Cities for Bikes

I have biked in the Netherlands, Longueuil, and Montreal. The difference is dramatic as People For Bikes listed the best Cities for Bikes. American towns don’t have to match Copenhagen. They might want to start with Memphis.

I remember when Bicycle Magazine called Memphis one of the worst biking city in America. That’s when they decided to change. Kyle Wagenshutz one of our past founders of Bike/Walk Tennessee became the city’s first Mayor’s director for Biking and Walking. Within ten years they revolutionized it. Bicycle Magazine reported it as one of the best in America. He offers his ideas in the Cities for Bikes magazine article. Read here.

In 2008, he founded the corporation Bike/Walk Tennessee with great visions. So what has changed? Adventure Cycling has been trying to complete US Bike Route 121, similar to the same USBR-23 that Bruce Day and Dave Shumaker established. Williamson County told it, “No bikes wanted in our county roads.” Franklin County has repeated, “No bikes wanted on our roads.” Nashville committees appear to want to ban ebikes on its Greenways. Really!

As Bruce, Dave, and I will warn, “It takes a lot of personal commitment and involvement to promote biking if we believe it is important.” Days are past our elderly efforts. It is now yours. We can’t just continue to run and hide from Tennessee/Kentucky State Line.