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I was in Valencia (Spain) a few weeks back. This city is one of the most ideal cities I have been to for cycling; flat, perfect climate, riverbed running right

I was in Valencia (Spain) a few weeks back. This city is one of the most ideal cities I have been to for cycling; flat, perfect climate, riverbed running right through the middle of the city, spacious roads and high density. One of the inhabitants told me they dedicated cycling lanes a year back or so. That was visible: They had painted bicycle lanes right over roads & pedestrian areas. I guess when the Valencian people start to see how much fun cycling ones life makes, Valencia will become the cycling capital of the world soon enough. Berlin has quite some traits for a good cycling city as well. A flat geography really helps here, along with a willing population.

fluxic 9y ago
Just chiming in to say Valencia is LOVELY!!!! Such a fantastic, cheap, beautiful, beachy place to be.
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  Is it someplace you'd recommend living for a few months? From the US, always looking for new, interesting places to work remote from.
  - jacquesm 9y ago
    Absolutely. It's a beautiful place and lots of very friendly people. Another place that you probably wouldn't catch on to from abroad is Croatia, the coast there is a great and still relatively cheap place to set up for a couple of months - or years, it tends to stick.
    - toomuchtodo 9y ago
      Thank you!
arximboldi 9y ago
Spain has been very much a car centric country but over the last years few cities have been pushing a transformation to become bike friendly. The biggest transformation I have witnessed is in Seville: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/jan/28/seville-cycling-capital-southern-europe-bike-lanes https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/jan/28/seville-cycli...
lobster_johnson 9y ago
Having wide streets where you can set side space for bicycle lanes also helps. After WW2, Berlin was in ruins, and the city was never built up to the density of many other European cities. The Soviets, in particular, were particularly fond of wide, open spaces. (The earlier Prussian kings also liked wide avenues they could march their soldiers through.) Berlin is definitely a great city to bike in.
- brute 9y ago
  The major factor here is Berlin's street width, which was chosen to be 22m by law in 1862 for fire safety reasons, much wider than other german cities. Consequently during WW2, Berlin proved to be a problem for allied incendiary bombs. At some point they were even building a to scale model city in the desert (Dugway Proving Ground) for testing various methods of igniting fire storms. > Berlin, however, would “prove more difficult than most other German cities”, the leading incendiary expert Horatio Bond avowed before the national commission for armament research of the USA. “The building quality is higher, and the single blocks are better separated from each other.” As the tests at the Dugway Proving Ground showed, is “was hardly to be expected that the flames would jump unhindered from one building to the next”.[1] [1] http://www.principality-of-sealand.ch/pdf/sealandbrief0503e.pdf http://www.principality-of-sealand.ch/pdf/sealandbrief0503e....
  - CurtMonash 9y ago
    I never knew this. And I heard plenty of stories about the Berlin air raids from my father.
- matt4077 9y ago
  Berlin Actually survived the war relatively intact, compared to, for example, Cologne. Even in places where every second house was destroyed, street layouts remained unchanged. Mitte, Kreuzberg. Neukölln, Wedding: all These suburbs are mostly unchanged. Karl-Marx-Street was renamed twice, but was originally build at today’s width. One of the problems with biking in Berlin are actually the cobblestone roads in many residential areas.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
jacquesm 9y ago
> I guess when the Valencian people start to see how much fun cycling ones life makes, Valencia will become the cycling capital of the world soon enough. Beijing and Amsterdam can probably make a better claim to that title. Valencia is on the right track though and I hope their project succeeds and will last.
- flexie 9y ago
  Or Copenhagen where 62 percent bike to work, 21 percent take metro, bus or train, 8 percent walk, and only 9 percent drive a car to work.
kazinator 9y ago
If the cycling commute is flat, it has to be long to get decent exercise, because you have to apply a flat-out effort and you cover a lot of ground. If my bike commute were flat, I'd prefer to be some 14 miles from work rather than the current 7. Or else I would have to run it (more often). To me, what would make an area ideal for cycling (if it has good roads and such) is: dry climate. No rain, no snow.
- aaron-lebo 9y ago
  7 miles isn't much on a bike, but anyone riding 14 miles 5 days a week should be in great shape. 14 mph is a decent clip, whereas 20 mph is constant exertion. I'd hate my commute to be a hour long both ways and at 14 miles, that's what the average person is going to hit.
  - rconti 9y ago
    Damn, 12 weeks into bike commuting 12mi r/t and I gained close to 10lbs!
    - piva00 9y ago
      Do you mean 10lbs of fat? If that's the case, watch your diet, 10lbs in 12 weeks you are eating something averaging 370kcal above your needs per day, with biking (and assuming you are a man and don't do any other kind of workout) it means you are eating between 3300-3800kcal/day, that's a lot if you don't do hours of sports or heavy weightlifting.
      - rconti 9y ago
        Not sure, but I was mostly joking. I mean, it was true, and my diet had not changed from when I was more sedentary, but I've ratcheted things down quite a bit since then with careful meal tracking and even more exercise (130mi/week on the bike, 18 mi/week running, plus strength training and core training).
- adrianN 9y ago

fluxic 9y ago

Just chiming in to say Valencia is LOVELY!!!! Such a fantastic, cheap, beautiful, beachy place to be.

