Flower Power

It’s all about the bikes.

Bikes here, bikes there. Bike rush hour! In Soviet Netherlands, bikes take precedence over cars. Vaaaht a caahntry!

The daily ride from the hotel to the university, about 2 miles, is bike paths all the way.  Some roads go like this, in cross section:

  1. sidewalk
  2. grass median
  3. Northbound bike path
  4. grass median
  5. curb
  6. car parking lane
  7. Northbound car lane
  8. Southbound car lane
  9. car parking
  10. curb
  11. grass median
  12. Southbound bike path
  13. grass median
  14. sidewalk

Even in downtown Utrecht, bricked tight as any old-school European city, the bikes win.  Wide lanes on the sides of the street, and the cars have to fight it out for the middle.  A park right in the middle of where you need to go?  No worries, there’s sure to be a bike trail across it.

And no hills!  Nothing but flats.  But no glass on the road, so not that kind of flat.  Although always a headwind, or so they say.  I haven’t particularly noticed.

Check out the tornado-shaped plastic flower arrangement here at SRON, apparently made from discarded bike tubes.  With the talcum powder still on.  I love it!

Note to pedestrians:  The word “fiets” sounds like a cognate for “feet”, so you might think “fietspad” means footpath.  Wrong.  “Bike path”.  Really, that should be your first guess.  I’ve been here five days and haven’t been in a car yet.

It’s all about the bikes

2 Responses to “Flower Power”


  1. 1 ycycle

    I’ve wondered about that….here’s a continent that was around long before ours…well, with roads and people and such, and yet they seem to have space for cars AND bikes. You’d think we coulda got it right.

  2. 2 ycycle

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