One aspect of Copenhagen was highly evident from the moment we arrived: Copenhagen has a huge bicycle culture. It’s a real bike city but much more organized and orderly than Amsterdam. In Amsterdam, it somewhat felt like we were taking our lives in our hands every time we went out in the city, due to the bicyclers. In Copenhagen, they have over 240 miles of designated bike lanes. Copenhagen bikers not only use the bike lanes, they seemed to almost always follow the rules of the road, such as stopping for red lights and stop signs, using hand turn and hand stop signals, staying in the correct lanes, wearing helmets and other gear, etc.

We understand that Danes associated bicycles with freedom back in the 1960’s. There was also a convergence of issues including the oil crisis, the environmental movement, and some controversial road projects during the 1960’s and 1970’s. The Danes freedom of the bicycle got infused with progressive city planning and backlash over the city’s growing sprawl of roads. One result was to make initiatives by the city to make cycling modern and cool. They added bike lanes, established marketing initiatives including billboards and online advertisements, and put a real focus on wellness and health.

Today in Copenhagen, cycling is a real part of the culture. Biking is for everyone. It’s not just being done by people who can’t afford cars or those strictly in the core area of downtown. It’s become a first choice as a mode of transportation. Cyclers include all strata of society in terms of wealth, all occupations from business people to laborers, families and kids, and cycling is done at all times of the year and in all sorts of weather from sun to rain to snow.

Our hotel is in the first photo, the Phoenix. You can see that as soon as we stepped outside, we needed to be aware of cyclers as much as cars. The cyclers reminded me of our electric vehicles, in that often times I couldn’t hear them coming. But it was clear that cycling is a common means of commuting to work.

The bridge in the second photo is for cyclers and pedestrians, each with their own lanes of travel. The third photo is the other end of this bridge, which runs into the harbor area.

I was surprised that for all the bikers in Copenhagen, it never seemed like overwhelming numbers of bikers at any one time. But I have included the last two photos to show that at some point, a lot of bikers are out on the roads. The fourth photo was taken in a major shopping area of the pedestrian mall. The last photo was taken in an old industrial area. I’m not sure what the area is used for today but a lot of people get there by bicycle. The parked bikes just go on and on.