel safely to essential destinations and are key to getting more people on two wheels. If you want to move away from bicycling as a niche, recreational activity, building out complete networks is key.

In Sevilla, Spain, the city went from almost no bike lanes to an expansive citywide network in just a few years. In 2007 alone, the city built 40 miles of protected bike lanes, a 542% increase over existing miles, and continued to double the size of its network over the next six years. The result was a fivefold increase in bicycling trips. In New Orleans, the Algiers Protected Bike Lane Network, inspired by Sevilla’s, is rapidly building out a network in one of the city’s most often neglected neighborhoods.

Rapid implementation is also an important factor when building out networks, as it can help rally public support and hold all parties accountable. Push local leadership to make public commitments by including timelines with all projects. And no matter what, make sure that your messaging stays consistent.

We spoke with retailers across the country to learn about various initiatives that are boosting business and building community.

Around the country, for-profit and nonprofit bike shops are stepping up to get more kids on bikes. We spoke directly with local retailers to learn about the different ways they’re engaging youth, from offering discounts on gear to hosting youth-focused bicycling workshops and events. Though the specifics on programming and reach vary, all of these shops are committed to building community for the next generation around bikes.  

Supporting youth cycling is an investment in the future of biking

For Brian Pierce, service manager at University Bicycles in Boulder, Colorado, championing youth programs is an investment in the future. “We feel it is important to expose young people to bicycling as a sport, a means of transport and a possible career,” said Pierce. Scott Smith, owner of The Bicycle Chain shops in the Raleigh-Durham area, is likewise thinking long term. “Your twelve-year-olds are your twenty-five-year olds in thirteen years — they’re my future customers,” said Smith. “It's important to make bicycling safe, inviting and fun.”

Eric Supil, executive director of the Charlotte Re-Cyclery community bike shop and of the local Trips For Kids chapter in Charlotte, North Carolina, emphasized the transformative role youth play in shaping communities. “We want to build a strong future by making sure that we're enriching and we're encouraging youth to make cycling part of their lifestyle,” said Supil. With the understanding that the youth are going to be the ones most impacted by current infrastructure investment and urban planning decision making, Trips For Kids Charlotte leads bike camps in local neighborhoods so youth can understand and engage with decision-making for transportation infrastructure investments and help shape the future of mobility in Charlotte. 


Supporting youth cycling engages families and is good for business 

By backing local youth cycling programs, bike shops can have a ripple effect, encouraging parents, guardians and other family members to both ride bikes and buy them. At the Charlotte Re-Cyclery, a youth-focused, earn-a-bike program makes it easy for kids to enroll in a street smarts curriculum and receive a free refurbished bike, lights, lock and helmet upon completion. Through a partnership with Cycling Savvy, the Re-Cyclery expanded in order to host entire families. 

“The [family] program provides a bonding opportunity and a way to continue engagement,” said Supil. “It creates a pathway so that youth can learn and build reinforcement and support from the people that are closest to them.”

[Learning to reattach a bicycle chain at the Charlotte Re-Cyclery. Credit: Charlotte Re-Cyclery.]

Engaging youth and their families also has a financial benefit, helping shops bring in more customers. The Bicycle Chain offers discounts to youth who participate in the local National Interscholastic Cycling Association (NICA) team, a decision that pays off in increased sales to parents looking to ride with their children. University Bicycles and Art’s Cyclery, a bike shop in San Luis Obispo, California, also offer discounts to local NICA teams with similar results. Josh Job, owner and service expert at Art’s Cyclery, has seen how getting kids stoked on bikes can set off a domino effect, ultimately bringing more parents into the store. “That parent will come out next time that we have an event and maybe that'll get a brother or sister into it too,” said Job.

Supporting youth cycling diversifies the bicycle industry

Exposing youth of all backgrounds to biking helps diversify a historically male-dominated and predominantly white industry. By targeting female and BIPOC youth in particular — with workshops, skills clinics and mentoring programs — local bike shops are helping remove barriers for populations that have typically been left out. These efforts have the added benefit of helping create a more diverse talent pipeline for bike shops and the bike industry in general. 

