Why Bicycle Commuting Is Risky Business In India
Cycling here isn’t for the fainthearted
Introduction
There has been great innovation and development over the past few years in the cycling space. Not just in racing bikes, but in the average commuter cycle as well. Hybrid cycles with thin lightweight frames, better gear ratios that strike a perfect balance between speed and pedalling effort, double disc brakes, easily attachable lights and horns, easily adjustable seats, better suspensions, and detachable tires with easily removable tire tubes are some of the ways the modern day cycle strikes a massive gulf of difference between its rickety old world counterpart; heavy old metal contraptions with non detachable parts that rusted easily, bad gear ratios or no gears at all, and difficult to change chains and tyre systems that made it incredibly hard to reach anywhere without working up a sweat. We even have pedelecs these days, so one needn’t even be a fitness enthusiast to take up cycling.
However, with the development and innovation in cycling technology, there should have been a simultaneous improvement in cycling infrastructure as well. Alas! Only a handful of cities in the world can boast off dedicated cycling lanes and complementary infrastructure for cyclists, where they can seamlessly switch from one mode of transport to another, and can peacefully pedal away on seggregated lanes without the fear of being knocked down by motor vehicles from behind.
This discrepancy between innovations in cycling tech and lack of infrastructure to use said tech is the cause of lots of frustration, disappointment, and anger for environmentally conscious cyclists who would like to reduce their daily carbon footprint by commuting everywhere solely by cyles. I’m one of those — or rather used to be — one of those people.
It seems that a lot of people who have no connection to the ground realities of cycling keep touting the benefits of it online as well as offline. Just like vegan activists, these are business or IT executives who work on the weekdays and indulge in outreach programs over the weekend to spread awareness amongst the public regarding the health and environmental benefits of cycling, and the urgent need to transition to sustainable and environmentally friendly means of transport. And trust me, I’ve tried it.
It worked well for a year and a half because my home and office, both were located on the outskirts of the city in close proximity to each other and the population was a fraction of what it is today. We’re talking about 2013 here when my city was just developing and all these software companies were busy setting up shop in the tech corridor propelling us into the status of ‘The Silicon Valley City of India’ today.
After having a good run for about a year and a half, I had to ultimately drop cycle commuting because the city had expanded significantly and my office had shifted towards the interiors of the city where the bulk of the traffic was concentrated. Being a suburbanite for so long (7+ years), I knew I wouldn’t stand a chance cycle commuting through the chaos of the city with my anxiety, trying to wiggle through dozens of motorbikes, cars, autorickshaws, buses, lorries, trucks, and other industrial vehicles every single day. I tried cycling to the new office in the initial days of the shifting but just couldn’t keep up due to the sheer inconsideration and disregard motorists had for cyclists, who considered us nothing more than pond scum. I would arrive at the office completely exhausted and worn out, in no mood to take on any kind of demanding work for the next half hour or so, which was used solely used for rest and recovery from the rush hour madness.
Motorcyclists cutting me off and almost making me topple while joining/exiting service roads, buses side swiping me at bus stops as they veered into the third lane, almost getting spit on by bus commuters/motorcyclists while filtering past vehicles at signals, and almost getting knocked off by autorickshaw and taxi drivers were the order of the day. You had to be really thick skinned to be able to cycle inside the city.
Besides these, a few more vexations gnaw away at the peace and sanity of cyclists in Indian cities:
People don’t expect you to go as fast a bike
This point applies to the ones riding those extremely lightweight imported cycles, or locally manufactured cycles which have implemented the same kind of tech. You know what I’m talking about. Those cycles that come in road, hybrid, and mountain bike versions. Since these aren’t commuter cycles, and are more meant for distance cycling and racing, pedestrians on Indian roads just don’t anticipate you riding that fast. On more than a dozen occassion I’ve had to panic brake to prevent myself from crashing into a motorcyclist who abruptly cut me off or a pedestrian gaily crossing the road.
