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The San Mateo city council already has two strikes for ignoring U.S. researchers and best practices around the world. Let’s see how they do against history.
“Imagine if we could invent something that cut road and rail crowding, cut noise, cut pollution and ill health – something that improved life for everyone, quite quickly, without the cost and disruption of new roads and railways. Well, we invented it 200 years ago: the bicycle.” [London Mayor Boris Johnson 2013]
Using local census data and surveys, you find out that the U.S. is actually quite bicycle friendly. Sixty percent of households own bicycles. 46% of county residents take the occasional bike trip for pleasure. Almost 65% of people would ride if there were better bicycle infrastructure.
Those numbers mean the U.S. has an outstanding bicycle culture. 60%, 46%, and 65% drive that point home. But if culture really was that important, isn’t it astonishing that North America never developed the same biking success and general health outcomes many of the European cities did? Why did cycling never boom in North America the way it did overseas?
Turns out that isn’t true. The U.S. had at least five eras called Bicycle Craze or Bike Boom.
1819: “The Dandy Horse”
In 1817, the Draisine was invented in Karlsruhe, Germany. It became a hit in Europe, and only 2 years later, America picked up and adopted it as well. But in American cities, pedestrians complained, and the boom ended when municipalities basically outlawed them instead of providing infrastructure. This first bike boom was beaten down by municipal codes.
1868: “The Boneshaker” and the “Penny-Farthing”
Shortly after the first pedalcycles were invented in France and the U.K., they came to America. But it was the same story as before: there was no unique infrastructure provided, pedestrians complained, and city codes beat down this biking boom as well. This is because these vehicles weren’t ready for All-Ages-and-Abilities (AAA).
1890: “The Safety-Bicycle”
The first chain-based transmission system made the bicycle more accessible for everyone. An economic depression in 1896 pushed bicycles to the forefront. The Good Roads Movement also came about during this era. Of course, with the advent of the car, the American Automobile Association (the other AAA) took over the effort and started to push bicycles off the roads.
This is also the era of Katherine T. “Kittie” Knox and the racist League of American Wheelmen or League of American Bicyclists, which banned black membership between the years of 1884 and 1999.
1965: “The Schwinn Sting-Ray”
The Schwinn Company provided this bike boom, which resulted from good product engineering. Schwinn built a cool bicycle for children. When these children grew up, they took their love for bicycles with them into adulthood, buying Schwinn derailleur bicycles. At the height of the boom, in 1972, 1973, and 1974, more bicycles than automobiles were sold in the U.S. The boom was prolonged by the desire to have inexpensive transportation for recreation and exercise and the interest in reducing pollution. Eventually, the oil crisis ended, and the fossil fuel and automobile industries returned to their old advertising strength.
But coming back to the theme of “bicycle culture” here, to this very day, you will find mostly older men arguing for more bicycle infrastructure and mostly older women arguing against it. The reason can be found in this bike boom, which was again stopped by a lack of infrastructure. That is undoubtedly one reason why America’s “bicycle culture” is heavily tilted towards older men – which are the generation that grew up in the 1970s with the Schwinn bike – and maybe their sons. Their daughters, however, are mostly excluded.
The Twenty-First Century
The European bicycle boom has been continuing since the 1970s. Their bike boom has just more and more cities joining. Since 2005, several large and very congested cities have famously joined the ranks of cities with “bicycle culture.” All they had to do was to add bicycle lanes. We are talking about Paris, Seville, Berlin, London, and even Dublin, which are joining now. All are working on providing the necessary real bike lane network, quickly leading to the culture and numbers. The pandemic opened the eyes of many more European leaders to double down on the smart city approach, focusing on public and active transportation. The e-bike accelerated the push. It is now the best-selling EV out there. Way ahead of Tesla and BYD.
Even some U.S. cities have joined in over the years. However, the local jurisdictions – joined by C/CAG – are falling further and further behind. They are still adding highway lanes and actively pushing down ridership on local and regional Public Transportation (SamTrans and Caltrain). And now they are going after the county’s very few bike lanes so far.
During the pandemic, San Mateo County did ramp up its “Liveable Community” and “Quality-Of-Life” advertising but not the necessary infrastructure to support it. In reality city leaders have been working hard to beat down this version of a bicycle boom through the same old “Share The Road” nonsense, just with different names: “Bicycle Boulevard”, “Bike Route”, “Neighborway”, and totally new “Slow Streets”. These are just basically marketing campaigns.
And these are your typical San Mateo Democrats in a nutshell.
Infrastructure Eats Culture and Marketing for Breakfast
While the U.S. went through the 1970s oil crisis learning very little, the Netherlands took that particular bike boom and the oil crisis and rode it to people-centric success. They kept building better and better bicycle infrastructure, which was more inviting to children, girls and women of all ages.
You know you have the right “bicycle culture” once you see women, children and older residents riding their bicycles. However, the All-Ages-and-Abilities crowd (AAA) wants real bicycle infrastructure, and they never got it in the U.S., which is why female riders are almost a rarity in North America but totally normal in many European cities.
“Safety is much more likely to affect women’s travel decisions than men’s. Women of color are more likely to take safety into account when making travel decisions than White Non-Hispanic women.” [Berkeley Case Study]
Clearly, San Mateo is wrong
Calling out the missing “bicycle culture” by Mayor Rob Newsom and several of his council colleagues was wrong on so many different levels. We just looked at this from three different angles. We looked at U.S. research, we looked at European best practices, we looked for historical reference and there is absolutely no trace of evidence that “bicycle culture” is required to deserve “bicycle infrastructure”. It has always been the other way around. “Bicycle culture” without the support of real bicycle infrastructure is a very short-lived thing. Taking away infrastructure is a surefire way to beat bicycle culture down again. And maybe, just maybe, that is precisely what the Cities and County of San Mateo (C/CAG) are really trying to achieve, and the Humboldt Street bike lanes are just the first domino to fall.
Post.Scriptum.
One more thing from the Grand Jury Bicycle Safety Report, which made recommendations that C/CAG and its cities have ignored for over 22 years now.
The Grand Jury seems to think that San Mateo Democrats keep fighting off sustainable and healthy transportation because they don’t have the necessary input from bicycle advisory committees. Interestingly, the same San Mateo Democrats made the 101 Highway widening happen without input from any automobile advisory committee just fine and in record time. Apparently, local politicians and traffic engineers feel equipped to install 20 miles of complicated FasTrak HOV Express Lanes, but they require additional knowledge and expertise to draw a few simple bike lanes on a few simple streets.
But San Mateo’s love for creating more congestion is a story for another day.
- Infrastructure eats Culture for Breakfast – Strike One
- Infrastructure eats Culture for Breakfast – Strike Two
- Wikipedia: U.S. Bike Booms
- Guardian: bike lanes do not lead to gentrification
- Riding while black
- UC Berkeley: Why Don’t Women Cycle?
Editor’s Note: The views and opinions expressed in all blog posts are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Redwood City Pulse or its staff.
‘Theft by the state’: San Mateo County leaders warn of cuts without funding fixAugust 13, 2026 6:24 pm
