Originally Posted by
Maelochs
Do you have more than one bike? That matters for a lot of reasons ... the bike which can carry 100 lbs of groceries and laundry might not be good to ride unladen, and vice versa. if the bike breaks or even if you come downstairs in the morning and find you have a flat .... and you are already running late. (I used to have a garage-full of throwaway bikes--bikes i literally picked up on the side of the road and refit, so in case of a disaster, i didn't have to call in to work ... which often doesn't sit well with management.)
A lot of people talk like that but I have one bike - a touring bike (Surly) that will carry a big load or not and still handle well. I used to have regular flats in town till I started investing in better tires. I ride CityContacts in recent years. My last flat was a few years ago. I've never ever found my tire flat before I leave in the morning but I'm sure that's possible - it's just not much of a worry. It also helps to leave for work earlier than you need to so you can adapt.
In practice I see car drivers at work show up late regularly and complain about traffic jams. A couple wrecks can easily delay a car by an hour. But riding my bicycle for about 75 minutes as my average ride to work, even the worst possible traffic jams are going to slow me down by 2 or 3 minutes max.