Originally Posted by
cyccommute
Just as you wouldn’t classify New York and Tokyo as “walking nirvana”, you shouldn’t necessarily classify those places as “cycling nirvanas”.
In a metropolitan context I would totally classify New York (at least Lower Manhattan where I did most of the walking) as a walking nirvana... just as CPH is easily bicycle-commuting heaven compared to pretty much any other +2mil metropolitan area.
Originally Posted by
cyccommute
Yes, there are a lot of bikes and a lot of bicycle infrastructure but that’s part of the problem...a very large part.
That's a bit of an absurd statement to me, you'll need to elaborate.
Originally Posted by
cyccommute
To be clear, I’m not saying to not ride there but you should go with your eyes open and informed. It takes nerves of steel and not a small amount of skill to ride in those kinds of crowds, if you aren’t used to riding in those kinds of crowds. In my experience, few people who are used to riding in the US...
It is a little amusing to witness this alarmist framing of biking in Copenhagen and other urban centres with similarly developed biking cultures. Kids 7-8 years of age are biking to school daily on the very lanes you are describing as essentially hazardous. Granted these kids may well have greater intuition for this kind of traffic than someone whose experience is limited to being a lonely enthusiast rider in an otherwise automotive landscape... nevertheless I have to cry hyperbole here. If your ambition is to drive fast, then yes - I'd say some experience with the flow of mass bicycle traffic is certainly warranted... but anyone can fairly safely plug into the flow at moderate speeds around 15kmph. Highly inexperienced tourists constantly do so... not gracefully... and also annoyingly to natives like me... but generally harmlessly.
The bigger problem by far are these new electric mini scooters and the insurgence of electrical bike ownership propelling senior citizens to speeds of 25kmph they otherwise would never reach, nor are cognitively equipped to handle... "fortunately" they're usually themselves the primary victims when things go wrong.
Bottomline, as a native Copenhagen'er who has lived in several major cities I disagree with your "romanticising" comment; living with cycling culture as second nature and a ubiquitous affordance throughout society is an absolutely immense quality of life factor essentially prohibiting me from living longer periods mostly anywhere else at this stage. In the past I've lived in Vancouver, St. Petersburg and London... where inevitably after some time withdrawal symptoms set in followed by claustrophobia simply because motorized traffic dominates life. It's a freedom we take for granted here, that you immediately notice losing in other urban locations, with a resulting sense of existential constriction.