Speaking of civilized, we recently visited Vancouver, British Columbia for a combo business/pleasure trip. We navigated the city for 5 full days mostly by foot, bicycle, and public transit (and the occasional taxi.) Compared to San Francisco, the weather sorta sucks (which says a lot if you know SF) but Vancouver makes San Francisco look ***archaic*** when it comes to transit. They really have it figured out.

Now I realize that everything has recently been spruced up for the 2010 Winter Olympics and a wave of over-investment has Vancouver brimming with enjoyable public assets. We never had to wait more than 2 minutes for a bus or train and the city is immaculately clean (presumably because of all that rain) but what really impressed us the most was how the city was set up for bikes.

First of all, Vancouver is ringed by Seawall paths for pedestrians and bikers, who are mostly separated from car traffic and each other. You can loop around Stanley Park (their Golden Gate Park) counterclockwise and not worry about other bikers or infringing on pedestrians. If you ride into downtown, you'll notice that car traffic is rather light (comparatively to any other city I've visited) and bikers get respect like they do in Portland, Oregon.

They've also created the coolest dedicated bike lanes I've ever seen. They exist on main downtown drags are lined for 2 directions, but together (as opposed to opposite sides of the street) while protected from the automotive traffic by planters. With the right gortex, I expect this is the most expedient and hassle-free way to navigate the city throughout the year. Why don't more cities have these kinds of bike lanes? (well, I know they were expensive and there was more resistance than you might think.)

The main bridges going into the city are ride-able but not with bike lanes. No worries... just jump on the ferries. We rode down to a cute little ferry to get to Granville Island, but you can bike aboard ferries going in every direction. They even have bike racks on the seaplanes. Just kidding.

We never got around to investigating the bike locker / shelter / rack scene but I think I remember seeing bike lockers at a Skytrain Station. Our rentals came with these cool german bike locks that I think I want to get for our bikes here at home. They are foldable bars and are easy to clip to your bike frame and are very strong.