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I’m always being told that people won’t cycle where it’s hilly, and Switzerland is a pretty hilly country, so does anybody actually cycle there? Well, yes. In fact, there are several cities with a higher percentage of people who cycle than any city in North America.
In this video, I visit Basel, Bern, Zürich, as well as one other lesser-known cycling city, to see exactly what it’s like for people cycling in Switzerland.
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Historical photos of Amsterdam
https://archief.amsterdam/beeldbank/detail/30cf3ead-b37b-5ab3-c8d2-b4d80b4e5cd8
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Hobbemakade 1991
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When Zurich was known for Needle Park
Cycling mode choice amongst US commuters: The role of climate and topography
https://journals.sagepub.com/eprint/AT4RRDTCGMVF3TJJHUJK/full
This video contains footage licensed from the Associated Press (AParchive.com) and Getty Images
38 Comments
My Mum did when we went on holiday there. She didn't even have to she just wanted to cycle around the Alps. It did help that we had a van and would drop her off on the top of mountains and she'd freewheel all the way down them.
3:15 I would love to consider this steep :')
I'm not really used to cycling because my town is in the swiss Jura and basically look like this / (don't worry, it's not exactly as steep) and isn't exactly a bike friendly town, while not being unfriendly either.
But the slopes everywhere aren't exactly helping me want to use my bike more often when I can simply use the bus and my feet to go anywhere in it with less efforts
What about Cycling in Bogotá Colombia?
I live in Mexico city and it has hills and people still bike. the hills make it fun.
Yes. Even though it is hilly :-/
I think the place at 10:42 Bern is the Ostring Access to the national highway "Autobahn" the shot you show at 10:42 is litteraly the exit ramps in the background and the tram turning loop between and the highway above and the access ramp in front.
It is one of the major highway accesspoints to Bern and non of the places in view on this shot are useful to bike on or should be biked on… There are parallel sidestreets which are better suited and I think the path might continue if you go through the crossing on the left going straight.
However this is not really an area where shopping, working or living takes place, the places arround it are mostly accessed from sidestreets or the other side, this is more like a highway crossing connecting one of the main car streets into the city beeing swallowed by buildings… This crossing shown can for the most part be avoided by bike and the part shown at 10:42 is already part of the highway system and banned for bikes. (Green big streetsigns = autobahn)
Why not take the tram? Or Bike? I live in the Canton of Bern and have to visit the City of Bern quite often, for me walking up to 2km is normal, so I'd rather walk more often than not than to wait the 5 min to the next tram or bus… I don't have my bike in Bern (I have it at home, about 45km away from the city) Whilst it takes about 2 times the time to walk than to bike, I enjoy it more.
Also walking and taking trams, depending on where you are in Bern you are actually faster walking, if you use the hidden allyways that connect streets or sidestreets and know the city layout…
That said, one major point why I don't have my bike in Bern is, that I would have to commute from the trainstation (Welle side) up the main road then intl the sidestreets to the part of the uni which is farther away from the city… And I hate hills, combine it with one of the main streets of Bern as a starting point…
Also, I generally don't like biking that much, though I use it to rush to the trainstation uphill if I ever miss my bus (it generally is enough to get the train in the last minute.)
I would like to save up for an e-bike, maybe then I would use it more often, because in my area we have only 1bus/h
1:06. haha i know this guy. 🙂
thers a need to educate car drivers better. get them to drive with good manners. make good streets rules. then painted lanes are totally okay.. Our super old city centers are mostly protected.. so the roads are never going to get any wider :).
also driving over tram rails is a learnable skill.
To add, our kids quite early go trough a traffic school with their little bikes. learning from a real police officer. 😉 ah those were fun times.
Please do a video about Hamburg!
bachfietsen?
You should come to Bucharest (an EU country) to see the chaos in traffic and the lack of infrastructure for cyclists.
I would love to go to college on bike here in Buenos Aires but there's almost not infestructure for bikes and also coming back at night is unsafe in certain areas. At least I can get there by train.
Show us more winter biking.
What about Germany.!?
