David Godin writes:
This is David Godin from Vancouver and I’m writing this to you on my Blackberry while standing on a busy street corner next to Amsterdam Centraal Station. I am using free wifi that I’m stealing from someone’s apartment, furiously sending off email and I made sure you were on my list.
… In Rotterdam I hired a bike and spent seven hours exploring the city. Wow. We have so far to go in Vancouver to even approach the quality of the bike infrastructure I’ve experienced so far. After Amsterdam comes Copenhagen, Berlin and Frankfurt.
My hostel in Amsterdam is on a canal boat, comfortably close to the absolute central part of the city, but mercifully removed from the unique qualities of the red-light district. I’m a five-minute walk from a huge, gorgeous modern public library with hundreds of free internet computers and five minutes again from the central train station and the heart of the city.
SO MANY BICYCLES!
I cannot believe how many there are here. Nothing could have prepared me for the sight of, literally, thousands of bicycles in my field of view when I walked out the front door of the train station. Every single surface has bicycles locked to it, often two deep. It’s like the tide receded and left a ring of bicycles tenaciously clinging like barnacles to every surface.
To my left in my field of view from where I am standing is a canal with easily 100 metres of bicycles all parked side by side at a 45 degree angle. To my right is a curving canal with bicycles again plastered to the length of my field of view. Across the street, which has bikes locked to each signal pole in the median, there is a wall of bikes that is only interrupted by the entrance to shops and patios.
And it’s like this everywhere!
I’m taking everything in and going through memory cards for my camera at a furious rate and enjoying every minute. I’ll have more to share in the days ahead.
All the best,
David Godin