These imported cyclists, which can cost as much as a motorcycle or scooter in India, are incredibly lightweight and can go ridiculously fast especially on downhill sections of roads. On one particular instance I almost crashed into an old lady who began crossing the road right after she saw me riding towards her. This is because pedestrians and motorists aren’t used to seeing cycles do motorcycle kinds of speeds here in India. It’s a fairly new thing. This is why motorcyclists cut you off while changing lanes or making a turn. They just aren’t expecting you to ride that fast.
Provided there is no traffic, one can zip around the city using a lightweight hybrid cycle without shedding bucketloads of sweat as opposed to regular cycles which are extremely heavy, have no gears (most of them), and are very difficult to maintain and maneuver. This is why many people who purchase imported cycles are also into long distance recreational cycling over the weekends as these machines can carry you for great distances without letting you feel all the aches and strains in your body that a regular commuter cycle would.
When an imported cycle is going to cost as much as motorcycle, then I’d might as well use it like one, right? Some of cycling buddies literally kept aside a second cycle for long rides. So they purchased a cheap one for the daily commute and a high-end model for recreation. But not me. I didn’t have that kind of money back then.
A pic from one of the many weekend recreational rides I did back in the day to the countryside:
(Back in the day = 2013–2016, thereabouts.)
Bad roads, potholes, and everything else
Bad roads and potholes are everywhere and for every class of vehicle, but it’s worth mentioning that cyclists are forced to bear the major brunt of these hazards along with the rest of the civic apathy and neglect.
Why?
Because for one, most potholes are found on the road shoulder and third most lane. And two, cycle suspensions are way smaller than those of motorized vehicles and aren’t efficient enough in insulating the rider from the shock of deep potholes when ridden over at high speeds.
The leftmost side of the road is usually the most dangerous and neglected part of road in India, and it’s where all the potholes usually lie. Whether it is large mounds of sand formed from dried up dust after a rainy spell, waterlogging, loose gravel, stones and glass pieces scattered all over by passing vehicles, garbage, carcasses of dead animals like dogs or birds (no kidding!), torn tyre parts, and metal debris, they’re all found only on the thirdmost lane in India, the one cyclists are forced to ride in.
Worse, we cannot go around any of these obstacles even if we wanted to as we could get hit by one of the vehicles coming from behind. Also, some drivers pass dangerously close to us, almost touching us. So we are forced to knead through the sand mounds like kneading dough for cake, give our bodies a rattling over the unavoidable potholes, or get some dirty water splashed on the lower body by riding through puddles big and small.
Cycling in India isn’t stressful. It’s life threatening!
Sometimes mini sand mounds accumulated on the side of the road (from dried up rain water and industrial vehicles) appear all of a sudden, and you are forced to ride over it at speed for fear of suddenly stopping and getting knocked over by a motorcyclist from behind. Most often these sand mounds contain only fine sand and nothing else to offer additional grip or friction to our tyres, and this makes us skid and fall in the process. Luckily, I’ve never skidded or fallen on a sand mound before, but I’ve always crossed one with my heart in my mouth.
Actually tackling the sand mounds is quite doable when you’re on a hybrid cycle or MTB. It’s road bike users with their dangerously slick tyres with minimal threads who need to watch out while crossing them.
Dark unlit stretches of road and the dangers of night-time riding
Come night time and many stretches of main roads as well as interior roads are poorly lit, dark, and dangerous to commute. And this is true for any class of vehicle. Not having a significant source of illumination and being out in the open only adds to the danger and risk factor as you’re not only susceptible to human hazards but roads hazards as well. Even though it was pretty safe to step out in the night back in the day, I’ve always crossed the most dark and desolate areas of my city with a prayer on my lips and a burst of energy in my legs. Today, to even cycle commute alone in the night along a dark lonely stretch is asking for trouble.
Yes, many cyclists do install lights on their handlebars to illuminate the road ahead as well as tail lamps to be visible to motorists from behind, but they are no match for the blinding high beams of cars, buses, and trucks.
