Intro

What does it mean to be free? Sometimes it means two wheels and an open road. This episode is a love song to and a celebration of the bicycle–from a dead-end American suburb, to a trail in Quebec, to a train station in Amsterdam. This is a story about how a few spinning gears can change the world. It’s I Heart This everybody. I’m Ben Lord. Let’s talk about what we love. 

You can’t ‘Merica without a car.

I grew up in one of the least bicycle friendly places on Earth–an American suburb. Us kids all learned to ride bikes in our driveways.  But once we learned to ride, there was no place for us to go. If we were feeling adventurous, we’d steer them across each other’s lawns. And that was all. Our road was narrow and curving. People drove fast and there were no bike lanes because . . . Ha! Who had even heard of those. In movies like ET or the Goonies, kids pedaled all around town, saving the world and their alien friends . . . but our reality was light years away. Going anywhere . . . anywhere other than the house next door . . . required a car. 

Some kids who grew up in quiet cul-de-sacs might be able to ride to a few dozen houses. But the main road of that town was a strip of parking lots that extended for miles with an automobile gutter in between. And, the sidestreets that connected it with the cul-de-sacs were busy and winding. Riding a bike to actually go somewhere was foolhearty. And so, to us, despite whatever 1980s nostalgia might suggest, a bicycle was nothing more than a toy. 

In college, I lived in a compact seaside village in Maine and had no car. You might expect that my bike would be my new best friend. But the squealing-braked mountain bike that I had was a 40 pound monster that I could barely huff up the hills. And during the seasonal tourist glut, riding a bike still felt dangerous. One of my best friends was thrown from his bike in a bad accident in the very first weeks of our freshmen year. I remember going to see him in the hospital, feeling very grateful that he was alive. I just didn’t see myself as a biker. I didn’t know how to ride very well. I didn’t really know how my bike worked. I was more of a walker . . . so, I walked. 

For most of my adult life, I barely touched a bicycle.  This was America. And as a European friend once observed, “You can’t ‘Merica without a car.” In the rural towns where I lived, even getting somewhere by car was a haul. The closest destinations (work, groceries, banks, restaurants) were all a thirty minute car commutes that made some of our suburban friends roll their eyes. 

In America, a bicycle isn’t transportation, it’s a hobby. It’s for people who care about things like VO2 max and titanium alloys. But it is not that way everywhere. 

Fietsen and Wielrennen

In 2021, I assigned my 9th grade Earth Science students a research project. Investigate a climate change success story . . .  some way that people have measurably reduced atmospheric carbon . . . analyze its effects, and report what you’ve found. And since it would be handy for students to have an example, I set out to do the project myself completely unaware that it would make me fall in love? 

The topic I chose was bicycle infrastructure in the Netherlands. It was kind of at random. On a brief layover in Amsterdam, many years ago, I’d been dumbstruck by the thousands of bicycles piled up at the train station. American that I was, it looked to me like some kind of bicycle junkyard. It wasn’t until hours later that I realized that that pile of bikes was the train station’s parking garage.” 

I planned to grab a few sources, whip up a few slides, and be done. Instead, I dove headfirst down the research rabbit-hole. And holy cow! What a journey it was! The Dutch have built an inspiring culture of bikes. They commute to work on them. They get groceries on them. Kids get to school on them. They go to restaurants on them. Bikeshares are integrated into the train system. Dutch bike lanes are so safe, people didn’t even wear helmets. Lots of roads basically didn’t allow car traffic, just bike traffic. At intersections bikes get their own lights. Nationwide, almost a third of all trips are made on bikes. In some cities, the number is closer to one half. 

This might be old news to people more worldly than me. But I was dumbfounded. I was temporarily obsessed with watching videos of Amsterdam city streets: quiet, clean. with pedestrians and cyclists everywhere. So unlike the dirty city streets of American cities where cyclists could scarcely be seen. It was a revelation. I read that most Dutch didn’t even think of themselves as cyclists, they just thought of themselves as people who wanted to go somewhere. Imagine what the world would be like if we followed their example!  

I presented my findings to my class with enthusiasm. And long after the kids’ reports were graded and returned, I kept thinking about it. I dreamt of what my town might look like with beautiful Dutch-style bicycle corridors along the brook. And I dreamt of what it would be like to explore the world on two wheels of my own. And so, for the first time in my life, I began to think of a bike as something more than a toy. 

Not long after, I set out on a bike adventure with my family. Our kids were thirteen and nine. We packed our tents, tuned up our bikes, and cycled 200 km through the Laurentians in Quebec, camping along the way. And I fell totally, madly, manically in love. 

It’s hard to describe how I felt setting out on that awkwardly packed bicycle. It was like the last day of middle school. I felt like I could go anywhere, at any pace I wanted, under my own power. It was freedom. It was euphoric. 