In Boulder, University Bicycles offers youth mechanic clinics specifically for women. “We’ve only done a few clinics, but that helped us get a bunch of young women interested in working on their own bikes,” said Pierce. Representation in bike shops can also help youth feel comfortable entering bike shops, creating an environment where they’re able to ask questions and even envision themselves working. “I am incredibly proud of the more experienced women we have working in service,” said Pierce. “They are active in teaching the younger, less experienced women and opening up opportunities to these young women that they previously might not have thought possible.” 

As a direct result of these clinics, University Bicycles ended up with five high-school-aged women working at its shop over the summer. Across the country, Supil and the Charlotte Re-Cyclery are in the process of developing an internship program to train diverse youth in bike mechanics and create a skilled, marketable workforce that represents the Charlotte community. The Re-Cyclery also offers low-cost or free bicycles in order to remove the high up-front equipment costs to biking. 

“That's a pro for the ecosystem of cycling here in Charlotte,” said Supil, who sees some of his program participants upgrading to bicycles from for-profit shops after discovering biking through the Re-Cyclery or Trips For Kids programming. For-profit bike shops in Charlotte accept used bike donations on behalf of the Re-Cyclery. “You have a gateway to bicycling, you have a next step and it almost becomes like a circular economy in a way,” said Supil. 

[Youth mechanics clinic for women at University Bicycles in Boulder, Colorado. Credit: University Bicycles, Boulder, CO.]

Other actions bike shops can take include offering up stores as meeting spaces for youth programs, as well as collaborating with non profits like Outride, which works to diversify cycling communities and advance youth health outcomes through its Riding For Focus (R4F) middle school education program. In Los Osos, California, Art’s Cyclery championed an Outride Bike Build at Los Osos Middle School. Together with Foothill Cyclery, Bike San Luis Obispo and volunteers from the Cal Poly Cycling Team, Art’s Cyclery built 51 bikes for the Los Osos R4F program. “Outride is helping less fortunate kids that don't have a bike to really get out there and experience it,” said Job.

Riding for Focus Bike Build for Los Osos Middle

PeopleForBikes applauds the work of local bike shops around the U.S. supporting youth cycling programs. Is a local bike shop in your community doing awesome work to get more kids on bikes? Let our PeopleForBikes’ youth team know. Drop a line to Nick Aguilera, youth and community partnerships manager. 

Why Local Bike Shops Should Support Youth Bicycling 

Through the personal bicycle history of Roshun Austin, we highlight the physical, cultural and societal barriers that exist for women in the U.S. 

Roshun Austin grew up poor in Memphis, Tennessee, the middle of five girls raised in the Pentecostal Holiness Church. “Religiously, there were a lot of things that girls could not do,” said Austin. “In the Holiness Pentecostal tradition, whistling was considered sinful, as was skipping. We couldn’t even wear pants, so riding a bike wasn’t that acceptable.”

When Austin was young, her father was diagnosed with an autoimmune disorder, forcing her mother to return to the workforce. The burden of childcare for her younger sisters fell on Austin, as did a lot of the household chores. 

“I never really got to be a kid,” said Austin. “I was the 11-year-old that had to get home and make sure the roast was cooked and the cornbread was made — dreaming of a bike just didn’t come up for me, even at Christmas.”

While Austin would walk and take the bus everywhere, she remembers seeing groups of boys who rode bikes around the neighborhood and away from it, empowered and carefree. 

“In the African American community, especially low-income communities, you haven’t arrived if you don’t own an automobile,” said Austin, explaining that her first desire was for a car rather than a bike. “In the ‘80s, the guys still riding bikes in our neighborhood were hustlers, probably with a substance abuse problem — you didn’t want to be like them. It was never a woman riding a bike.” 

When she did see bicyclists, it was kids, mostly boys, who got bikes for Christmas or white men in suburban, wealthier areas wearing spandex and riding fancy bicycles with curved handlebars. When Austin eventually left Memphis, attending Middlebury College in Vermont on a need-based scholarship, she remembers seeing her wealthy classmates riding around campus. It wasn’t until decades later, at the age of 44, that Austin finally learned how to ride a bike. 

In March, we released “Where Do We Go From Here? Breaking Down Barriers to Bicycling in the U.S.,” a report based on research conducted in 10 cities across the country. The report is extensive, running more than 100 pages, and contains a lot of qualitative data on people’s experiences bicycling. While managing the focus groups, lead researcher Charles T. Brown, of the Alan M. Voorhees Transportation Center (VTC) at Rutgers University, heard from women that experienced or were currently experiencing physical, cultural and/or societal barriers to biking. 

