A commute that's good for the planet

By Robert Kunzig, ENVIRONMENT Executive Editor

In the old days, before March 2020, I used to bike to work at National Geographic’s headquarters in Washington, D.C. Taking the bike instead of my car saved me sitting in traffic, which I despise, and paying to park downtown. It saved me running for a bus that came at infrequent and unpredictable intervals. The ride was less than four miles, and on the way in it was mostly downhill, which made the decision to ride each morning a little easier. Plus, all that biking, especially the uphill slog home, allowed me to skip going to the gym and still feel entitled to my wine and chocolate.

And oh yeah, it was better for the planet too.

The pandemic shut down my commute, like that of so many others, but it has inspired millions of people around the world to jump on bikes for the first time in years, Ilana Strauss writes for us this week. Most of that riding was recreational and probably didn’t displace much carbon pollution. But cities around the world are making lasting changes to their streets to encourage biking, in what may prove to be an enduring silver lining of COVID-19.

Fear of being maimed or worse by cars is what keeps many people from commuting by bike, surveys show. European cities don’t kill nearly as many cyclists as American ones; the fatality rate is five to 10 times higher in the U.S. than in countries like Denmark and the Netherlands, urban planners Ralph Buehler and John Pucher reported last year. But in Europe too urban biking used to be much more lethal—and much less common.

“Americans have this image, ‘Oh cycling is just paradise, and it’s always been paradise in Europe,’” Pucher tells Strauss in this week’s episode of Overheard, the National Geographic podcast. “Wrooong. Not true!” After World War II, European cities were overrun by cars too. It’s just that since the 1970s many have made concerted efforts, spearheaded sometimes by concerned citizens, to reclaim their streets for unmotorized people.

American cities are now following that trend, a few decades behind. Minneapolis is a leader, Stephanie Pearson writes for Nat Geo; its 5.5-mile-long Midtown Greenway (pictured above), which follows an old railway corridor, is lit at night and plowed in winter, and it’s often a quicker way across town than driving. In Minneapolis and other cities, however, the key to bikeability isn’t a gorgeous greenway or two. It’s a connected network of bike paths and lanes that make it possible to ride from any point A in the city to any point B, safely and easily.

New York City has added more than 60 miles of paths and lanes during the pandemic, Chicago around 30, Buehler and Pucher reported last spring. Washington hasn’t seen a surge like that, but it has seen a steady expansion of its network. The percentage of commuters traveling by bike in D.C. went from 1 percent in the late 1990s to 5 percent in 2018, Strauss writes.

I noticed the change myself. On some mornings, when I entered the final straightaway to the office, there would be a whole motley peloton of us rolling down 17th Street, fanning out as if we owned the road, as if we were Tour de France riders leading our chase cars down the Champs-Elysées. As we crossed Massachusetts Avenue, some of us would stand up on the pedals, pumping furiously to make the light at Rhode Island. For this aging boomer in cargo shorts and a goofy helmet, that sprint was a little morning jolt of childhood joy. You may think you can’t recapture that in your grown-up workday but think again: It’s just like riding a bike.

If you want to get this email each week, join us here and invite a friend.

THE GUERRILLA CYCLISTS OF MEXICO CITY

Tired of waiting for the local government to build more bike lanes, a group of cyclists in Mexico City, the largest city in North America, took matters into their own hands: They painted the lanes themselves. Grassroots activism, we discover on the latest episode of our podcast, Overheard, is finding creative ways to get the job done. (Pictured above, children with bicycles on a plaza in Seville, Spain, in 2020.)

HEAR THE PODCAST 

A BETTER WORLD

We asked, you delivered: After a Nat Geo poll showed strong support for eliminating plastics waste and curbing fossil fuels use, we asked readers what else world leaders should focus on to improve the planet. Your answers ranged from widespread reforestation to regulating large-scale commercial fishing, from banning polluting two-stroke engines and creating hi-rise urban vertical gardens (pictured above in Singapore) to cutting back production of beef.

THIS WEEK'S QUESTION

Climate change is threatening production of coffee, avocados, chocolate and, yes, beef, and forecasters expect prices to keep rising for these products as harvests fall. Will you miss one of these foods more than the other, and have you started moving away from some of these products and subbing in others? Let us know! We’ll share reader answers and the view from a poll we’re doing with Morning Consult.

TAKE FIVE

• Rainforests have adapted to hurricanes but climate change may be pushing some to the breaking point (Above, new fronds at El Yunque National Forest in Puerto Rico.)
• Scientists trained cows where to pee. It could help the environment
• Volcano in Canary Islands erupts for first time in 50 years; lava flows threaten communities
• After summertime deaths, U.S. to develop new standards for working in extreme heat
• Meet 50 Latinas whose companies are innovating sustainably, and deliciously

A REPRIEVE

Giant sequoias targeted: One of the world’s biggest trees (by volume) has been spared so far in the wildfires that have spread through California’s Sequoia National Park. Rangers wrapped the General Sherman tree in a foil-like covering to try to keep it from wildfires that have torn through parts of the forest, which has been home to some of Earth’s oldest trees, Alejandra Borunda reports. Some areas of the sequoias have been aided by controlled fire programs to clear the fire-accelerating underbrush that gathers. (Pictured above, a giant sequoia burns from the top down in California’s Long Meadow Grove.)

Helping the giant trees: Why controlled fires help giant sequoias survive

READ ON 

SMARTER PLANET

The ‘indicator’ animals of climate change: It pays to keep a close eye on the northern spotted owl, American pika, and the variable harlequin frog (pictured above). These species are often the first to be affected by changes to an ecosystem—and provide early warnings on climate. “Monitoring indicator species can also better help scientists zero in” on climate effects, Natasha Daly writes.

SEE THE ANIMALS 

ONE MOMENT

Can Florida’s springs be saved? They form the largest network of freshwater springs in the world, providing drinking water to 20 million Floridians. But declining water flows, agricultural runoff, rising sea level, and sewage are pressuring Florida's freshwater springs, Nat Geo reports. (Above, photographer and Nat Geo Explorer Jason Gulley’s image of a cave diver swimming in Peacock Springs, Florida, where green-tinged groundwater is sandwiched between river water on the cave ceiling and the silty springs floor.)

READ ON 

The National Geographic Society, committed to illuminating and protecting the wonder of our world, has funded Gulley’s work. Learn more about the Society’s support of Explorers.

FAST FORWARD

Trees for Jane: Renowned primatologist Jane Goodall has launched Trees for Jane, joining a global campaign to combat climate change by planting a trillion trees by 2030. The longtime Nat Geo Explorer (pictured above at the science museum CosmoCaixa in Barcelona in 2018) says that planting is just one aspect of Trees for Jane; there’s something even more important, Nat Geo reports. “The key is protecting existing forest because those big trees already have stored CO2,” she said in an interview.

Subscriber exclusive: How Jane Goodall changed what we know about chimps