"A Multi-Vitamin Viagra Pill for the Urban Landscape"

What can bicycling be for our environmentally- beleaguered cities, including our own little NOPA niche? Mikael Colville-Andersen, the Copenhagen-based bike blogger (Copenhangen Cycle Chic and Copenhagenize) recently offered his Vitamin V prescription for making our urban spaces more livable through more bicycling.

During a talk at Columbia University (covered today by Sarah Goodyear in today's Streetsblog), Colville-Andersen described how "visionary urban planning" and "visionary political decision-making" transformed Copenhangen into a city where 37% of commuters travel by bikes and two-wheel spinning accounts for 55% of all trips in the city. (San Francisco's commuter percentage hovers at 6% while the city's percentage of bicycling continues to leap every year with a gain of 53% over the last three years).

When is a bicycle like a vacuum cleaner? When it becomes simply a tool, a means to an end, according to Colville-Andersen. Not a sub-culture for only the fast and furious, but simply an excellent way to get from Point A to Point B. Streetsblog provides these and other notes from the Danish bike blogger's "pretty spiffy, though low-key" approach to advocacy. A final favorite here: Cyclists in Copenhagen are simply people. On bikes.

Note: Copenhagen's city planners updated Oakland audiences Tuesday night about the Danish city's experience with implementing bicycle and livability improvements. We hope and expect Streetsblog to give us the highlights. (Pic below from copenhagenize blog site)