It was utterly different from the weight I felt from the way I felt when I got my driver’s license.  That day, all I felt was the awesome weight of responsibility. Sitting behind the wheel of a one and a half ton machine that could kill a dog or a child that ran into the road. One that, with every mile, heated the Earth’s atmosphere. Yes, that car brought me freedom but at a staggering cost to people and the planet. Driving felt necessary, but not free. 

By contrast, putting my feet on the pedals on that first long bike trip felt like the perfect balance of freedom and goodwill. And I wanted to go everywhere.  

Bikes Aren’t Machines; They are Systems

But I didn’t. Back at home, cycling wasn’t any easier. It was still as inconvenient, uncomfortable, and dangerous as ever. 

But why?

The answer is, of course, because we made it that way. 

We tend to think of bikes as machines, but cycling isn’t about the machines. It’s about a system. The bicycle is only one component of that system. It is the most elegant transportation machine ever developed by human ingenuity. No train or bus or boat can ever come close to its efficiency. “Up to 99% of the energy delivered by the rider transmits to the wheels.” “Traveling on a bicycle at 10–15 mph, using the same power required to walk, is the most energy-efficient means of human transport.

But a bicycle is nothing without a second component of that system–a human rider. Cycling isn’t instinctual; it requires skill. You have to learn how to ride it. 

And that’s not all. A rider has no use for a bike if there is no place to ride it. Bikes are useless without roads and trails. 

It is this third component where the system breaks down. I still live in a place where cyclists were second-class travellers. This is implicit in the very shape of the roads. My country was made for cars and for the comfort and convenience of their drivers. Cyclists might be allowed on roads, but that is a technicality. When I have cycled on city and suburban streets as the law prescribes, drivers invariably shout at me and lay on their horns. 

In North America it seems people have to fight for years just to designate a few miles of rail trail. And they had to fight ten times harder than that for anything like protected bike lanes in ACTUAL STREETS. If cyclists wanted to practically get to a workplace or a grocery, well, it better not inconvenience drivers one bit. Under this kind of pressure, plans for beautiful dedicated bike lanes become plans to put a bit of paint on a busy road, which, of course, makes a cyclist no safer at all. 

Yet, strangely, when some city or town finally builds quality bike lanes. It brings vibrancy to even the shabbiest town. It becomes a destination, a place that people want to go.

And when we feel that intoxicating sense of freedom that we can truly go where we want in this world, it is because we have invested in all three parts of this system. 

That investment only happens because people work for it. Every safe bikeway was gained against bureaucratic headwinds and long entrenched habits.  

Even in the Netherlands. 

which in the 1970s, was slumping into car-centrism. If Amsterdam is the city of cycling today, it is because a movement of ordinary people began to demand change–appalled by the number of children on bikes who were killed by motorists. It was a movement that literally transformed the face of that country.

If today, Dutch transportation infrastructure is a model for the world, it is because of those activist. It is because the people mustered the political will to make their streets safe. It is because clever engineers solved problems, intersection by intersection. It is because, as a country, the Dutch decided to care. 

And the rest of us can too. 

So I have some homework for you. Sometime this summer, get on a bike. Find one that feels a little bit like flying. Take it to a place that is safe and pleasant to ride. And then put your feet on the pedals and feel how the slightest little push with your toes can send you whizzing down the trail. Feel how the slightest lean can change your course, and how your body just knows how to do it, with hardly a thought at all. 

Feel things, you are not in a hermetically sealed bubble behind a window or a windshield. You are in the world. You can hear the sounds and feel the sun on your face and the breeze on your skin. And feel your freedom. You can decide where you want to go, how fast, how far. You can stop as often as you like. There are no rails or ruts for you. Then, think of the elegance of the bike–how a few sprockets and fenders is all it takes to see the world. 

And finally, think of all the people in the system who made this freedom possible. The ones who built this bike you get to ride. The ones who make the trails and roads that you get to ride it on. And then reach way back into your memories. Reach back to that day when someone trusted friend held your seat and ran along beside you. To when they let go even without you knowing it. Who shouted behind you, that you were on your own. Taking your first tentative pedals toward freedom. 

And take a moment to thank them for their gift. 

Outro

“If you love that feeling of freedom on a bike, don’t keep it to yourself. Share this episode with someone. Talk to your town council. Join a local group pushing for safer bike lanes. Because every safe street starts with someone who cared enough to ask: Why not here?”

I Heart This is written, edited, and produced by me, Ben Lord. Our logo was designed by Briony Morrow-Cribbs. Our website is iheartthispodcast.com. Thank you so much for listening. And, as always, Be kind. Be curious, and be thankful.