It’s amazing how switching up your routine can change your perspective. I never expected to look forward to the commute in and out of Wellington for work but that’s what’s happened.
I certainly had misgivings in January when I first pulled my daughter’s ‘old school’ Raleigh commuter bike out of the basement and pumped up the tyres. I had seen plenty of talk in newspapers and social media that it’s some kind of cyclists vs motorists ‘war’ out on the roads. I waited for the first driver to toot angrily at me, or fail to give me my ‘bubble’ as they passed.
Honestly, it hasn’t happened in more than three months’ of cycling. Once, on Hutt Rd heading to Petone, I was overtaken by a car that 10 seconds later turned left in front of me to go down a side street. Dangerous and careless because I was moving at a decent clip.
But that’s been it. I’ve found that if you’ve got decent front and rear lights, you wear something fluoro and loud, and you use hand signals to indicate you intention, there’s little or no trouble from motorised traffic. In fact, plenty of drivers will slow down to let you in.
Probably when I have more kilometres on two wheels under my belt there will be incidents – certainly some friends who cycle have suffered them. But my aim is to continue to obey the road rules and use common sense, and hope that drivers around me do the same.
On the trip to and from Belmont, I can use river and stop bank cycle trails to Ewen Bridge, then Hutt Rd to Petone, more often than not overtaking all the queued cars, then down SH2 to Ngauranga, enjoying the harbour views. Cyclists are then on the brilliant shared path that Wellington City Council has installed from Ngauranga to Thordon – wide, smooth, a sort of highway for two wheels.
It’s a great shame that progress on the long-promised harbourside Petone to Ngauranga cycle and pedestrian path has moved more slowly than I do into the teeth of a southerly. The latest price tag is an elastic $50m-$100m and NZTA says it’s now in the ‘design’ phase. It seems to have been stuck in the investigation/design slow lane for years now. Meanwhile, more ‘pass safely signs’ and green road markings at various pinch points along SH2 are being installed.
It’s said that several hundred cyclists already regularly commute from the Hutt to Wellington – and that sounds about right because so many of them on racing and electric bikes zoom past me. If we get on and build the Melling to Ngauranga cycle paths, I’m convinced many more people will leave the car at home – at least when the wind isn’t a gale.
In the morning and evening rush hours, it’s not as if cycling takes a lot more time. If you take into account finding a car park, walks to and from the train station, waiting for it to arrive, etc., the 45-50 minute trip by two wheels isn’t much longer.
In February, plenty of cyclists enroll in the Aotearoa Bike Challenge and monitor their trips using one of the apps that can be downloaded onto a cellphone. During that month I recorded 36 trips, 333 kilometres, 67 kilograms of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere avoided by not taking the car, and 7,650 calories burned. Not enough to get rid of the beer gut yet but the cycling means I’ve reach equilibrium on that front.
My recommendation to others: give it a try. The exercise and savings beats fuming behind the wheel in another traffic snarl-up.
Leave a Reply