How bicycling is building a better future (and already is worth $1.4B annually to Iowa)
I spent part of my weekend at a pair of events that reminded me of the power of two-wheel culture and how Iowa plays a central role.
I know it feels as if consensus opinions keep dwindling in the public square as everything becomes a bitter litmus test for partisan allegiance.
One of the last things I’d like to think we can agree on: Bicycling is the ideal form of transportation.
I didn’t say it was the most prevalent. Technically there may be more bicycles worldwide than automobiles (perhaps 2 billion compared to 1.4 billion), but if you’re reading this the car probably is what literally drives your daily life.
This isn’t the Netherlands, where 99% of residents own a bike.
I also didn’t claim bicycling to be the most consistently thrilling ride. I’m sure two wheels usually don’t top parasailing or hang gliding; I have yet to try those options—like most people.
But then that’s part of the egalitarian magic of bicycling: Nearly anybody can get on a bike of some sort. It’s the sweet spot where utility, a sense of freedom, accessibility, and carbon neutrality align in one elegant, classic design.
Bicycling is the sweet spot where utility, a sense of freedom, accessibility, and carbon neutrality align in one elegant, classic design.
I’m waxing poetic on bikes because over the weekend I attended a pair of events that reminded me what a powerful bike capital Iowa has become in the last half century.
The Iowa Bicycle Coalition’s annual expo took over the main convention hall in downtown Des Moines, followed by an afternoon banquet and silent auction.
The coalition, founded in 2007 to promote and advocate for the bicycling community, staged its own banquet because this year the Register’s Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa (RAGBRAI) moved its route announcement party to the suburbs and into the flashy new Vibrant Music Hall in Waukee.
RAGBRAI, as you may know, is world’s largest, longest, and oldest bicycle touring ride, founded in 1973. Each January it unveils a new route that, during the last full week of July, winds through small towns from the Missouri River to the Mississippi.
I suppose this split between the coalition and RAGBRAI, with two events a dozen miles apart on the same day, shows that bicycling can’t always bring everybody together. But I also took it as a sign of the sector’s overall growth: Both the banquet and announcement party seemed full of enthusiasts eager for summertime’s warmer temps and rampant opportunities to warble bad karaoke on bar patios.
One of the speakers at the coalition banquet, Ken Bryan, has spent 33 years with the Rails to Trails Conservancy. He outlined progress on the coast-to-coast Great American Rail-Trail—3,700 miles connecting 159 different trails across 12 states, from Washington to Maryland and running through Iowa.
Fifty-five percent of the trail already exists, with $161 million funding another 125 miles currently under construction.
“Think of it as an interstate highway system … for bicycles,” Bryan told the audience, with 50 million Americans living within 50 miles of the trail.
That’s not only a powerful recreational transportation artery but a symbol of the continuing rise of the bicycle.
The coalition’s lineup of speakers emphasized some of the main ways these simple machines improve our everyday lives.
Kittie “Miss Kittie” Weston-Knauer, 76, is the nation’s oldest woman racing BMX bicycles and is backing construction of an indoor track for year-round riding. Years ago I had a blast spending time as her narrative coach for a bicycling-themed storytelling event.
“I will be riding a bike of some sort for forever and a day,” she told the coalition crowd.
In my experience, this just-keep-pedaling mindset is catching on with more riders, and technology is swooping in to support them. Coalition Executive Director Luke Hoffman noted from the stage how e-bikes—initially disdained by many diehard cyclists—have become mainstream and more affordable and reliable. Sleek new models are enabling more aging riders to stay in the saddle longer and more safely. Or take Adaptive Sports Iowa, a wonderful organization showing how bicycling is within reach of more body types than you may realize.
Another speaker: Dr. Richard Deming is director of his namesake cancer center at MercyOne in Des Moines and founder of the Above and Beyond Cancer nonprofit. He’s also one of the most compassionate and generous Iowans I’ve encountered in my two-wheeled travels. Deming highlighted bicycling’s health benefits. It’s “the elixir of life,” he said, as part of daily exercise that reduces risks for eight different cancers.
On the topic of keeping bicyclists healthy, there also was much discussion at the banquet about the coalition’s longtime support for a “hands-free driving law” that may be poised for passage this year at the Iowa Legislature to help reduce distracted driving and car-bicycle accidents.
But here’s what really motivates the masses: money.
As part of the coalition’s work, Hoffman contracted Rob Moore of Scioto Analysis in Columbus, Ohio, for a new study of bicycling’s economic impact in Iowa. It was badly needed considering the last major study dates to 2012.
Moore and his team vacuumed in a range of data, including a 2022 study by People for Bikes, a new bicycling survey, and information from the U.S. Census, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Bureau of Economic Analysis, and other sources.
The splashy topline figure is $1.4 billion in annual economic impact for recreational bicycling in Iowa.
Contributing to that total: Even the average casual bicyclist spends $900 annually, while a dedicated commuter contributes $4,700.
The Des Moines-Ames corridor itself boasts an estimated 250,000 bicyclists supporting 6,300 jobs.
If it was considered an industry, bicycling in Iowa would rank in the top 50.
Big Ag, meet Big Bike.
It took a couple of generations to get here, as unused rail lines gradually were replaced by rec trails and RAGBRAI grew into a global example of how a zany ritual welcoming everybody may be the best answer for sustained rural tourism.
This year’s RAGBRAI rolls from Orange City to Guttenberg—406 miles and one of the flattest, easiest routes in the history of the ride.
Once again I’ll be sharing the road with my dear friends in Team Groucho/No Pie Refused—a gaggle of public radio journalists, dentists, and others from around the nation. I’ve ridden RAGBRAI since 2011, and other states (Nebraska, Georgia, etc.) host their own annual rides.
But you don’t need a giant cycling circus to hit Iowa’s growing trail network of more than 2,000 miles on any given day.
You also don’t need to wait for the warmup: The 48th annual BRR (Bike Ride to Rippey) embarks Feb. 1 from downtown Perry no matter the weather.
Doesn’t that $1.4 billion in annual economic impact feel all the more real when you consider how some Iowa bicyclists will stop at nothing to get in a ride?
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