[tapland]

I bike year round, from -25 to 25c. Schwalbe marathons tyres and their studded version in winter.

I slip on light windbreaker pants on top of the regular, regular winter jacket and gloves, a thin hat and a scarf.

What issues did you run into while trying?

[epivosism]

A large fraction of humanity is young or old. Like, >50% of people are not really safe to ride a bike on their own, let alone at -25C. There are people who can do it, but as a solution it lacks generality.

[cycomanic]

Are you serious? My mother is 72 and pretty much bikes everywhere. If you walk or bike around in many European cities you'll see people from 2-90 on bikes. Have a look a Videos from Finland where you see people of all ages biking around in sub - 10 C.

It's also hilarious how - 25 C is being brought up as not suitable for people to bike around. Like how many people in Europe/Northern America actually encounter these temperature even once (let alone regularly that it should determine our traffic policies). These are the same arguments that ICE car proponents make against electric cars, "I might want to make a cross country road trip once every 5 years and so every car with a range of less than 800km on a single charge is not suitable".

[ineedasername]

The level of risk your mother is willing to take with a body that can’t bounce back from injuries very easily does not generalize to an obligation for others to accept the same level of personal risk.

[kiba]

Sedentary behavior is in itself risk factors for dying. If you break your hip bones, then your health is going to spiral downward because you can't walk.

You need to load your body. A car takes load off of you.

[ineedasername]

Irrelevant. A person can stay fit without avoiding cars.

[oblio]

Yet in practice we're all getting fatter, especially so since cars took over.

I wish people here would just accept that on average people don't exercise.

[inferiorhuman]

Irrelevant. A person can avoid cars without increasing their risk for injury.

[epivosism]

I lived in Beijing for 10 years, where it regularly gets to -10 or -20C for a few months, and I did commute by bike through those winters, and it is extremely taxing and hard. I don't think you'll succeed in convincing more than say 20% of the population to do that in reality. If you think you have the power to convince more, please go for it!

[waveBidder]

20% is actually the trip fraction by bike that places like Amsterdam have, so that's actually what success would look like. it's one option many.

[epivosism]

Yes, I am. What percent of people have dementia or alzheimer's - it's at least 5-10% right? What about Parkinson's? What about cancer? What percent are not able to manage their own lives and need constant oversight (psychological, etc.) What percent are <10 years old? these are huge chunks of humanity.

[xrikcus]

The problem with that argument is that in places that are setup for it, it clearly works because people do it. So we have to ask whether there is something unusual about the people in those places, or the infrastructure. It apparently isn't something wrong with being young or old, within obvious limits.

[Aeolun]

My grandma at 90 still rides a bike. Not in -25 degrees I’ll grant you, but the range is larger than you think.