I dont get articles like this. Its no competition between towns and countries. We have to improve all over. It also supported by EU here.
Even Denamrk is mentioned as top top we here and there drown i uneeded cars. By that the bicycle is not the only improvement lectrified or not.
We see so many diffrent ones. They mainly are fine but also makes problems fx in how wide they are and in speed too. Thats a hard one.
I also will say, that most trains here has space for at least 4 bicycles at each waggon. By that You can take a fast sunday trip to the next station nor the next and next and use Your bicycle and enjoy the sea, the forrst or the town and its villages.
Its not expensive. Im sure others has that too, but its an easy improvement. You also by that can have a real vacasion with own bicycles and tent or gasthouse.
There are bicycle routes all over europe for that kind of cheep vacation. By that You can efford more icecreme 🙂
So we have to learn from each other in this too.
None should forget that in many big town You can make subways and tubes. We do that too.
Another Swiss here with something I haven't seen mentioned so far:
I'm not sure if this is a thing in other countries but over here we actually have "cycling education" a few times in school as a kid where (if I remember correctly) someone from local police comes to teach the kids how to cycle (both how to physically cycle but mainly how to follow the traffic laws).
You mentioned that swiss drivers seemed more respectful/behaved than others but I'd argue that Swiss cyclists are also just used to cycling as part of traffic (instead of having separated cycling traffic like in some parts of the netherlands). I'd assume that this might have something to do with cycling being very popular even when cities aren't (yet) optimized for it when compared to other countries.
Most Swiss cities are pretty flat. As you see not a lot of bicycle infrastructure isn’t needed to make it cycle friendly. Of course some people like you want all cars banned. Luckily Swiss people love cars (and can afford them) and won’t get rid of them.
I think you got the wrong idea of Bern, it's full of bikes (and full of those bikes for taking kids), and even in the places where the infrastructure is not the best, the car drivers have huge respect for bikes and they are very careful with them. At least, I feel very safe cycling here.
Well, TBH, I'm comparing it with my homeland, where going by bike was quite really dangerous.
At this point if you live in Western Europe, Not Just Bikes has probably used you in his background footage
think about it? how do you find your place in Switzerland? by adapting yourself to the best quality of life. everybody wants to live here. you are in competition with the best in any category. if you failed, return to your shitty place you come from and try again. i work in a hotel, nothing exceptional but let me tell you…..tourists used to tour all around europe and when they arrive in switzerland, they are amazed by our quality of service…….they are truly astonished……and finally, we, the swiss working class are genuinely happy to be there , having gratitude and humility to be part of one of the best occidental country in the world, knowing people are struggling with almost every aspect of their society. and here is the recipe : almost everybody is working their ass off and we trust our democratic system. end of the opposite of propaganda. have a good ride!
I'm a huge bike user as I promised myself to use the car the least amount of possible times, years ago. I live in Italy and luckily this has never been very difficult, but apparently, it is for the majority of people. In all these years I've not convinced anyone around me to do the same. When it's sunny it is too hot, When it's windy is too windy and cold, when it's raining everyone is afraid of water, and so on, but more than anything else people keep on saying biking around is not safe enough, indeed. I mean roads and infrastructure here are not nearly as bike friendly as a tenth of what you can see in the worst scenario of this video, so technically they are right.
But what frustrates me the most is that as long as people don't start cycling, cities won't change in their favor. Amsterdam is a unique and fortuitous case. Administrations cannot be expected to change cities' infrastructure for cyclists if they first notice that no one goes and wants to ride a bike. If, on the other hand, many use the bike despite the absence of an adequate network, finally those who manage will be forced to adapt.
Damn man. You are godsent. Just come to Estonia and visit Tallinn and Tartu cycling lines and then shame and assess how bad it is. They both "compete" and say how bicycle-friendly cities they are… people keep saying no these cities are not …
They need a voice from outside to show these city "lords" to see how bad all that is.
Love the videos! Would love to see your opinion on Cambridge a town that is well known for its cycling in the UK but nowhere near the level of some European cities!
you should definetely make one about London!
There is underground bike parking in basel and probably other cities as well.
