Friday, August 17, 2007

Umeå living

The first thing you'll notice about Umeå is all the people biking, walking or in many diverse ways moving about by their own power. Yes, they use cars, but the bicycle is a very important means of transport. To support and encourage this the place is riddled with and surrounded by paths for bikes.

The use of bikes is so extensive that it has to be regulated. Now, Swedes don't need an excuse to regulate something, but here it's pretty well justified to put up some instructional signs.

This makes Umeå a good place for one of the more original biker organisations I have seen announced, the Vegan Bikers:

But this bikers paradise will disappear under heavy snow and low temperatures in a few months, and that's when I'll be very happy about certain architectural peculiarities at the University. They have walkways between a lot of the buildings, making it possible to walk over much of the campus without setting a foot outside.

But until then I am going to enjoy the outdoors here as much as I can!

3 comments:

Patrik said...

About winter time: You will find that there is a whole lot of biking going on also in the winter here. People use studded bike tires, and some bike bridges are even heated.

I hope you are enjoying summer as long as it lasts. Soon time for darkness and ice :) - excellent time for work, coziness and longing for summer...

Me said...

It looks like you have already caught some of our greater parts of Umeå! Welcome! I am looking forawrd to working with and gettting to know you better :-)

Torill said...

I have to admit that I can't even conceive of bikin in winter. I guess it has to do with the strong conditioning that winter biking would mean either struggling to get uphill, or sliding downhill. I think I'll rather look for some studs for my hiking boots, thank you.