Making the Bicycle Hip

David Serna, writer of the CycleChic Bogotá blog and a founder of the Creatorio bike company with their cool bikes. 

Practical? A Creatorio bike's basket. 

At Bogotá's recent Feria Ambiental I saw lots of products of dubious environmental value - with the general exception of the bicycles.

Bogotá is experiencing a minor boom in bicycle manufacturing. These bikes are relatively expensive, colorful and fancy, and not likely to become transportation for Bogotá's working class, who are predominantly poor and not interested in hippiness.

But, by making bicycles cool, perhaps these companies can counterbalance a bit of the propaganda driving bogotanos to purchase cars, with all the damage they cause to health, the environment and Bogotá's quality of life.

Most of these companies, with the exception of Gallardo's bamboo bikes, are incipient, as you can see from their bare websites. Creatorio's bikes are still in an experimental stage. With luck, some will survive, find a market, and set a trend making bicycles more desireable than cars.

We can hope, at least.

Cletta bikes. 

Gallardo's pricey bamboo bikes are in a category of their own.

A decidedly uncool bicitaxi. Thousands of them perform great public and environmental services in Bogotá every day, but are technically illegal. 

The Ciclocar, which generates energy for other uses. 

David Serna helps organize the annual Ciclopaseo Cachaco, in which participants dress in the style of yesteryear and ride old-fashioned bikes. 

These environmental fair participants found plain old bikes good enough.

The city provided some of the public bikes being lent on Ave. Septima. 

A gimmick? The Yike Bike. 

But the environmental event offered lots of probably free parking. (I didn't hae the heart to ask.)

Bicycle parking. I was told they had another bike rack, but never saw it.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours