Building the Cycling City

by Melissa Bruntlett

  In order for more people to see firsthand that there is an alternative to the occasional, adrenalin-fueled racing session, retailers must have more than one token city bike on display, and staff must be able to educate their customers on its virtues. But when every square foot counts, dedicating floor space to relatively slow-selling transport cycles makes little sense, and retailers are forced to choose between paying the bills and satisfying a rather small portion of a highly competitive market.

  Cutler doesn’t accept this rather dismal state of affairs, however. Like many in the advocacy world, he believes it comes down to a lack of education for both the consumer and the retailer, which is why he’s very selective when choosing which dealers will represent Workcycles in North America. Only those willing to invest the time it takes to get to know the customer’s needs, ask them the right questions, and truly respect everyone who walks through their doors are entrusted with his brand.

  When asked whether he has achieved his goal of selling the world on Dutch cycling, Cutler expresses his satisfaction. “We came to the realization a year or two ago that our original mission was fulfilled. Workcycles has been enormously influential in bringing Dutch bicycles to the world,” he states proudly. “Now others have picked up the fight for us. The momentum is there, and now we can focus on building a company.”

  A More Welcoming Retail Environment

  Regardless of where the retail market currently stands, if everyday cycling is to flourish outside the Netherlands, buying an everyday bike needs to be made much less complicated than it is now. Most bike shops, for example, greet their customers with the same daunting sight: row upon row of road, mountain, and hybrid commuter bikes, equipped with carbon frames, dropped handlebars, disc brakes, countless gears, and hydraulic shocks. And then there are rows of expensive helmets, cleated shoes, dry-wicking shirts, padded shorts, high-visibility vests, and high-performance socks.

  Add to that dynamic an overwhelming and intimidating sales staff that often fail to comprehend that not everyone is looking for a faster, lighter, more high-performance machine. Most retailers conflate the distinct worlds of sport and transportation cycling, to the detriment of the latter. It’s the equivalent of a car dealership pushing Formula One–level technology on a family looking for a minivan.

  The distinct lack of more-welcoming and less-prohibitive retail environments undoubtedly remains a barrier to the growth of transportation cycling in cities around the world. While industry players focus on competing over their narrow share of the pie—rather than growing the entire pie—the onus will fall on selfless entrepreneurs willing to put passion over profit in order to fill that gaping hole.

  Simon and Victoria Firth are the married co-owners of Firth & Wilson Transport Cycles, currently operating out of a 10,000-square-foot former elevator factory in Philadelphia’s rapidly gentrifying Fishtown neighborhood. Simon pulls no punches around their shop’s raison d’être: “We often joke about painting the phrase ‘Not Sport. Transport.’ in four-foot-high letters on the wall,” he admits, only half kidding. Victoria adds, “Unfortunately, the sports mentality is still the driving force of bike shops. But I think they’ve got to adapt, because people really want these bikes.”

  The pair opened the shop in June 2013, partnering with Seattleite David Wilson when his wife Rebecka was transferred from IKEA’s Delft offices to their North American headquarters just north of Philadelphia, in nearby Conshohocken. During the Wilsons’ three years in the Netherlands, David worked in a number of bike shops, even crossing paths with Henry Cutler and Workcycles on several occasions. That short stint definitely influenced Firth & Wilson’s emphasis on utility over luxury: “For the Dutch, bike shops are just a way of purchasing and maintaining what you need to get to work and get the kids to school in the morning,” claims Simon.

  In addition to stocking a number of Dutch brands, including Babboe and Gazelle, their shop boasts a carefully curated selection of city and cargo bikes from Benno, Faraday, Linus, Breezer, Pure Cycles, Xtracycle, and Yuba. Many of these designs are North American variations on the traditional upright Dutch bike—offering lighter aluminum frames, multiple gears, and even electric assist—from companies located in New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Toronto. But crucially, they incorporate all the “bells and whistles” needed for everyday cycling in regular attire—including the requisite fenders, chain guards, lights, bell, kickstands, and utility racks—making the purchasing process much less scary and confusing.

  Figure 2-3: The sales floor at Firth & Wilson Transport Cycles, a 10,000-square-foot former elevator factory in Philadelphia’s Fishtown neighborhood. (Credit: Modacity)

  According to Simon, a community-focused bike shop is a crucial ingredient in building a bike-friendly city. “Bike lanes are part of creating a cycling city,” he explains. “The annual Bike Expo is part of creating a cycling city. And having a great bike shop like ours is part of creating a cycling city.” That includes using their space for more than just selling and fixing bikes, as they regularly host art shows, fringe festival events, lectures, film screenings, and charity fundraisers. Philadelphia’s growing urban-planning and advocacy scene has even embraced the shop, with 5th Square—the city’s urbanist political action committee—renting the space for a number of events.

  Simon and Victoria attribute much of Firth & Wilson’s success to fashioning a family-friendly setting. Simon happily recounts the dozens of smiling families they’ve served in their neighborhood since opening their doors in 2013: “Part of the reason I wanted to open this place, was not just to have a bike shop, but to create a more inclusive and welcoming bike scene in Philadelphia.” It’s the little things, such as finding room in their shop for a small play area—complete with a box of toys—that make bringing the kids along all the more feasible. Visit on a typical Saturday afternoon, and the shop floor will be bustling with moms, dads, and children test-driving multiple bikes, and locals stopping in to drop off or pick up their bikes for repair.

  When it comes to building a market for these unfamiliar machines, they really think it is a matter of “seeing is believing.” In some instances, Victoria will have a customer walk through the door looking for something sportier, only to be convinced that a Dutch-style city bike is the best fit for their lifestyle. “We do stock some entry-level road bikes and hybrids,” she notes. “But we try to show them the alternatives, and in many cases they’re really stoked on the three-speed internal step-through frame that’s very upright.” Despite being used to a faster, more forward-leaning position, the customer’s mind is often changed within minutes. “I’ve seen many instances where, after test rides, people say, ‘Oh hey, this is really comfortable. I want this.’”

  “Sometimes, you have to show people what they want,” insists Simon. Firth & Wilson’s best sales strategy seems to be to show these bikes to as wide of an audience as possible, whether it’s test driving one in store, renting it for the day, or spotting a neighbor’s new set of wheels on the street. “We sell bikes to customers, and their neighbors will ask them, ‘Oh, that’s cool—where did you get that?’” says Victoria. “These bikes are slowly disseminating through the city, and that’s a great thing. It’s exciting to hear customers say, ‘My neighbor has one of these. I want one.’”

  The arrival of Indego, a public bike-share scheme, in Philadelphia has also made this style of cycling accessible to tens of thousands of potential customers who suddenly experience how leisurely, comfortable, and enjoyable bicycling can be. Victoria has noticed a distinct pattern since the Indego program launched in April 2015: “A lot of people have been using the bike-share in town. And they are very upright bikes,” she recounts. “And they say, ‘I really like that bike, it’s comfortable, but I want my own. I’m used to that now. What do you have?’ And we’re more than happy to help them.”

  As wonderful as it is to see their market share growing, Simon recognizes that they cannot remain puritanical about one type of cycling, that it woul
d be to the detriment of their business and the community that now depends on them. The end goal isn’t to get everyone on a Gazelle, but to empower them to ride on whatever they can afford. “We’re just trying to keep people’s bikes on the road,” he insists. “It’s not about everyone having a fancy bike. A lot of people in Philadelphia are poor, and they have cheap $100 bikes, and a lot of new shops will say, ‘We’re not going to fix that.’”

  Firth & Wilson will repair virtually anything that wobbles through the door, particularly if it’s someone’s primary mode of transportation. “That’s part of our success, not being a snob about bikes,” asserts Simon proudly. “We might have some $4,000 bikes on the floor, but—to us—your $100 bike is just as valuable.”

  That isn’t to say that swimming against the current hasn’t come without its trials and tribulations, but their single biggest challenge—real estate—is one common to virtually everyone living and working in the increasingly unaffordable Fishtown. Paying the rent on such a large space has required some creativity, including subletting some of their square footage to other fledging businesses: “Haley Trikes rents space from us,” notes Simon. “I have a frame shop—Hanford Cycles—and I share that space with my friend Chris, who is a hobby builder. We have a glass blower, a couple of offices, a couple of artists, and an architect in here.”

  Unfortunately, after watching everything around them sell, the reality of an economy where real estate is worth more than enterprise recently caught up to them. “The building just got sold, and we have three years left on the lease,” sighs Simon, but he remains optimistic. “The good thing is, the neighborhood’s coming up, and lots of stuff is being built. There’ll be plenty of retail space; we just won’t have 10,000 square feet of it. We’ll move into another, smaller space and we’ll continue.”

  In order to make cycling more accessible to the regular citizen—and not solely the fit and brave—cities are in dire need of trailblazers like Simon, Victoria, and David, who specialize in practical, comfortable, complete machines. There is clearly a latent demand for these types of utilitarian bikes, specifically designed for short trips within an urban environment. As it stands, many of the “interested, but concerned” crowd gets turned away from cycling by the sheer number of specialized bikes they have to sift through just to find one designed for a slow roll to the supermarket.

  One thing’s for certain: in Firth & Wilson Transport Cycles, Philadelphia has an absolute gem of a bike shop, one that could possibly inspire some altruistic and enterprising citizens to provide a similar hub in their own hometown. Not just as a business opportunity, but as a chance to create a critical resource that will get more citizens—especially women and children—choosing the bike as a mode of transport. “I think the family bike market is growing in Philadelphia,” reflects Simon hopefully. “We want to keep providing that place for people to get a bike and try it out.”

  Electromobility for All

  If there’s one thing on which manufacturers, retailers, and advocates can agree, it’s the potential of the electric-assist bike—or pedelec—to swiftly push city cycling into the mainstream. For over a decade now, e-bikes have been leading a quiet revolution on European streets, where a battery-powered motor has added a new level of mobility, diversity, capacity, and range to what was already an amazingly efficient machine.

  Industry insiders will admit that their long-term business plans are centered on e-bikes, with their increased profit margins and servicing costs. Those in advocacy circles are excited about their undeniable ability to close both the gender and age gaps, flatten hills, and remove sweat from the equation, thus addressing many of the barriers to the widespread embrace of cycling as a form of transportation.

  As development director of the European Cyclists’ Federation (ECF) in Brussels, and president of their Cycling Industry Club—a support group representing 40 of the world’s biggest bike companies—Kevin Mayne has his feet placed firmly in both camps. “I think there’s not a shadow of a doubt the e-bike is a tool to bring more people into cycling,” he affirms boldly. “There are people that perhaps wouldn’t cycle without the feeling they get from extra support. So that broadens the number of participants.” The other advantage it offers, Mayne maintains, is making journeys that weren’t previously conceivable feel possible. An added electric boost offers those who believe they can’t cycle due to terrain, temperature, or distance an option to arrive at their destination in a timely manner, feeling fresh and composed.

  The science backs up Mayne’s claims, with a 2015 study from Norway’s Center for Gender Research finding that e-bikes are ridden twice as far and twice as often as traditional, non-motorized bicycles, with the biggest impact on women and seniors. This offers some potentially dramatic changes to transportation patterns within cities, with very real impacts on car ownership and motor vehicle congestion rates.

  A 2017 study from the German Federal Environmental Agency discovered that, in an urban setting, regular bikes are faster than cars for trips up to five kilometers. With pedelecs, this radius is increased to ten kilometers, with a marginal difference for distances up to twenty kilometers. “We’re no longer talking about the bicycle as a solution for five-kilometer trips,” states Mayne. “We’re talking about the bicycle as a solution for most trips.”

  There are still some purist voices that denounce e-bikes as “lazy” and “cheating,” but Mayne argues that they must be ignored. “If we take the voices of the sporty fit to write the books, we end up with helmets and Lycra, and we end up with no e-bikes. So we have to switch off those voices,” he insists. “It’s not for you. It’s for someone else.”

