The solution is -besides regulations for that - have governments push for much MUCH more bicycle roads and same for public transportation. With great public transportation and bicycle roads, most people won’t need cars to begin with.
My city is just too hilly. Cycling around is one thing, and they just put in new bike lanes (they’re not good ones, but still), but doing that with a grocery run or 60lbs of cat food and litter? No thank you.
Weight speeds you up downhill more than it slows you down uphill. The trick is to not coast - keep pedaling downhill, use the momentum to get up the next hill.
Wat? The law of conservation of energy tends to disagree. Commuters are generally starting and ending at the same elevation so there’s no trick. We’re not going to convince anyone to carry heavy loads on bikes by saying “pedal more downhill to smooth out the power requirements if you hate grinding it out on uphills”, the answer is just ebikes.
I’m just relating my experience - when I was younger, I commuted 20 miles round trip every day, and I worked at a bike shop with weenies that were always trying to shave weight off their bikes, so I did whatever I could to add functional weight (so no filling the tubes with lead, that would be cheating) including building up a dually, two rims side by side on a Sachs 3x7 hub. My average speed was higher when commuting (lots of rolling hills, but overall uphill in the morning, downhill going home) than it was on days off, when I was mainly riding around town where it was flat.
And it certainly wasn’t because I wanted to go to work…
The solution is -besides regulations for that - have governments push for much MUCH more bicycle roads and same for public transportation. With great public transportation and bicycle roads, most people won’t need cars to begin with.
In the USA, that boat sailed long ago… most cities are too spread out to pedal anywhere
My city is just too hilly. Cycling around is one thing, and they just put in new bike lanes (they’re not good ones, but still), but doing that with a grocery run or 60lbs of cat food and litter? No thank you.
Weight speeds you up downhill more than it slows you down uphill. The trick is to not coast - keep pedaling downhill, use the momentum to get up the next hill.
Wat? The law of conservation of energy tends to disagree. Commuters are generally starting and ending at the same elevation so there’s no trick. We’re not going to convince anyone to carry heavy loads on bikes by saying “pedal more downhill to smooth out the power requirements if you hate grinding it out on uphills”, the answer is just ebikes.
I’m just relating my experience - when I was younger, I commuted 20 miles round trip every day, and I worked at a bike shop with weenies that were always trying to shave weight off their bikes, so I did whatever I could to add functional weight (so no filling the tubes with lead, that would be cheating) including building up a dually, two rims side by side on a Sachs 3x7 hub. My average speed was higher when commuting (lots of rolling hills, but overall uphill in the morning, downhill going home) than it was on days off, when I was mainly riding around town where it was flat.
And it certainly wasn’t because I wanted to go to work…
I mean, if we are imagining government doing it’s actual job, isn’t it easier to pass regulations then to change how North American cities work?
Like I support walkable cities, I’m just convinced (majority of) regular people don’t actually want it.