If women in Eugene are afraid of bicycling, it’s not immediately or visually apparent. Around campus, cool bikes have become functional and ubiquitous fashion accessories across the gender spectrum.
Still, on the national level, men out-bike women two to one. Even in Portland, which the League of American Bicyclists ranked “Platinum” for bicycle-friendliness, the Portland Mercury reports a gender gap of about 3 percent.
A recent article in Scientific American reports that women are an “indicator species” for bike-friendliness. In other words, you know you’ve gone platinum when you close that two-to-one gender gap. In the Netherlands, for example, where 27 percent of all trips are made by bicycle (compared to under two percent in the U.S.), 55 percent of riders
are women.
It seems obvious that cities where half of the population is half as likely to ride bicycles lack adequate infrastructure and outreach, but Scientific American writer Linda Baker notes a more complex trend. Statistically, women cyclists have different needs than their male counterparts.
When Jennifer Dill, a researcher at Portland State University, used GPS devices to track individual bicycle trips, she found that women were more likely to go out of their way to avoid traffic and use “bike boulevards,” “quiet residential streets with special traffic-calming features for bicycles.” Baker suggests that the typical woman’s activity load, which includes child rearing and grocery shopping, along with a propensity for risk aversion, accounts for gender differences in cycling.
While the emphasis on traditional gender roles in Baker’s article offends my personal aesthetics, she offers an honest, pragmatic approach to improving the bike-ability of our cities in this crucial era of reducing our reliance on gas-powered transportation. Even if gender norms are cultural constructions, instilled by the mass media while we are still too young to mouth the words “patriarchy,” or “dominant paradigm,” they nonetheless exist, and it pays to address them.
With this in mind, Janis McDonald, who works at the City of Portland Office of Transportation Options, started a “Women on Bikes” program to teach classes and host city rides that empower women to use alternative modes of transportation.
“I want to make it a viable option for women to use bicycles for transportation and recreation,” she said. In five years, McDonald has seen over 600 women participate in the program, increasingly from older demographics. Women-only bike maintenance classes are especially popular for their comfortable, social atmosphere.
“(The women) feel like they can ask the ‘silly questions,’ that are keeping them off their bicycles”— basic safety and mechanical questions which, added McDonald, “aren’t really silly at all.”
For McDonald, the program works in two directions: using women to inspire bicycling as alternative transportation, and using bicycling to inspire women. “What I’ve seen is that the program builds confidence in women, not just on bicycles but in other aspects of their lives,” she said.
Our own Briana Orr, coordinator of the University’s young and wildly popular bike loan program (55 bikes out now, with a waiting list of 160), was somewhat hesitant to advocate for bicycle infrastructure and outreach aimed specifically at women.
“My first reaction to the article was: Well, women can handle the road just as well as men can.” Still, she said, “It’s different when you take into account the element of small children and the diverse needs of men
and women.”
Regardless of gender roles, Orr said, cities can benefit from city planning aimed at beginning cyclists. “You’re really trying to get those people who are on the fence,” she said. “Man or woman, they all have safety concerns.”
A more telling “indicator species” for bike friendliness, Orr said, is children. “If kids are comfortable, then anyone can be,” she said.
Ultimately, the Scientific American article is a reminder that doing things “for women” can benefit everyone. It’s not favoritism to create policy and infrastructure that empowers whichever half the population happens to look after children, grocery shop, and worry about personal, bodily safety more. It’s just smart.
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