12 Days of Bikemas — #5: Boulder, Colorado

I wrote a whole chapter about Boulder, Colorado in my book, Round America with a Duck ( I lived there for three weeks during my 10,000-mile journey across the USA via bike, buses, trains and working on organic farms), if you are interested. For the sake of quick-to-implement ideas that other places can do right now, let’s just (yet again) highlight bike racks. 

The photo above shows the bike parking area at the Boulder Farmers Market. There’s an equal amount of bike parking at schools. I rode my bike everywhere in Boulder (and also all the way to Denver from Boulder) and there were bike racks everywhere.

Bike racks are an inexpensive, effective way to encourage people to travel on bikes — and keep more money circulating in the local economy. Add a cover (which they do in rainy Ireland) and you’ve won my heart (and business). Here are some free bike rack resources for your business or city. Also, don’t miss this little recent post. 

I’ll probably include at least one (maybe two or three) more bike ideas from Boulder in my 12 Days of Bikemas, so stayed tuned (and subscribe). 

Note: Boulder is just a suburb that is about twenty years ahead of most other suburbs on this issue. It ain’t all rosy, and I do point out the rubber-hits-the-road things that did not work for me in my book— critical lived-experience input for any city currently working on a twenty-year bike plan.