Mostly true but I find the price is pretty high nowadays.
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You don't need a carbon road bike to cycle to the supermarket, you're not racing in the tour de france.
Yeah well even basic bitch bikes go from 300-1000 euros. Even second hand is 175 cheapest. And then you have a shitty one.
Almost as if cost of living has increased, but wages have not…
Yeah that's my point. We don't exactly live in a "oh it's stolen, oh well" time.
Paint it with extra rust and stick some exposed wires on it for +15 to theft resistance.
You can absolutely find 2nd hand bikes for less 175. One search of marktplaats for an omafiets and there are plenty for less than 90 euros. Sure it’ll be a real nugget but with 30 euros of parts, youtube and some elbow grease it will last for years. They probably even will without fixing it up first
I think we have different definitions of shitty bike. I could go to Kmart and buy a $120 AUD (€73) brand new bike. It has 2 wheels, pedals, a handlebar. Sometimes they have bells. You can even make it go forwards if you try hard enough.
If I go to Gumtree (our classifieds app), there's literally free bikes as low as $20:
Mountain Bike. In working condition, has back brakes and rides straight. The gear shifter doesn't work, but just leave it the desired gear.
If I go to an actual "bike shop", their cheapest bike is $400 AUD (€243), which is close to your listing.
Cars can easily long distances in a short period of timeinn most weather conditions comfortably, allowing the freedom of movement even if it isn't done daily. It is a symbol of long distance freedom on weekends and holidays, not daily commuting.
goes as far and as fast as you can
And cars go much further and faster than I can
I prefer to call it "freedom". Nowadays your vehicle spies on you and you're tracked everywhere you go and anaylized.
Have definitely seen bike traffic jams in London before, you get a lot more people through though!
I don't have a photo of a big one though ☹️

Because cars make a shit load of money for the ~~economy~~ the rich people.
the only bikes that make any money to sell are the ones that are for rich people.
the profit on a $500 bike is like 200 bucks, the profit on a $15,000 bike, is like $10,000
I bet it's closer to like 13k profit, depends on how you do the math on the supply chain
Anon missed the biggest sin of all:
Monetizable, but only at two or three orders of magnitude less than automobiles.
TL;DR: "He's cheating because he's not spending as much as I am."
They're cheaper in every conceivable way than cars, and that's why the worst people out there hate them. Once you see the systems in place to equate personal validity and social values with what wealth may be extracted, it's impossible to look back. Bikes are effectively a form of protest by way of scaling back one's economic interaction, because of this.
Bikes are awesome. Bike infrastructure helps wheelchair users and pullcart users as well.
Can only be safely used in good weather.
Collisions will, in fact, fuck you up bad.
Limited cargo space.
Single occupancy.
- Try a rain poncho
- Two bikes colliding may fuck one up, but death is VERY unlikely
- Electric cargo bike
- Electric cargo bike
Most arguments against bikes are from people who never even tried to address the issues. It's like "I've seen a BMX and that's ALL there is!"
Not disability friendly.
Limited Range.
Makes you all sweaty before arriving at your destination.
Hills.
Infrastructure not set up to store them anywhere.
Easily and frequently stolen.
Not in fact super cheap, for a decent one.
Requires new infrastructure because everything is built around cars and is literally not safe to use around cars.
They're exceptionally disability friendly and many age specifically adapted for people with disabilities. E-tricycles are used a lot for this purpose. You see them a lot in some countries.
E-bikes address the sweatiness and hills issue. But even without electric assistance, people in Germany and Austria have managed.
It doesn't always require new infrastructure to be built. Ideally infrastructure for cars is repurposed for walking and cycling. This is something that needs to be done anyway because lots of people don't drive, causing transport poverty.
My bike was $270 second hand and is awesome.
The range issue is fair. Consequence of designing exclusively for cars. Then again, no need to cycle every journey. Just the short journeys already helps a lot. Where I live most car journeys are under 5 miles.
Because people are lazy.
