“Do you really need more than a ton of steel to move your rear end two miles?” Jeff Mapes asks in Pedaling Revolution: How Cyclists Are Changing American Cities, Oregon State University Press, 2009, a book that explores the movement by cyclists to find their rightful place on city streets and bikeways around the country. He talks about cyclists filling the gap between pedestrians and motorists.

The typical bike commuter’s speed of “ten miles an hour may not seem like much, but it’s competitive with the car for short distances, particularly when the congestion is thick and the parking difficult.” He examines strategies and philosophies in other countries where the bicycle has been more warmly embraced as an alternative to the automobile.

In different ways around the world, there are efforts to promote a culture of bicycling. Freiburg, Germany, for example, long ago banned cars from its inner city. And residents of Portland, Oregon; Madison, Wisconsin; Boulder, Colorado; and Davis, California; are leading the American movement to encourage two-wheel commuting.

But while groups here in the U.S. form road-blocking cordons and long to constitute a critical mass, motorists in Amsterdam queue up patiently behind slower bike commuters. No horns are heard, no one-finger salutes are raised. Bicycles are an accepted fact of urban life there. Mapes addresses the most pressing issues about bicycling as transportation in Europe and more and more throughout the U.S. In the first meaty chapter in the book, “Learning from Amsterdam,” a Netherlands cyclist describes the mix of bicyclists and motor vehicle drivers as “a complicated dance and everybody knows the steps.”

That’s a dance we could learn in Madison and other Midwestern cities, where both bike riders and drivers run red lights, swear at each other and get home with hot tempers and stories to tell. Cyclists in Madison and Chicago know what it’s like to pedal against traffic, so to speak. Those of us who regularly commute by bicycle all have hair-raising tales to tell, close calls brought about by both bicyclists and motorists who haven’t yet learned the steps to this complicated dance.

Then comes 11 a.m., Sunday, Aug. 30, and there’s a jaw-dropping lack of cars in downtown Madison. I’m sitting on my bike in the middle lane of John Nolen Drive just outside the tunnel under the Monona Terrace Convention Center. John Nolen, a multilane causeway, normally funnels much of Madison’s crosstown car traffic. But today, it’s all about the bike. The inaugural Ride the Drive – closed to cars – a little over six miles of city streets, including sections of two of the city’s major thoroughfares. Cyclists took their place.

Among them, I thought about all the times I’ve sat in traffic in the tunnel or on the long hill that leads up East Washington Street to the state Capitol. In stark contrast, I find myself amidst a carnival of fellow cycling enthusiasts. Families on two wheelers weave across the multilane streets. A bicycle built for three passes me. A tandem recumbent cruises by. In the tunnel, a bagpiper, resplendent in his tartan kilt, pumps out Scottish tunes as costumed riders on festooned bikes stop to listen. As I join the flow of bikes around the square, I’m drawn back to Mapes’ book.

The author’s reporting takes us on some eye-opening rides, too. He shows off the success of the European model in which pedestrians, cyclists and autos willingly coexist thanks to some innovations and mind-sets that have yet to be adopted here in the U.S. In Amsterdam, he finds a place that has “a cycling culture so rich, so nurtured by government and so seemingly enduring” it is a leader in bike friendliness among Western nations. In Copenhagen, Mapes writes, cyclists make up a whopping 34 percent of all commuter trips.

After examining what we can learn from the Europeans, Mapes moves closer to home. In the chapter “Creating the New Urban Bike Culture,” he takes us to a 2005 San Francisco critical mass ride. Critical mass, in which hundreds or thousands of riders plug the streets and bottle up car traffic, lets cyclists reclaim their own piece of the pavement. But detractors feel it just angers motorists and creates too much ill will and not enough sense of community among all those who share the streets. Mapes quotes Chuck Ayres, a well-known Seattle cyclist, who had this to say about critical mass rides, “There is no message. This does nothing but piss people off.” The critical mass riders, however, view it as a legitimate and effective flexing of the cycling community’s muscles.

Mapes dedicates an entire chapter to Davis – the first city in the country to win platinum status as a bicycle-friendly city, as determined by the League of American Bicyclists. Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz has actively taken up the chase to join Davis, as has Boulder and Portland, in reaching the platinum podium. Madison’s bike-friendly improvements prompted the league to award it gold status in 2006. Ann Arbor, Michigan, Chicago and Minneapolis are currently silver recipients, and another handful of communities across the region boast bronze status. Wisconsin and Minnesota are ranked second and fifth, respectively, as the most bicycle-friendly states.

Mapes fills another chapter with a look at the booming bike culture of Portland, his home base. He then takes readers on a bike tour of the Big Apple to see how the city treats the urban cyclist. He pedals “over the Brooklyn Bridge ... into the maw of Manhattan traffic.” At first he’s intimidated by the sea of cars in the high-rise canyons. Then he tucks himself in behind a cab, “which slowed me some, but (I) felt safer. I was content not to compete with the bike messengers hurtling between cars in the faster lanes. I was starting to enjoy myself.”

In his chapter on “Overcoming the Safety Barriers,” he describes innovations in traffic patterning in Portland and Chicago that lessens the risks for “vulnerable road users.” Cyclists feel safer when there are more of them, the author finds. “If the motorist expects to see someone walking or bicycling, he will behave accordingly.”

So the message to cyclists is, “Get out there and ride!”

Mapes does a remarkable job of championing the upsurge of the bike culture in Europe and across the U.S. Pedaling Revolution has the facts and the fervor, I believe, to inspire more of us to get on our bikes commuting, shopping and exploring our communities at a two-wheeled tempo.

The book also increases one’s admiration for the way Madison is leading the way in nurturing this cause. Cieslewicz spoke to a crowd of 450 some fellow cyclists at the 2009 Wisconsin Bike Summit this past spring. “A city that’s good to bike in is a city that’s good to live in,” he said.

For those interested in making their communities more bike-friendly and better places overall, join the call and “pedaling revolution.”

James Sajdak is an English teacher in Madison, Wisconsin.

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