Is walking better than biking? As I understand biking’s more efficient.
It depends. Expended energy/m is higher but space usage is much lower. For walking you arguably don’t even need a paved path while (non-sport) cycling needs a somewhat even surface and places to store and lock the bike. It’s not nearly as bad as with cars but even with cycling, space usage can become an issue in very densely populated areas; the Dutch don’t build massive bike garages because it’s cool (okay, maybe also a little of that) but because it’s a necessity.
If it’s near enough to walk, it’s usually better to just walk.
More people are happy to walk than bike, and getting hit by a bike is worse than getting walked into by another person
I guess it is because of the tires
I feel like the amount of wear I put on my shoes by walking a certain distance is higher than the wear on my tires when I bike that same distance
Is it though? Time for science, it’s the only way to tell for sure!
I put about 2000 miles on my boots before they need replacing. They cost around 200usd.
I’m pretty sure my tires last twice as long at least
Time to walk using tires instead of shoes.
Well, you can buy sandals made from repurposed, used tires.
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Save mother Gaia, go barefoot as goddess intended.
Walking is better because if you can walk it means stuff is close to you.
The bike’s production has a non-zero carbon footprint. A very small footprint, but one that is there nonetheless. The carbon footprint of walking is negligible in comparison.
Shoe production has a non-zero carbon footprint, especially with the vast majority of shoes being a “single use” product (i.e. not resoleable) and with a very limited amount of miles
I’m surprised by how fast I wear holes in my shoes from walking.
Not all shoes are so limited, you can buy shoes that have plenty of lifespan such as Brooks running shoes. I’ve put hundreds of miles on mine and they’re still in good shape. That being said with planned obsolescence and cheap manufacturing for fast turnover being prioritized, we end up with less reliable shoes.
Hundreds of miles? I’ve walked/run hundreds of miles on my ~$10usd shoes and they’re still holding together. I would expect a expensive pair to manage thousands or ten-thousands of miles.
That’s why I wrote “the vast majority”??
And hundreds of miles, before you throw away a pair of shoes, my… Look, that might mean much to a Northern American who drives everywhere.
“Hundreds of miles” is what I actually run each year, and then I get lots of hiking and just walking around on top of that. I guess I can measure my Redwings and Hanwag in tens of thousands kilometers each, and my Lundhags I could pass down if I had kids.
I’m not sure I was disagreeing with you in the previous statement. I haven’t thrown my shoes I’ve only put hundreds of miles on yet.
My point is that it isn’t exactly easy to find good shoes unless you invest a lot of money into them, especially in North America since we’re specifying locales. Most stores, even specialty stores, don’t carry custom-made or handmade shoes that are re-soleable. You could blame that on car-dependency, but it’s more likely due to an overall lack of understanding why one would need shoes that last much longer. People spend their money on cheaper, shorter-life shoes because they don’t have that much money to begin with.
I’m not sure I was disagreeing with you in the previous statement
Then don’t repeat things I explicitly mentioned, as if I said something else?
Also get better examples. Brooks break down as easy as Asics, Saucony, whatever. They are exactly the “single use” product I spoke about, making the shoe and clothing industry in general highly non carbon neutral, which was my point.
it isn’t exactly easy to find good shoes unless you invest a lot of money into them
Yes, it’s called the Sam Vimes “Boots” theory of socioeconomic unfairness.
You could blame that on car-dependency
I don’t blame that on anything but capitalism.
Considering the energy efficiency of cycling being much higher than walking, it more than makes up for it.
this is true, although they all round down to 0 when compared to car travel so past a certain point we don’t have to worry about it
Debatable, and largely depends on a person’s diet and some other factors like how much travel is getting done. If someone is fueling their biking (or walking) by flying in beef from the other side of the world, I think it is pretty safe to say that their carbon footprint is worse than a typical gas car, (because air travel and beef are just that bad) or if not that at least an electric car from renewables and ethically sourced materials. For everything else in between, we’d just be speculating and we’d have to factor in source and type of car fuel, and the source and type of additional food consumed by a cyclist where that “additional food” line lies exactly.
Controlling for diet, distance and purpose of travel, I think cycling virtually always wins over walking.
Bikes are actually greener than walking, because if you need to move, they allow you to have a greater daily range for a not much higher footprint (more efficient and 3 times faster).
What about production?
Embedded CO2 for a bike is like 100kg (that’s what 4 trees in your backyard absorb a year), which over a lifetime of 30 years is negligible.
You say negligible, but what you mean is negligible on a scale of the CO2 emissions we are used to. Human body CO2 emission is just as negligible on that scale.
Ill do some quick maths: According to the first source on google, an average human burns 3kcal/min walking and 5kcal/min biking at 15km/h, which is about 3x as fast as walking. Considering that, we arrive at a difference of 1.33kcal/min by walking instead of biking. Estimates suggest 1.3g CO2-equivalents per kcal for average consumption (much lower for vegans), so thats 1.73g CO2/min. 100kg CO2 for bike production would take 57,800min of walking, thats almost 963h. An average bike will probably be used more so I guess you are right and bikes are indeed more efficient than walking :D
CO2 emissions that fall within natural cycles in terms of scale, are negligible.