toomuchtodo 9y ago
Is it someplace you'd recommend living for a few months? From the US, always looking for new, interesting places to work remote from.
- jacquesm 9y ago
  Absolutely. It's a beautiful place and lots of very friendly people. Another place that you probably wouldn't catch on to from abroad is Croatia, the coast there is a great and still relatively cheap place to set up for a couple of months - or years, it tends to stick.
  - toomuchtodo 9y ago
    Thank you!

arximboldi 9y ago

Spain has been very much a car centric country but over the last years few cities have been pushing a transformation to become bike friendly. The biggest transformation I have witnessed is in Seville: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/jan/28/seville-cycling-capital-southern-europe-bike-lanes https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/jan/28/seville-cycli...

lobster_johnson 9y ago

Having wide streets where you can set side space for bicycle lanes also helps. After WW2, Berlin was in ruins, and the city was never built up to the density of many other European cities. The Soviets, in particular, were particularly fond of wide, open spaces. (The earlier Prussian kings also liked wide avenues they could march their soldiers through.) Berlin is definitely a great city to bike in.

brute 9y ago
The major factor here is Berlin's street width, which was chosen to be 22m by law in 1862 for fire safety reasons, much wider than other german cities. Consequently during WW2, Berlin proved to be a problem for allied incendiary bombs. At some point they were even building a to scale model city in the desert (Dugway Proving Ground) for testing various methods of igniting fire storms. > Berlin, however, would “prove more difficult than most other German cities”, the leading incendiary expert Horatio Bond avowed before the national commission for armament research of the USA. “The building quality is higher, and the single blocks are better separated from each other.” As the tests at the Dugway Proving Ground showed, is “was hardly to be expected that the flames would jump unhindered from one building to the next”.[1] [1] http://www.principality-of-sealand.ch/pdf/sealandbrief0503e.pdf http://www.principality-of-sealand.ch/pdf/sealandbrief0503e....
- CurtMonash 9y ago
  I never knew this. And I heard plenty of stories about the Berlin air raids from my father.
matt4077 9y ago
Berlin Actually survived the war relatively intact, compared to, for example, Cologne. Even in places where every second house was destroyed, street layouts remained unchanged. Mitte, Kreuzberg. Neukölln, Wedding: all These suburbs are mostly unchanged. Karl-Marx-Street was renamed twice, but was originally build at today’s width. One of the problems with biking in Berlin are actually the cobblestone roads in many residential areas.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

jacquesm 9y ago

> I guess when the Valencian people start to see how much fun cycling ones life makes, Valencia will become the cycling capital of the world soon enough. Beijing and Amsterdam can probably make a better claim to that title. Valencia is on the right track though and I hope their project succeeds and will last.

flexie 9y ago
Or Copenhagen where 62 percent bike to work, 21 percent take metro, bus or train, 8 percent walk, and only 9 percent drive a car to work.

kazinator 9y ago

If the cycling commute is flat, it has to be long to get decent exercise, because you have to apply a flat-out effort and you cover a lot of ground. If my bike commute were flat, I'd prefer to be some 14 miles from work rather than the current 7. Or else I would have to run it (more often). To me, what would make an area ideal for cycling (if it has good roads and such) is: dry climate. No rain, no snow.

aaron-lebo 9y ago
7 miles isn't much on a bike, but anyone riding 14 miles 5 days a week should be in great shape. 14 mph is a decent clip, whereas 20 mph is constant exertion. I'd hate my commute to be a hour long both ways and at 14 miles, that's what the average person is going to hit.
- rconti 9y ago
  Damn, 12 weeks into bike commuting 12mi r/t and I gained close to 10lbs!
  - piva00 9y ago
    Do you mean 10lbs of fat? If that's the case, watch your diet, 10lbs in 12 weeks you are eating something averaging 370kcal above your needs per day, with biking (and assuming you are a man and don't do any other kind of workout) it means you are eating between 3300-3800kcal/day, that's a lot if you don't do hours of sports or heavy weightlifting.
    - rconti 9y ago
      Not sure, but I was mostly joking. I mean, it was true, and my diet had not changed from when I was more sedentary, but I've ratcheted things down quite a bit since then with careful meal tracking and even more exercise (130mi/week on the bike, 18 mi/week running, plus strength training and core training).
adrianN 9y ago