Cargo bikes

[jacob]

I don't recall ever seeing one in the US, but they're hugely popular in Denmark to the point of other cyclists complaining about how they take up the full width of the bike lanes and prevent other cyclists from passing.

https://arstechnica.com/cars/2024/01/st ... much-less/

[Ego]

They are very popular here. We live right on the main bike path across the city and I see many daily. Mainly parents delivering children to school. They became much more popular with the integration of electric motors.

[Bicycle7]

They are really popular where I live too, as Ego said, with electric motors.

Yeah, I've thought about how bikes in a way are following the trend of gigantism in the car industry. A past job, I'd ride around on an employer provided electric cargo bike that had an extended wheelbase and weighed 77 pounds. Add 50 pounds of cargo, a 150 pound rider and 20 mph and that equals a lot of momentum!

I'm surprised you don't see these in Chicago, Jacob.

[jacob]

I'm surprised you don't see these in Chicago, Jacob.

I almost never go downtown. Around here (~8 miles out), cyclists are mostly riding MTBs on the sidewalk or going the wrong side/way down the street.

[ducknald_don]

I saw one in Oxford the other day with a fifth wheel, it was huge. The guy riding it was delivering packages between university departments and colleges.

[loutfard]

Where I live, mail and many pacakges get delivered by these:

https://cdn.uc.assets.prezly.com/34978a ... rmat/auto/

[mountainFrugal]

A cargo bike to carry your regular bike: https://surlybikes.com/blog/big_dummy_haulapalooza

or various creative things to haul:
https://surlybikes.com/blog/humanoids_o ... di_carlson

[bos]

I actually had the pleasure of growing up with a cargo-bike right in our own home. It was such a handy mode of transportation for my dad to carry us around or transport goods. Cargo bikes have been massively popular in The Netherlands for quite some time now.
Something like this
https://pendix.de/media/Default/Pendix/ ... 00x450.jpg

[loutfard]

Might be interesting to know that a large contributor to the cargo bike revival was Christiania, the Copenhagen hippy colony. https://www.christianiabikes.com is still at it.

[guitarplayer]

An alternative is to get a trailer for children and use it for purposes other than intended. They are designed to carry quite a lot of weight. I have once a long while back gone on a cycling adventure around Orkney with one and carried all my gear in it.

Very recently DW found a trailer for twins for free pick up and now we have it. It can carry up to 40kg and fit bulkier things than cycling panniers would. I thought maybe DW is wanting to tell me something, but then she mentioned a free monitor she'd arrange to pick up from someone, so I figure we will be using the trailer as cargo bike attachment for now.

[mooretrees]

We had a cargo bike for a few years. It was built for flat places with too few gears for climbing any hills. It worked much better with the electric motor installed, though that also was temperamental.

We had a trailer/stroller combo that was pretty useful. The one benefit with the cargo trailer and a kid, was it was actually possible to talk with my son while we biked. When he was in the trailer it was hard to interact with him without stopping.

The cargo bike was also way more fun to ride, though I did drop it twice; one time with my son in it! He was fine, thanks to the five part harness DH built for him. I would be interested in a three wheeler in the future for that reason. In the end, our son aged out of the cargo bike so we sold it.

Back when we lived in a bigger city, DH was part of an active bicycle move culture. Those moves featured quite a few cargo bikes and diy trailers.

[ducknald_don]

One of the unexpected benefits of a trailer is most drivers will give you a lot more room. I guess they don't know you have a sack of potatoes in there rather than a two year old.

[guitarplayer]

One of the unexpected benefits of a trailer is most drivers will give you a lot more room. I guess they don't know you have a sack of potatoes in there rather than a two year old.

I was actually going to write it but then forgot! Folk are much nicer to you generally with the trailer. On that trip, only once I had this strange situation when someone had approached me to talk about the babies and I told them I only have a tent, sleeping bag and such in there. Puzzlement on their face.

[NewBlood]

Bikes like these have become very popular here:
https://www.r-m.de/en-en/bikes/multicharger2-mixte/

Can transport kids and stuff but they aren't too wide. I tried it once, super heavy. Even with the electric assistance, it was hard to get it going with two kids in the back (8 and 6 yo). I also heard it's supposed to be safer for kids than in a cargo at the front, but I don't have sources for that.

[ducknald_don]

I'd like to find a bike like that which was beefy enough to carry my wife. Sadly I don't think I will.

[jacob]

I'd like to find a bike like that which was beefy enough to carry my wife. Sadly I don't think I will.

Tandem?

[7Wannabe5]

I had a trailer specifically designed for cargo, not kids, that I used to haul garden stuff with my bike. The funniest thing was that one time when I was locking it up while I ran into a store, somebody asked, "Are you Canadian?" The trailer worked wonderfully well, so it seems to me that it would be disadvantageous to have the cargo capacity built into the bike.

In the days before bike safety became a thing, I used to ride my single gear bike to the beach, with my youngest sister sitting on the handlebars, and a picnic basket lashed to the rear. We also used to let our bikes pick up speed coasting down the hill to the lake, so we could crash into the water. I had a bike baby seat for my son, but switched over to mostly hauling my kids around in a wagon once I had two.

A low riding trailer in the back of the bike would generally be the safest for hauling children, because just falling from the height of a bike, absent any velocity or impact is liable to cause head injury.

[macg]

I've been trying to convince myself that I need a cargo bike for years, even though I really don't lol. I just like them! But alas, my hybrid with back rack and panniers work just fine lol.

I have seen on many a bike touring blog where people do use the kid trailers as storage instead.

Overall, I'd rather have cargo bikes around than cars, but certainly an argument can be made about safety if/ when the e-motors can get them moving really fast. That may already be the case and I I'm just not aware, of course. At this point in time it's still going to be way safer than cars and trucks though.

[Slevin]

E bikes generally travel around 15 mph. Yes you can hack it and go 30 mph, but nobody really does that (not comfortable really to go >20mph unless you go full suspension and use it as a moped, or have a really nice downhill. Fatbike wheels just kinda don’t go faster than this easily). Then the damage is mostly determined by the object you hit. 15 mph head on crash with a pedestrian can be bad, but it’s still negligible damage compared to a car impact at the same speed. Cargo bikes still aren’t usually that heavy (maybe 70lbs? Depends on a lot of factors), rider weight and cargo weight will dominate the impact force.

Think of the scaling as car~=20x cargo weight, bike~=0.5x cargo weight. So theoretically 40x less impact force in any collision. Downside risk is that it’s much easier for passenger to be ejected upon collision. Positive is that bike riders actually wear helmets, unlike drivers (yes they should from a safety perspective).

Basically, bike scale mitigates the damage to be much much less bad than cars, so replacement of cars with cargo bikes has a positive effect in multiple fronts, and usually all to do with not hauling around drastic loads of extra weight for no reason.

[delay]

I don't recall ever seeing one in the US, but they're hugely popular in Denmark to the point of other cyclists complaining about how they take up the full width of the bike lanes and prevent other cyclists from passing.

Cargo bikes are popular in The Netherlands too. Cargo bike cyclists are scary when they overtake you in a bend while reading their mobile phone and calming the child in the front seat.