I agree, but the question at hand was not whether one or the other was negligible, but which is more efficient: walking or biking.
I responded to the wrong comment, sorry
It’s faster to make bikes than legs
It’s also really green if you die riding one in places where it’s completely unsafe to ride one like where I live. You eliminate your carbon footprint completely!
I was so excited to finally live in a city where I could actually ride a bike to work most of the year until I actually tried it.
Drivers are assholes, have no awareness of their surroundings, the rules of the road and they give zero shits.
Nope nope nope. I’ll walk to the train
I lived somewhere with trains half my life ago, it was very nice. I have no trains or buses or sidewalks or even a shoulder on the road. Just fast two-lane curvy backroads with a ditch on the side.
It’s not really the drivers’ fault, it’s the bad infrastructure that drives their behavior.
I’m talking about running stop signs, gunning it at yellow lights, not using turn signals, using turn signals but not turning, swerving into bike lanes and flinging open their doors without looking.
Infrastructure like protected bike lanes and robust public transit so fewer people feel the need to drive are great, but bad driving is bad driving.
#fuckcars
Even greener if the murderer in the car gets thrown in jail!
I can say the same about public transportation
But tanks are the perfect cure for traffic jam.
That’s clearly self propelled artillery.
SPGs are the ultimate commuter vehicle if you only need to move a couple of hundred metres.
worked well in tiannenmen square (:
The final cure to jaywalking is no man’s land.
Is c level a motorcycle or an e-bike? I’ve never seen an icon for an e-bike before, and if it is, I am loving the conciseness of the design. If not, there’s no way a motorcycle is better than a line bus right?
Just a bonus note from a Dutch guy, the text just below say lekker blijven likken, or: ‘just keep on licking’.
It’s probably ebikes, mopeds and motorbikes.
I’m sure there could be an entire tier list for 2 wheeled vehicles!deleted by creator
The missing S tier is a sedan chair being carried by 4 shirtless stud muffins.
Walking times four
tankies in shambles
Yeah let’s send Ukraine bikes
I unironically want to see bicycle infantry back. Would also be a nice thing to have for the individual soldier, as time in the open is far more dangerous than being hidden or in a fortified position.
Armored Trains! https://youtu.be/e_U2p-Ix2EU
This makes cars look to good.
The gap between trains and cars should be really wide.
But tank driving is a lot of fun.
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I think it’s probably referring to yachts rather than ocean liners.
Ocean liners are all but extinct. They’ve been supplanted by cruise ships which are utterly horrific for the environment.
What about boats with sails?
Sailboats shouldn’t be that bad considering what goes into their construction and that they don’t actively produce pollutants beyond whatever wears off your rope and I guess painting the hull every couple of years.
Boats put out more CO2 than cars. Water is more dense than air and friction of tires and rolling and etc. Boats are overall worse for the environment both on climate change and environmental damage.
This guy’s gonna drive his boat to work!
There isn’t a canal, inlet or fjord everywhere.
How is a moped better than a tram?
Edit: I mean for the environment, I’m sure mopeds are better than trams in other ways - like for doing tricks and making quick runs to the supermarket to get bread and milk
I read that as an electric bike originally but now I wonder if you’re right. Mopeds are definitely better than cars but I doubt they’re better than trams.
Where do the plague of SUVs and light trucks live in this scale?
hell or G
In real life, the system is screwed, and vehicles are not measured just by their energy consumption, but by their energy consumption compared to other vehicles of similar weight, so in the end there are heavy SUVs with much better ratings than compact cars.
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let’s push those yachts and private jets down a few levels while we’re at it.
Driving a tank to hell is probably a good idea.
Where do monster trucks lie on this scale?
Actually, serious question: How do most of you feel about car sports? Like if we managed to get a world where cars are not a necessity would vehicular sporting events also be purged? I’m not much of a race fan, but demolition derby and monster truck shows are fun.
The community is, I believe, about eliminating car dependency. Basically, it would be an ideal world if you don’t even have to consider owning a car to participate in society. Car racing is like the difference between mountain biking and riding a bike around for your commute. There are worse practices than racing cars.
Nah dude, care can be really cool toys! I fully support Nascar, demolition derbys, monster trush shows, old car collecting, etc.
I just don’t want cars to be the main way to go places, let alone the only one as it is in many places! It is bad economically, it is bad for people’s health, and it is bad for the environment. Using cars for entertainment though really isn’t an issue, nor is using them in situations where the alternatives don’t work as well.
The pollution impact is fairly small and a lot of innovation happens in those competitions that might end up in ordinary vehicles.
Motorsports are cool. And their contribution to pollution is negligible compared to wider vehicle use as well as more accountable.
