But if you bike at the gym, you're putting in double time, because you still have to commute somehow. If only they'd put some exercise bikes on the bus...

There are risks in everything we do. The question should be, in the aggregate, what is it we accomplish?

Stationary bike is my primary form of transportation.

Note to City lawmakers, from the report:

the city would be much safer if it paid more attention to "simple things that don't require a lot of money or time."

For example, 20 percent of injury crashes requiring medical attention were reportedly caused by poor roadway conditions. Streetcar tracks, wet leaves, loose gravel and slippery steel plates were cited most often.

If you're a dude, bikes can also damage your urethra, your nuts, and the main nerve to your penis (the same one that sometimes gets severed or damaged during a bad prostate surgery).

50 percent of all crashes involve a bicycle alone (curbs, railroad tracks).

90 percent of all bicycle accidents happen in darkness/night.

Only 17 percent are bike-car.

Soylent Green is people

At this time of year biking in Seattle, what I worry about most are all the dead leaves filling up the bike lanes. Once they get wet they're super slick.

Did you actually read the whole article? OHSU counted even the most minor injuries in their report. I think I'll keep riding my bicycle despite the horror of a one in five chance I'm going to fall and get a scrape within a year.

When I rode I feared leaves more than anything, more than snow. I used to ride in the snow all the time. Leaves, no way.

You know what's really dangerous? A sedentary lifestyle.

Maybe if they would wear some freaking helmets down there, it wouldn't be so bad.

@ 13, I wnat an exercise bike powerd everything. I wish I could power my car with my bike. I know that sounds like I should just make a Flint Stones car but I like the idea of getting to work not sweaty but still being green and fit.

Sure, riding bikes is dangerous. But riding a bike feels so god-damned good I'll keep doing it as long as I'm able. At least there is a huge attendant health benefit, as opposed to other dangerous things people do without thinking, such as drinking and smoking.

By the way, Fnarf, I disagree with you re: leaves vs. snow. Leaves are usually pretty easy to avoid, and it's easy to avoid falling even when you have to ride through them. Snow and the ice that often comes with Seattle snow, not so much. It's everywhere and impossible to avoid. I learned this during "Snowpocalypse." It was hard to trundle along at 4mph, even on the deserted residential streets I was sticking to.

my head is all itchy, i think it's because im old and the hair is falling out

@16, stacks of leaves make almost frictionless layers of sliding surfaces. The slip you should worry about isn't your tire on the top leaf; it's the top leaf sliding across the one below it. Just deadly.

Snow is easy to cycle in, especially if its been compacted by traffic (get off those deserted streets!) Snow actually makes ice safer; bare ice is of course really, really bad. Snow itself isn't hardly slippery at all if you have knob tires.

I bought a used lifecycle on craigslist 5 years ago for 350$ Still got it, still works great, lost alot weight with it and gained a bit back. No need for a gym membership.

Its just like owning a gun in the house. The odds that you will be injured with that gun, substantially rise, just like it will rise if you peddle out in traffic. Buy a swimming pool, never mind the fact that the odds jump that you may drown in it one day.

What makes cycling more interesting, is the fact that most people will be peddling behind cars, so theyre getting a direct hit with car exhaust from the tailpipe. Not good for your lungs, basically cancels out any health benfits you might get from the exercise.

@5 That is a myth. You need to cite an example or evidence if you are going to say things like that. This is a classic myth that is another reason why people won't ride bikes that does not hold up. Please knock it off.

@15 - Exactly. Case closed.

Exercise bikes on a bus: it's been done. http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/11/…

So if you don't bike, what are your chances of getting a minor injury: cut, scrape, etc. I once fell on my ass getting out of my freaking car. Should I give up riding in cars too? I'd stay at home, but there was that time I cut my finger making a salad...

I broke my elbow walking.

Wait. I thought Portland was America's model biking city. And even Portland isn't doing enough for bicycling?

Just how fucking much do bicyclists want? How much?

@20: That's a myth? Seriously? I had thought it was well established that certain types of seats could cause sexual problems. And all this time I haven't been biking... wow, more information on this please?

@18 - Agreed. One of the two wrecks I've had that required hospitalization involved a left turn on top of wet leaves. It wasn't even a tight turn, either. Might as well have been on sheer ice.

@26- The only research I ever saw that showed anyone's willy being damaged by bicycling was study of freeriders, the guys who jump off 15 ramps and do double backflips and such. The bruise the living crap out of their taints and it does indeed take some of the stiffness out of Mr. Stiffee.

Now a poorly adjusted seat can put your tallywacker to sleep, but just like your leg it wakes up again. You could kill The Bishop of Cuntingham by sitting on your bike seat for many hours without ever standing, but no one ever does that.

Seats with the "love canal" (some brand actually calls it that) cutout or grove can prevent this, but proper seat adjustment will do the trick even with smooth seat for most people. The whole grooved seat thing is basically marketing.

Lance Armstrong rides a bike four hours a day for decades and father's children like a rabbit with an immortality complex even with half the sperm of a normal man.