Due to the dimness of cycle lights, the high beams used by all classes of vehicles in the night because of insufficient street lighting, and the subsequent night blindness caused due to it, cyclists are more prone to accidents and collisions during the night.
If we were purely a blind spot hindrance to motorists during the day, then we were literally invisible to them in the nights. Many cyclists have been knocked down because a motorist “couldn’t see” them approaching.
Impatient motorcyclists
Motorcyclists ride with a primal mindset in India. Anyone in front of them not keeping up with traffic ahead must be honked out regardless of whether theirs is a motorized vehicle or not. Bikers and scooterists can’t tolerate waiting behind cyclists even for a second after the signal turns green and they’re in a mad scramble to clear it before the next red. They honk at us incessantly before finally realizing that we’re cyclists and aren’t going to get moving anytime soon. Since cyclists can pick up speed from a stopped position only very gradually, this makes motorists irate and furious that they have to go around us, especially during the dreaded rush hours.
“You’re slowing down traffic for everyone. Why can’t you be normal and commute to work by bike like everyone else?”, some of them would yell.
Others would call us entitled and elitist for riding imported cycles, fully decked up in helmets and cycling jerseys, as they themselves zipped by in expensive cars and bikes.
My cyclist buddies have, in the past, received many such sarcastic and condescending remarks from motorists in the heat of the moment. For all the praise and adulation we received at the office for being able to ride all the way to work and then give our 100% there, we knew that insults and abuses menacingly lay in wait for us at the end of the day when it was time to ride back home again in rush hour traffic, with frenzied swarms of motorcyclists all hellbent on pushing us out of their way.
Vehicles parked on the third lane and backtrackers
I feel Tibo’s video encapsulates this the best:
The video link is timestamped to explain this particular point.
Poorly designed entry and exits to service roads and flyovers
Indian cities are notorious for having badly designed roads. Of course, this differs from city to city. But in my city of Bangalore the entry and exit points to service roads, flyovers, and underpasses are very badly designed.
For one, there’s no proper signage indicating which one’s for entry and which is for exit.
Two, neither are they angled in such a way that suggests either an entry or exit.
And three, the approach to the entry/exit is very short and abrupt, leaving absolutely no time for vehicles on either side to check if another vehicle is approaching it until the very last minute, causing them to panic break in the process.
These three factors coalesce to create the perfect storm; motorists using the break in the road for both purposes, entry and exit, unnecessarily creating chaos, confusion, and congestion everywhere. This has sometimes escalated to violent road rage and has been the primary cause of many accidents as well. These poorly designed entry/exit points leave very little room for motorists themselves, forget cyclists, to properly merge in with free flowing traffic on the main road without disrupting their flow. Cyclists are last in the vehicular hierarchy and are always forced to beg for space to move back into the road shoulder after merging onto or exiting main roads.
Sometimes you might get stuck in between two buses, trucks, or even two large SUVs who just don’t possess the patience to lay off the accelerator and wait for you to cross over to the shoulder of the road after merging from an intersection, service road, roundabout, or signal. They just want to step on it in a furious frenzy and get ahead at all costs because if they wait behind for a cyclist to cross over, another vehicle might cut them off and take their precious spot.
It’s a conquistadorial fight for space on Indian roads. If any of you have ever visited here, then you already know that.
Poorly designed drainage covers
In many cities, storm water drains are constructed alongside main roads to drain excess rain water and prevent flooding. However, the covering of some of these drains have been designed without keeping all kinds of road users in mind, with most of them having gaps in the metal gratings large enough for cycle tyres to fall through. And when these drain cover plates are installed in the same direction as the road running parallel to it, you have a recipe for disaster.
Since road bikes and hybrids have very thin tires, they manage to slip through the gaps of these metal gratings gravely injuring the rider and/or anyone following them from behind.