“Across the board, women were more likely to say that their family members, friends and others felt that bicycling was much more so for boys, and not so much for them,” said Brown. “We heard that more so from minority women.”

Brown and his team identified marketing as a major factor when it came to societal influences preventing women from bicycling. In particular, the way marketing materials tend to represent women as a “shero,” or an above-average female hero, often clad in spandex and other technical gear. Instead of mothers bicycling with their kids to work or school, promotional materials often depict a road cyclist riding for recreation. More often than not, the women portrayed will be stereotypically fit and white. 

“This image of a female cyclist as a shero is great in terms of boosting the confidence of women,” said Brown. “However, it does make cycling appear out of reach. To be able to cycle, or want to cycle, you have to be able to take on this insurmountable task.” 

Male participants in the study, when responding to what they thought of female bicyclists, reiterated that they thought women had to be “independent” and “confident” to be able to bike in public. For women who don’t see themselves as exceptional or simply have less confidence in the bicycling space, riding becomes all the less accessible. 

In terms of cultural barriers, something that repeatedly emerged in Brown’s research among some Hispanic female respondents was the perception of bicycling as a sexualized activity. “Women have said they were prevented from riding bicycles as a young girl because they were deemed to be promiscuous,” said Brown, noting that the association had to do with one’s proximity to the seat. “In a way, these girls were shamed from riding because they didn’t want to appear as sexually active.”

Stereotypes like this are only further exacerbated by the difficulty women have when riding in skirts or dresses, as well as the catcalling almost all female bicyclists have experienced. In Memphis, where Austin still lives, many female focus group respondents noted harassment as a chief concern. One expressed a “sense of envy that [male bicyclists] feel comfortable enough to ride and feel safe enough. That’s something that I cannot get over — feeling safe to ride.” Fear for women exists on a spectrum. While it may seem harmless to one woman, eliciting a whistle from an adjacent pickup truck might prevent another from biking at all.

For women like Austin, who were raised in strict faith traditions, gendered barriers persist in different ways. While conducting a focus group in Portland, Oregon, Brown spoke with a Muslim family that saw bicycling as more dangerous for its female members, not because it went against Islam, but because they believed society at large perceived hijab-wearing Muslim women to be weaker and thus, an easy target. In the United States today, biking while being a Black or Asian woman can likewise be dangerous.

Appearance is another factor that often prevents women from biking. According to Austin, for Black women with relaxed hair, anything that involves sweating or getting caught in the rain is not on the table. For those that wear their hair natural, in braids, dreadlocks or afros, helmet sizes can be problematic. Throughout Brown’s research, respondents also shared that as women — particularly minority women — showing up to work sweaty would be an issue. As one female participant indicated, “There is a big gender element to [presentation]. Men can show up a little sweaty. It’s kind of okay. There is definitely an element of women needing to show up in the professional context looking pretty much perfect.”

The number one barrier women face, however, is safe, protected places to bike. While focus group respondents across the board emphasized the importance of protected bike lanes, women did so more, noting the need for LED lights for nighttime travel. Catcalling becomes a lot scarier when you’re alone, at night, on an unprotected and unlit bike path and you don’t speak English. As with almost all the barriers noted here, some women are affected more than others. 

“When we’re thinking through solutions, we should target all women,” said Brown. “But at the same time, we also need specific solutions that take into consideration the differences between racial, ethnic and religious minority groups.”

Today, Roshun Austin is the President and CEO of The Works, Inc., a nonprofit that serves South Memphis and runs a farmer’s market. Since many local residents didn’t own private automobiles, in 2016, the community organization began exploring what bikeshare in Memphis might look like.

“I still had some fear, or trepidation, about getting on a bike. It was just never going to be at the top of my list,” said Austin. “I was all for getting community voices involved in bikeshare, but I still wasn’t talking about me riding.”         

That same year, PeopleForBikes’ VP of Local Innovation Kyle Wagenschutz, who knew Austin from his days working for the City of Memphis, called to extend her an invitation for a bike study tour in Amsterdam. At first, Austin didn't quite realize the tour would necessitate her actually biking. Although she pushed back at first, Austin eventually decided that she’d learn to ride a bike. In one of the informational sessions for the study tour, Austin met a woman who biked to the meeting wearing a skirt and wedge heels, the opposite of the lycra-clad cyclists who’d come to annoy her. It was that woman, Sylvia Crum of Revolutions Cycling Co-op, who became her first teacher.