I have some coworkers, that have E-Bikes, live 5km from the office and ride their bikes maybe 10x per year because there is a 5% chance of rain today, or it's too cold (15°C) or it's too hot (25°C) or whatever other excuse. Very sad...
As someone who hasn't missed a single day due to riding my e-bike 9kms to work and once rode it to work through a snowstorm I can sympathize with this.
It's almost comical how even just a little bit of rain can deter people from taking their bike. On sunny days I sometimes barely have room on the bike paths, but if the weather forecast is even a little bit ominous I almost always have the roads all to myself.
10x per year is still better than never.
I use a bike to commute 6.5 km to work and it's not just a good time. I do have a dedicated bike/pedestrian paved path (with few pedestrians, just a lot of other bikes) which is nice.
But in rain it sucks. And in winter it sucks even harder with the cold, and snow and ice. I have studded tires but that adds to the suck as they make you slower. I always have to shower when I get to work. I deliver and pick up in kindergarten, and there is no place to lock the kid trailer, so it adds an extra km to pick up and dump of the trailer at home.
I still use a manual as it gives me some excercise, but an electric bike would solve many of the issues.
And I save money on parking and toll. And bc of traffic I use about the same time.
Nothings perfect
I live in a city where this a lot of bike commuting.
All the same shitty stuff that you deal with while driving, you now deal with while riding your bike. People going way too slow, people riding up your ass, people going way too fast, people who speed up when you pass them, folks that violate every law/signal/sign and don't give a fuck. idiots blasting shitty music, idiots with sound isolating headphones, idiots who come straight at you head on going the wrong way in the bike lane, etc, etc.
So I basically stopped riding my bike to work. I don't want to deal with bike traffic, bike aggression, and bike accidents.
It was awesome when nobody else did it, but now you have to wait for specially little bike traffic lights, and there are like 30 people in front of you, who are either slow as shit, or blazing around on e-bikes, and it's generally just a total shitshow. The 'freedom' of cycling isn't really free when you are forced to deal with all the same stupid bullshit you would in a car. On top of the hostility you get from drivers, pedestrians, and other cyclists. It sucks.
I take the subway now because at least on the subway people leave me the fuck alone and play weird passive aggressive racing games with me and aren't trying to head-on collision me everyday.
I cycle to work and have none of these problems because the bike route is pretty wide. Old railway converted into a bus route, no cars allowed but bikes can use it. The bus is every 15 mins so at most I have 1 bus overtake me along it.
It's dead straight and nothing crosses it all the way along. It's great. Overtaking is easy because there is loads of space.
One downside I haven't seen mentioned yet is the hassle of having to laboriously lock up your bike front and back, saddle bag, too, so some freaking degenerate won't steal anything that isn't secured. I've had my rear wheel stolen before (who even DOES that?) and am not looking for a repeat.
I love riding my bike and do most trips with it in the summer (shopping, appointments, gym, etc.)
But I envy motorists sometimes who just get out of their car, push the button on their key and everything's neatly locked up.
Friendly reminder that if you only have enough lock to lock your frame and ONE wheel, make sure it's the rear wheel! It is the most expensive of the two to replace.
That said, bike thieves should have their fingers broken.
As a full time car-free person, this is absolutely a valid argument. I'm lucky to live less than 10 minutes away from my job. I could bike there in even less time, but walk anyway specifically because I don't want to deal with these logistics.
someone compared efficiency and long distance trains are more efficient, but that's it.
Further proof that trains are the ultimate form of transportation. But we all knew this. Choo choo!
Suppose that I decide to pack up the cat and everything I own and just disappear one day?
I can't do that with a bike.
Hills. If you live near hills bikes don't work too well at least not as transportation, they work more as exercise equipment then.
I've actually got an electric bike and it does solve the hills problem but then it has the it weighs as much as a baby elephant problem. So it's still a pain if you have to lug it on and off the train.
It is cool and all, but I don't wanna haul a crap load of tools on a bike
If only we had good bicycle infrastructure everywhere 😔