I’ve personally experienced this one myself. My hybrid cycle’s front wheel fell into one of these gnarly contraptions during a recreational ride in a park one Sunday afternoon. I flipped over and banged my left knee hard on the iron grating. It hurt like hell for a while. Luckily, this didn’t happen while commuting to work on the city’s main roads. It happened inside a park where motor vehicles aren’t allowed. If this incident happened on a main road while commuting somewhere alongside motor vehicles on a regular weekday, it would have ended very differently.
While narrating this experience, I had initially made the incorrect assumption that this was solely an Indian thing. But as I was scouting around for Indian news articles to link here, I discovered that this was a global phenomenon and many cyclists have fallen victim to it, including those living in developed countries like Singapore and the United States as well. One would be poised to believe that they would have at least got this right in developed countries, if not in developing countries like India.
Crazy huh!
Lack of seggregated cycling tracks
Seggregated cycling lanes don’t exist anywhere in the country for those who would like to travel to their workplace daily or commute around the city using a cycle. Cycle lanes do exist in posh pockets of certain Tier 1 cities, but they can be called ‘functional art’ at best.
There’s just two designated cycling tracks in my city. They’re very short and one’s not even seggregated from the road. The first one is located in the CBD area. It cannot be used for one’s daily commute as it doesn’t stretch for too long and there’s nothing of significace that falls on the route. It can be used for a recreational ride on a Sunday at best. Besides, even if a cyclist had some business to conduct in the area, they would have first commute on normal roads putting their lives at risk riding alongside inconsiderate and hooligan drivers just to use the cycling lane in the central business district.
It makes no sense to ride 10kms up and another 10kms down in heavy vehicular traffic just to use a 5 km long seggregated cycling lane located in a prominent area of the city.
There is no direct end to end connectivity.
“Open manholes, rampant encroachment, heaps of garbage, unauthorised places of worship and hawkers, amongst others, force pedestrians and cyclists onto the main road, where they come under the direct threat of rashly driven vehicles.”
The second one located in a posh neighbourhood of the city has all kinds of encroachments on it such as parked vehicles, construction debris, and garbage strewn upon it, with pedestrians and motorcyclists feeling entitled enough to use the cycling lane much to the dismay of the cyclists residing in the area.
Besides, even if lengthy cycle lanes did exist in certain prominent areas, where is the rest of the complementary infrastructure such as safe parking bays at metro stations and bus stands, rest areas, refreshment kiosks, shower rooms at offices, and sheltered pedestrian pathways leading from cycle parking bays to places of business, entertainment, and leisure?
This is why cycling to work remains to be a distant dream for Indians, and many potential cyclists are forced to either depend on unreliable public transport services, or use their personal motor vehicles to get to work like everyone else.
Climate change
The days of year round cool weather are frankly over. Bangalore, the garden city of India, used to be known for its cool salubrious weather all year round. Now its either too hot, too gusty, too rainy, or too hot and humid, which is usually what comes after the rainy. No one wants to cycle in wet weather, let alone commute to their workplace in such horrible sticky weather every single day. Everythings damp and wet by the time you arrive at the office and you’ve already worked up a runny nose.
Then you have extremely dry summers, unseasonal summer rains, and the monsoons, which cause waterlogging and flooding everywhere causing you to junk all your cycling plans and hop into a car, bus, or metro train like everyone else.
If we’re left with just 3 to 4 fair weather months in the year which are favourable for cycling, it comes as little surprise that fewer people are adopting it as a means of transport year after year.
The plain lack of respect
Tell me. Which institution respects cyclists in India?
Do hospitals respect cyclists?
Do malls respect cyclists?
Do banks do?
Do colleges and universities do?
Do parks and fitness centers do?
Do government offices do?
Do restaurants and hotels do?
Do hypermarkets and shopping centers do?