“I learned how to ride in a parking lot in about a day,” said Austin, who caught on quickly. “By the end, Sylvia took me onto the streets. It was baptism by fire.”

Austin started joining Crum for slow-roll group rides around Memphis, but by the time the group landed in Amsterdam, biking still felt more forced than fun.

In European countries like the Netherlands, Denmark and Germany, the gender split among bicyclists reflects the population as a whole — hovering around 50-50 — or in some instances skews female. In the U.S., however, the majority of bike commuters (about 72%) are men, according to the 2019 American Community Survey census data. For recreational riders, the split is slightly better: 56% male and 44% female, according to a PeopleForBikes study. 

Encouragingly, the pandemic has been good for female riding stateside. Data from the bicycling app Strava shows that more U.S. women than ever are uploading rides. In 2020, women uploaded 47% more bike rides than they did in 2019. In New York City, the number of women using the app increased by 82% over the previous year (a trend that holds for other major U.S. cities). A 2020 PeopleForBikes study of bicycle participation during the pandemic found that new riders were evenly split male and female. 

There are also more organizations than ever working to break down barriers to biking from a young age. The Youth Cycling Coalition, which PeopleForBikes is a part of, brings together a variety of programs that specifically target girls, including Trips for Kids, GRiT and Little Bellas. World Bicycle Relief, a global bike charity, is committed to gender equality, with 70% of its bicycles for education going to girls. Black Girls Do Bike, which serves women of color of all ages, is growing the community by hosting meet-up rides and promoting skill sharing across more than 70 chapters nationwide. 

“These social groups are successful because women find comfort in the company,” said Brown. “Groups promoting sisterhood in cycling are what’s needed to keep breaking down barriers.”

Bike education programs have also expanded in the last decade and range from membership-based programs such as Get Women Cycling to national advocacy initiatives like Women Bike. All share the goal of using bicycles as a tool to empower females. In Europe, Berlin’s #BIKEYGEES has offered bicycling training for refugee women and girls since 2015. At the nonprofit, origin, religion and status are unimportant — bicycling is seen as a necessary, sustainable approach to ensuring mobility among an often marginalized population.  

In Amsterdam, Agartha Frimpong, best known as Mama Agatha, has taught more than 1,500 female immigrants to bicycle using donated bikes. Mama Agatha’s 12-week course is run by volunteers and covers a lot more than just bicycling, with topics that include fears, health outcomes, family dynamics, financials and crucially, how bicycling offers independence. Many of the women come from places like Syria, China, Somalia, Nigeria and Iraq, know little-to-no Dutch or English, and occasionally, weren’t even allowed to ride bikes in their home countries. While on the bicycle study trip in the Dutch capital, Austin’s group got to meet Mama Agatha.

“Until I met Mama Agatha, I was still thinking biking was for younger people and mostly men,” said Austin. “But when I saw her, a 60-something-year-old woman, an immigrant, teaching other women like her — that changed things for me.”

When Austin returned to Memphis, her organization started hosting slow-rolls and bike to work days, and she even invested in bicycles for herself and other staff members. The more she biked, the more Austin began to find joy in it — and the more comfortable she found the seat. Today, Austin owns a Peloton, two road bikes, one hybrid bike, a “granny” cruiser and a whole lot of spandex. Eventually, she plans to start “clipping in,” attaching her shoes to her bike pedals.

“I went from not knowing how to ride a bike to being the person that yells at people to share the road,” said Austin. “When I’m most stressed, I jump on a bike and it makes me happy.”

Because Austin didn’t know how to bike, her daughter never learned, so her organization now partners with local schools to hold bike rodeos, ensuring there’s gender parity amongst bike ambassadors and encourages women of all ages to join community rides. Austin has noticed that her story, as well as her physical presence as an older Black woman on a bike, inspires others. 

As the research shows though, the reasons why some women choose to bike and others do not vary considerably based on location, culture and lived experience. Therefore, all solutions must account for these differences — what works in one community might not in another. What’s clear is that in a country where women are paid less, their bodies are policed by men and societal double standards persist, bicycling can offer a release.

“Those boys I’d see as a kid, riding their bikes, they were so free,” said Austin. “It comes down to freedom.”

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