Ups and downs with urban cycling

This chapter explores the dramatic history of mundane urban cycling. The first section documents the overwhelming fall of, and defection from, bike practices around the world throughout the twentieth century. The second part gives ethnographic evidence of the distinction of being an urban cyclist, and the differences between cycling in a pro-cycling city such as Copenhagen and low-cycling cities such as London and New York. The third part investigates the quiet retaliation of bike cultures on the streets of western cities and in urban planning and mobility research.