By: Shane Bryan

Photo by: Shane Bryan

I felt the need to write, “Biking into the Future with Bike Utah,” because it was a topic that I cared a great deal about. Coming from a small town on the East Coast and moving to Salt Lake opened my eyes for the need of safe ways for people to travel via bicycle. Where I come from, there were no such thing as commuting by bike so I was never exposed to all the things required to do so safely. I personally never wanted to ride on the roads with cars, however, in the last few years I have grown increasingly confident due to the infrastructure around Utah’s cities.

I decided to write this piece to educate both cyclists and car drivers that riding bikes is a form of transportation as well as to shed light on the work organizations do to put infrastructure in place to make it a safe environment for everyone. I contacted Bike Utah, an advocacy group for cycling, to understand how they help educate cyclists as well as take part in advancing cities and towns to better promote bicycle riding. After I spoke to one of the organizers of Bike Utah, I sought out a cyclist using one of the bike paths to see his opinion of the current bike lanes, traffic patterns and maybe what he does to stay safe on the road.  Lastly, I wanted to end the piece with some tips for people who commute or plan to commute by bike, and present ideas that could help them stay safe on their daily ride.

I hope this piece shows that bicycle commuting can be awesome, safe and rewarding if done right. People opposed to sharing the road with cyclists hopefully can see that bike riders are not lawless and abide by rules of the road. With the current and  future improving infrastructure, bikes and cars will be able to peacefully co-exist.