  Despite its mostly flat terrain, the Netherlands has emerged as the world’s largest pedelec market per capita, with electric bikes making up almost a third of new bicycle sales in 2016. Denmark is a close second, proving to experts like Mayne that infrastructure is absolutely critical, and e-bikes won’t sell in significant numbers without a safe space on which to ride them: “The numbers show that countries with good and developing infrastructure have good and developing e-bike markets.”

  Another crucial ingredient to burgeoning e-bike use is the availability of a safe space in which to store them. “Parking is a huge issue,” explains Mayne. “It’s a €3,000 [about $3,700 USD] unit, instead of a €150 to €200 unit. People don’t want to leave machines of that cost on the street. They want lockers, underground garages, and secure parking at stations.” This is one area where the Dutch excel, installing large-scale bike-parking structures within their cities. Known as fietsenstallingen, these ample, secure, end-of-trip facilities can be found at major living, working, and shopping destinations, complete with entrance escalators, maintenance facilities, and on-site security staff.

  The fact that over 80 percent of e-bike sales in the Netherlands are made to people over the age of 50 demonstrates their unparalleled ability to preserve personal mobility and encourage healthy, active transportation habits well into old age. “There is a need in society to get older, heavier, less fit, and different gender groups active,” acknowledges Mayne. He believes the e-bicycle and e-tricycle offer real opportunities in that area, and governments facing ballooning healthcare costs should be thinking about them as game changers: “We’re familiar with personalized mobility scooters for the really elderly on the high street. This is a bridge. And it’s a lot cheaper.”

  To see that return on investment, Mayne and the ECF are lobbying governments all over Europe to reconsider their fiscal policies related to electromobility. “If, for reasons of inclusion, you want to make the e-bike part of your solution, they are expensive. So cost is clearly a barrier. Including them in any taxation benefits, or electric-mobility subsidies, is essential,” he suggests. While many bureaucrats seem to be betting on a transportation future centered on the electric car, they’re ignoring the fact that e-bikes could provide them with a much bigger return on investment.

  Figure 2-4: Electric-assist bicycles are an excitin
g new way to close the gender and age gaps, flatten hills, and remove sweat from the equation. (Credit: Modacity)

  Germany provides the most striking example of this, where €1.4 billion ($1.7 billion USD) in electric-car subsidies resulted in just 24,000 units sold as of 2014. Meanwhile, with zero government subsidies, an incredible 2.1 million e-bikes now motor along German streets.

  In the Netherlands, a few cities piloted such schemes after national e-bike subsidies were discontinued; currently Utrecht is the only municipality with a permanent program. They now offer grants of up to €1,500 ($1,860 USD) to companies who wish to purchase or lease a pedelec or e-cargo bike for commuting employees or daily business use.

  Belgium, on the other hand, is experimenting with a different incentive model, which, for the past six years, has rewarded bike commuters with a €0.22 (27¢ USD) bonus for each kilometer ridden. The average Belgian who cycles to work rode 1,045 kilometers in 2016, making them eligible for a €230 ($285 USD) refund. The e-bike suddenly makes those numbers more enticing. “If you ride a pedelec for a 20-kilometer round trip, you’re going to accumulate a lot of kilometers,” asserts Mayne, pointing out that such a distance would entitle someone to a €924 ($1,147 USD) annual rebate. “That goes a long way to supporting your bike. So the per-kilometer model incentivizes e-bikes quite well.”

  Once government agencies level the playing field and provide the necessary incentives, the brakes are well and truly off for the impending e-bike revolution. Many car manufacturers, including Ford and BMW, recognize this as inevitable, so they are developing their own electric bikes for mass production—and they aren’t the only major players entering the already crowded market. “When you look at entries such as Bosch, they are a world-leading company in motors and drives,” explains Mayne. “They recently established an entire e-bike division—because they think they can make money in this. And they’re exporting to China, Japan, and the States.”