Bike Distance/Time vs Car Distance/Time
I was talking to a friend today about a bike ride that I had just done and he seemed amazedat how far I had gone. I was thinking to myself that it seemed like a short ride. I had only ridden from Ravenna down to the north end of West Seattle and back to Lake Union.
While coming home I realized that this is probably a case of bike distance/time vs car distance/time. Cyclists (and pedestrians) move at a fairly constant rate no matter where they are riding. True I might climb more slowly or descend more quickly than my average speed, but at the end of the day my riding speed is pretty much always the same.
Cars are different. Some roads are built for very high speed travel and some are built for low speed travel. It takes me the same amount of time to drive to my mother in law’s house that is 4 miles away as to drive to my office that is 15 miles away. The big difference is that I have to take 30mph speed limit roads with lots of traffic signals to the mother in law’s, but I can drive at 60mph with no lights to get to work. Distance isn’t the most important factor here, it is the type of road and the number of traffic intersections.
I think this is one reason why I love city cycling. In the highest density parts of most cities there is no advantage to being in a car vs being on a bicycle when you look at the time that it takes to get from point A to point B. A 4 mile car ride that takes me 20 minutes (common in Seattle if you are going east/west) means I’m only averaging 12mph. On a bicycle I can pretty easily get the same average and I get some exercise and don’t have to look for parking. Isn’t being a cyclist great?
I should probably stop communicating bike trips in miles and just communicate them in time.
alex