In Part 2 we ride through some of the worst weather we’ve encountered in the Netherlands, take some new shots of familiar locations, visit bike tunnels we missed last time, finally take some shots of turbo roundabouts, do some filming, and enjoy a little beach time as the weather finally warms up…

In past years on our Dutch trips, we’ve set out on a bit of a mission to see how far the bike network extends… And turns out it extended everywhere we went… This year would be a bit slower paced, enjoying a few cities and their surroundings within South Holland… There was no focus other than to once again enjoy the Netherlands, but there’s always things to see along the way that are worth sharing…

With a flight home out of Amsterdam, it would have been rude not to spend the last couple of days in the Netherlands, and after a few weeks in cities that still have a way to go in terms of bicycle infrastructure, it was so good to once again enjoy the ease of getting around the Netherlands by bicycle…

The final leg of our April 2024 trip takes us back to Utrecht, our favourite city in the Netherlands, for reasons I can’t fully explain. This time, we ride from Amersfoort and dive deeper into one of my favorite routes through the city. Along the way, we explore the usual highlights: protected bike lanes, bus rapid transit, bicycle streets, bike parking, and plenty of people getting around by bicycle, along with a few other interesting sights.

City of Bicycles, their claim, not mine, but it’s probably a fair one… Groningen has the highest mode share of people cycling anywhere in the world. We arrive in Groningen for Kings Night so expect some people getting around on bicycles while wearing a lot of orange, expect some bicycle scrambles, some back streets, and a few fast bicycle routes to neighbouring towns…

On this part of the trip we work our way across the north of the country, taking in some new locations to us, and seeing how far the good bike infrastructure extends north, beyond the mainland, and between small towns and cities as we head towards Groningen…

A historic and compact city north of Amsterdam, we explore many tiny streets, pedestrian streets, bicycle streets, amongst the usual protected bike lanes, people of all ages and abilities riding bicycles, tulips, windmills, and some very changeable weather…

Part 2 of the trip finds us back near Amsterdam, staying on the south side, discovering new bridges for active modes, ticking off the bike parkade, discovering a diverging diamond interchange, and… not kidding… a machine for cleaning flex posts….

Starting the 2024 Netherlands Trip in Den Bosch, we get over jet lag while exploring the centre on foot, some infrastructure highlights further out, ride to neighbouring Tilburg, and see a few innovative things I haven’t seen before along the way… There continues to be more lessons from the Dutch…

The final chapter of fietspad not only summed up the findings of that trip, it was the starting point to explore other Dutch ideas, beyond the protected bike lanes, protected intersections and continuous sidewalks that are already gaining traction.

Featuring the things that didn’t fit in a nice neat place of their own, from infrastructure to lifestyle, to simply nice or interesting photos I took along the way. There’s still a few stories to tell… It’s a long one…

Imagine a traffic signal that is aware you’re arriving on a bike and decides to adjust its timing to give you a green light without needing to stop. It doesn’t happen every time, but when it does, it’s quite special!

It might seem like nit picking, but what we call a street for bicycles is important, even more so if we can reflect that name in the signage and pavement markings, and maybe even convey the priorities a little better than a simple sharrow.

To date we’ve been doing them wrong in North America, or at least in the wrong places. Woonerf’s are most often found on residential local streets rather than commercial main streets in the Netherlands.

What it’s like to ride a folding bike straight from the airport, ride it relatively long distances, take it on the train, and even take it around the grocery store…