None of them do! We’re treated like an afterthought wherever we go. These institutions and the people working them are cruel, insensitive, and unsympathetic to the needs of cyclists. For starters, there’s no parking bays or any kind of cycling infrastructure installed in the premises of any of these institutions. Second, the staff working there haven’t been taught how to behave with cyclists, or where to direct them towards for parking and refreshments. Some institutions have designated cycle parking spaces, but no accompanying safety infrastructure. I can’t park my cycle there if I have nothing to lock it to, right? Then there are places where the cycle parking bay is located in the most uninviting space of that particular institution.
On one particular occasion I was asked to park behind a mall when I commuted there by cycle. The cycle parking was towards the very back of the mall near the loading docks which was quite a long walk from the main entrance. Consignments of goods and workers loading and unloading them from trucks isn’t the most ideal scene you want to witness entering a mall. Car and public transport users are greeted by art installations and gorgeously designed plazas with spacious walkways and landscaping. Cylists are greeted by container trucks and sweaty workers fighting at the top of their lungs with each other.
Then there are other places that don’t have designated cycle parking but you find a pole or other installation to lock your cycle frame onto, which makes it look very odd and completely out of place with its surroundings.
We’re treated like second class citizens no matter how expensive our bikes are or how glamorous our get-ups look.
It makes no sense to continue down a path where you are treated like an outcast and are villainized everywhere you go, when people coming to those very same institutions in huge SUVs and swanky sedans are bowed down to and afforded the utmost respect. Ushers opening doors for you, valet parking, priority parking, and vehicle cleaning services whilst you’re inside the mall are just some ways in which car users are treated like royalty everywhere.
Rising cyclist fatalities on Indian roads over the years
Last but not least is the rising number of cyclist fatalities over the past few years.
As the city developed and personal wealth soared, so did the number of cars on the road and the consequent overspeeding and rash driving. Many cyclists have lost their lives to overspeeding vehicles on Indian highways and city roads alike over the past few years.
This has acted as a very strong deterrent to new cyclists looking to take up cycling for recreation or sport.
Please note that the above article is paywalled and is only linked here to highlight this particular point. It’s the only article with cumulative stats I could find.
But here’s one which does an in-depth analysis on the risks posed to cyclists on Indian roads:
Notwithstanding all the other deterrents to cycling on Indian roads, the sheer number of rising fatalities is one of the sole reasons why many long time cyclists including myself have dropped cycling and left the cycling community for good.
Imagine putting up with all the pathetic infrastructure, lousiness, and misbehaviour on the road only to meet your untimely end at the hands of a rash driver! So many cyclists have gone this way, unfortunately.
I just couldn’t keep my head straight at work whenever I cycle commuted. So I either had to look for a job closer to my house or drop cycle commuting altogether. I chose the latter. It was good while it lasted because like I said in the beginning, the roads were empty and my home and office were both in close proximity to each other in the most thinly populated part of town that was just developing.
Cyclists basically got split into 3 after traffic and climate change mayhem took over the city sometime after 2016.
The ones who decided to put up with the daily insanity and continued cycle commuting to work, those whose cycling aspirations got relegated to recreational rides over the weekends where they would ferry their bikes in cars/pickup trucks to the outskirts to cycle on rural countryside/jungle trails where traffic wouldn’t be a cause for concern. And three, people like me, who gave up cycling altogether.
Final Thoughts
Yes, cycling might help reduce traffic congestion and pollution, it might lengthen my lifespan, conserve resources, and all those wonderful things. But what good are all the benefits if the price to pay is life itself?
Why can’t I save the world and not die or lose a limb at the same time? Why must I be scared for my life every second on Indian roads? Why must I constantly watch my back as if I’m doing something that’s illegal or taboo? Taboo! Ah, that’s the word I was looking for. Ask any cyclist here and you are sure to be told how taboo it feels cycle commuting here. It’s like the entire system is inherently set up against cyclists and for motorised means of transport.
It’s terrifying to be a cyclist on Indian roads today, let alone a motorcyclist, because you never know when you’ll face your untimely end at the hands of a drunk, rash, or distracted driver.
Sorry. We can’t save the environment anymore.
We’re busy saving ourselves.
