Afraid to ride a bike in the city? Here’s the gear you need to stay safe, plus 10 tips from experienced cyclists

MY FIRST EXPERIENCE with the city bike was not promising. The suburban rides of my childhood hadn’t prepared me for the crumbling concrete, bulky freight trucks and unfriendly drivers. When I moved to New York six years ago, biking seemed absurd.

Early in the pandemic, however, the traffic disappeared from my neighborhood in Brooklyn and it seemed like everyone was taking to two wheels. The New York City Department of Transportation reported that it tracked 33% more bike trips year-over-year between May and December 2020. Recently, I realized I had some enough of being too scared to join the new wave of cyclists.