Mexico City’s bike culture is thriving

On a recent weekday morning, Monica Castilla stopped her bicycle in a protected bike lane on the busy avenue Paseo de la Reforma to explain why she pedals to her job as a hotel cook in the Zona Rosa area of Mexico City, Mexico.

“You get the stress out. You [get] exercise. And it’s faster,” she said, noting that she cuts her 40-minute bus ride in half on a bike. “And you are not with other people. Oh my God, on the bus everyone is angry. So, I think it’s better (on a bike).”

People for Bikes, the respected Boulder, Colorado-based nonprofit, rates cities around the world for their bike networks. Mexico City has one of the highest scores in the Global South, ahead of New York City, Washington DC and even Portland, Oregon — yet is behind Bogotá, Colombia, with its nearly 350 miles of bike trails.

As the world’s fifth largest metropolis, Mexico City now has 250 miles of bike lanes, many of them created during the COVID-19 pandemic when crowded buses and subways were considered virus traps.

Becoming more bike-friendly

In its crusade to become more bike-friendly, Mexico City closes major avenues in the city center every Sunday and turns them over to cyclists. (This idea started in Bogotá.) Thousands of riders fill the grand Paseo de la Reforma — usually packed with honking taxis and flatulent buses — to leisurely pedal past stately monuments and fountains.

The idea is to entice people to bike on blocked-off streets and get them to consider commuting to work during the week.

“I work in an office where I cannot exercise, so I come out here on Sundays to ride with [my dog] Nami,” said Maricarmen Rodriguez, a 50-year-old medical assistant. 

Rodriguez does not, however, pedal to work. 

“My house is on a hill, and there’s too much traffic,” she said. “What we need from motorists is a culture of respect for cyclists. People are distracted. It’s very bad.”

Mexico City’s conundrum is the same faced by every ginormous, gridlocked city in the world: how to get people out of cars and onto bicycles.

Andres Lajous, CDMX’s Secretary of Mobility, gets tired of being compared to Amsterdam, one of the world’s most bikeable cities.

“It’s like, look at Amsterdam. No,” he said. “Mexico City is different. We have to find our own way to do it.”

Lajous is in charge of all public conveyances in this 570-square-mile city: buses, subways, cable cars and the public bike-share system that has nearly 80,000 riders a day.

“I want people to know outside of Mexico City that it’s easier to bike in Mexico City than what it looks like at first,” he said. “We have  infrastructure that helps cyclists bike safely along(side) cars.”

Bicycle advocates complain that the city is not doing enough to make cycling safe. They say there’s not enough education for motorcyclists, pedestrians and dog walkers who think the bike lanes are for them. Advocates want the police to ticket motorists who ignore bike paths altogether.

“Every day, there are millions of people riding in their cars, so we need alternatives to that,” said Areli Carreón, a longtime cycling activist who recently stepped down as the “bicycle mayor of CDMX.” “We already have that, but people won’t jump on a bicycle if they’re scared of being run over.”

Drivers are often unsympathetic.

“I’m not against bicycles,” said Edgar Sanchez, who drives a private taxi. “But they should be introduced more slowly. People are against bike lanes on busy streets.”

Despite its chaotic traffic, Mexico City actually has some advantages for cyclists.

“The city’s flat, so you can take a bike and go everywhere,” said Diego Cardenas, a bike builder. “The sun or the heat is not that [intense]. We have very mild weather.”

Cardenas makes bicycle frames from sturdy, lightweight bamboo harvested from Yucatán, Mexico. Since he started in 2010, he’s built more than 2,000 bamboo bicycles.

In one sense, the bicycle is making a comeback. 

Bikes have always been popular in Mexico, going back more than a century, but primarily with peoplewho couldn’t afford a car. Certainly, automobiles are a status symbol in a country where 43% of the people live in poverty. But among many urban millennials, bicycles have become de moda, or the latest trend.

“Every day, having more cyclists [makes] motorists more aware of us,” Cardenas said. “I think it’s a work in progress, and I think we’re moving in the right direction.”

Cyclists were heartened by Claudia Sheinbaum’s election on June 2 as Mexico’s first female president. When she was Mexico City’s Secretary of the Environment, she installed the first bike lane in 2004. She continued to support bicycle transportation as mayor of CDMX, pledging in 2022, “Bicycle lanes are part of Mexico City’s sustainable mobility.”