Flashback Friday: Cycling in Nantes and #VeloCity2015 Conference

Like many parts of the world, Europe is starting to attempt some semblance of post-lockdown normality (even despite the ongoing Covid infection numbers…). In the cycling world, that meant another recent Velo-City cycling conference two weeks ago, in Ljubljana,

Flashback Friday: Cycling in Amsterdam – does it live up to the hype?

Pay attention to some of the debates that occur in the media comments sections about cycleways and at some point a naysayer is invariably going to say that “[NZ town X] is not like Amsterdam!” Ignoring the fact that a

Flashback Friday: Cycling in Utrecht

Happy Easter! I hope you’re managing to get in some bike rides to work off all the additional chocolate… It’s been an interesting week, not least because I managed to catch Covid. I’ve been pleasantly surprised that my symptoms have

Flashback Friday: Reflections on a Month in the UK

With all the recent Govt announcements allowing more easy travel in and out of NZ once more, it feels like the world has suddenly opened up again. People are talking about doing the travel they’ve had to postpone for the

Flashback Friday: Cycling in Bristol

Any time that someone claims their city is too hilly for lots of cycling (and conversely, that’s why everyone bikes in Chch…) I invariably think about all of the hilly cities I have visited around the world that somehow buck

Flashback Friday: Study Abroad – First Stop: London

Remember that thing called overseas travel? Long before Covid, it was a thing apparently… And back in my previous university job it was a regular thing to visit places overseas to check out their transport systems (call it a busman’s

Flashback Friday: Last stop Boston – and Reflections on US Cycling

As Covid omicron threatens to cause some mayhem across NZ, we often look with thanks that to date we seem to have avoided the worst outcomes as observed in places like the US. The US is an interesting place to

Flashback Friday: Interesting cycle stuff from New York

I’m still struggling to get many original posts out there right now – seem to be straight back into a busy workload for the year. So for now, another Flashback Friday will have to suffice, again returning to my North

Flashback Friday: Interesting cycle stuff from Washington DC

Back at my old university job, about this time of year I was often making the pilgrimage to the winter of Washington DC for a big annual transportation conference there. Remarkable to think that my last visit there was 5

Flashback Friday – Cycling in Madrid

The welcome news in the last day that Spain has come to the rescue with some additional vaccines for us brings to mind previous mutterings on this site about the cycling provisions over there.  Regular guest blogger Robert has been

Flashback Friday – Adelaide: Sharrows

They are fairly common nowadays across Christchurch, but it wasn’t that many years ago that sharrow markings on shared cycle streets were a new concept in the city. And at the time, we sought some inspiration from overseas places that

Flashback Friday – Adelaide: Frome Street Bikeway

Protected cycleways are becoming more the norm around Chch these days, even if the occasional one still stirs up a bit of debate. But we’re certainly not the only Australasian place to encounter these “controversies”. Back in June 2014 (when

Flashback Friday: Thoughts from Velo-City Global 2014 Adelaide

It’s hard to picture while Covid currently rages across Australia, but back in 2014 hundreds of people from around the globe descended on Adelaide to take part in the first instance of a global cycling conference happening down under.

Flashback Friday: Dealing with Cycling Safety in NZ

Concerns about the safety of cycling in NZ certainly haven’t disappeared in recent times, and sadly we still have a number of deaths and serious injuries occurring every year. Still, many of the current efforts in this space (including considerable

Flashback Friday: Cycling in the Netherlands

After a year in which most of us have been unable to do any overseas travel, it is nice to reminisce on opportunities in the past to visit interesting new places. Regular viewer Frank Dohmen (Cyclomaniac) provided a guest post

Flashback Friday – Guest Post: Impressions from a “tourist”

Seven years ago when I was still working at university, we were fortunate to be visited by a colleague and cycling expert from the UK, Prof John Parkin (I was very pleased to be able to return the favour when