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I lived for a couple of years in Amsterdam. Cycled fine in the rain, snow or sunshine. Then again, the infra was amazing and supportive. Can’t speak for the cities you mention though but in Phoenix where I live now, cycling in Summer is impossible.

discuss

shagie|3 years ago

How many days does it snow and how much?

Compare https://www.weather-atlas.com/en/netherlands/amsterdam-clima... and https://www.weather-atlas.com/en/illinois-usa/chicago-climat...

If you get less than an inch of snow a month and it doesn't stay long enough to go through thawing and freezing cycles, then bike infrastructure can handle it reasonably well. If you get a foot of snow at times and the snow you get in November hasn't melted by March, then bike infrastructure and the safety of riding bikes on segments of road that are difficult to plow, biking in the winter may be more problematic.

I'd suggest a trip up to Minneapolis, Madison, or Chicago in January and consider how bikeable those areas are and if it would be reasonable to do a commute.

(And as an aside, I don't consider those areas to be AI drivable in the winter either)

lelandbatey|3 years ago

Deeply freezing temperatures, ice, snow, all of those are completely ridable on bicycles, but you have to ride with very fat tires, often called "fatbikes"[0]. You can ride those bicycles in just about anything; I've ridden them across frozen lakes and up chunks of frozen glacier in the dead of the Alaskan winter, so cold roads don't sound particularly scary. If you want to have a single bike that you can ride in any weather very easily, an electric "fatbike"[1] makes for a super versatile single-person car replacement.

[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatbike

[1] - https://www.radpowerbikes.com/products/radrover-plus-electri...

AlotOfReading|3 years ago

It's worth noting that the nearby city of Tucson is a cycling mecca for pros during the offseason and many avid cyclists continue riding throughout summer. If Phoenix were better designed for the climate it's in (e.g. dense, narrow streets between high thermal mass buildings and lots of shade), the summers would be far less intense.