I used to live in Grenzach-Wyhlen and time to time on weekends I rode my bicycle to Basel
The only problem with Switzerland is it's adherance to EU rules about electric bikes, namely the motor limit on bike motors. Ebikes in Europe are a ripoff compared to ebikes here in the US. The US regulations allow for a motor at 1 horsepower, which is about 750w, perfect for pedaling up serious hills. Why the EU limits motors to 250w is insane.
Im guessing "needle park" was similar to "Plata" in Oslo, before that too was cleaned out in the mid 2000s… ie a place where people used, well, needles
I grew up in Basel and moved to Zürich about a year ago. I can only confirm the stark contrast between these two cities. And interesting fact about Zürich is that the most important (and worst cycling) streets are owned by the canton and not by the city. This is similar to Basel with the defining difference being that in the canton of Zürich only about 30% of people live in the cities and another 30% in big villages while the city of Basel makes up almost 90% of the total population of the canton. Which of coarse leads to the differences in transportation policies you saw between those cities.
Something you didn’t mention in your video are the long range cycle paths in Switzerland.
The Swiss cycling infrastructure is very well suited for long range cycling tours. It’s truly amazing how interconnected the long range cycle paths are in Switzerland. You can go from anywhere to anywhere using only the official cycle paths which almost always are quiet and well maintained streets through the country side with very good sings showing the distance to large cities but also to nearby smaller villages. If you have some basic knowledge of the Swiss topography and don’t mind memorising some names of villages there is no need to look at map during longer cycling tours.
Great video! It's so fun to see places you're intimately familiar with through someone else's eyes. Also I knew which one the fourth city was as soon as I saw the blurry picture 😄
Two add-ons:
1) If you go to primary school you take a cycling test where you have to show that you know how to ride on streets with other traffic (kind of like a driver's licence for cycling)
2) In Winterthur, because it's known as a cycling town, most drivers are very aware of cyclists. Although in winter the snow gets ploughed on to the bike gutter 🤦🏻 So the council doesn't seem to care about its status
One of the reasons Basel has quite a high number of cargo bikes is the excellent bike shop in the city centre that sells only quality cargo bikes. Shout out to Obst & Gemüse". 👋
in my town San Diego Ca. nimbys come out like zombies when the mayor tries to make safe bicycle lanes , they call the local media that never fails to show up and they shout and scream and cry about lost parking spaces .
You should probably say "in my home town IN CANADA" to make it clear it is not in the Netherlands.
why choose bike?? EXERCISE, fresh air, learning to fix it urself 🙂
Thank you very much for these videos, making me envious. I've been riding since I was three, now I'm 70 and still going. I do drive, using my Vespa and Mini when appropriate, but I bike as much as possible. Many of the street scenes you showed that were bad, I agree with, but also were where much of my cycling too place. Many experiences prepared me for those streets, like riding in Manhattan and Honolulu, San Diego and Chcago. I also rode in Israel; Barcelona; Toulon, France; Dubai (before it was a 'thing'), Scotland; Monaco. How did I survive? I learned a lot on a long motorcycle trip when I met up with an Air Force pilot. He flew F-14 Tomcats, just watch the original 'Top Gun.' He said riding motorcycles was a lot like flying his Tomcat. He explained 'situational awareness.' Stay vigilant to all around you, identify threats and rank them as dangerous or not. Will that car pull out in front of you, dont be afraid to precaution brake. Try to predict mistakes others may make. Be aware of what is behind you. Pay attention to sounds, and what they mean. I applied that to my motorcycle riding, driving and biking. And, one more thing for biking. In Manhattan and Honolulu I found that things were much safer if I just s l o w e d d o w n. The faster you go, the less time you have to react.
A bit late to the party, but with a Dutch dad and a Swiss mom from Basel living in the Netherlands I had to see the video and react. Basel is beautiful! I miss getting together with my grandparents and going 'home' with tram number 8 😥. Sweet memories!
My uncle used to bike to his work. It's getting better and better in Basel to bike. He used to be one of the exceptions. Now a days it much more the norm.
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