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Russia: Bicycle lighting: Riding experiences in St. Petersburg

Write-up by Dima, on riding experiences in St.Petersburg, with slight editing by me:

I live in St. Petersburg, we have very similar climate to Amsterdam and Helsinki (including White Nights), may be a little bit colder and more humidity and winds from Finland gulf. [ WHS: But there are no white nights in NL. ]

I travel with a bike, cycled along east and west coasts of USA, and mediterranean coasts of Europe. In other coutries I travel alone, but in Russia outside of the city I only travel in groups, because it requires a very good route planning. I think I understand why cycling is not very popular here:

It is NOT a big problem to use a bicycle, BUT everything is optimised for using cars:
- Main advantage for car: fuel is cheap 0.33eur/lit (main bike advantage: city is 99% flat, and fuel is free)
- Some of the roads INSIDE the city center allow highway speeds (cyclists can avoid them)
- Roads are cleaned enough for cars (not clean enough for cycling, but you can change clothes)
- We have many bridges, most of them require cyclists to go from lane 1 to lane 2... (or you can go with pedestrians).

so,
- A smart cyclist can ride in our city without real problems right now, he just needs to put in some extra effort into planning some new routes.
- We have more and more cyclists every year, and with more cyclists it is easier to use the bicycle in the city.
- There are no unresolable problems, you can travel in 1.5 hour from most distants points of the city (Moscow is much bigger).
- In our city motorists are respectful, they just need to develop a habit of expecting cyclists (right now we need to be careful).

We have a very beautiful city - when it was build 300 years ago the city's founder invited the best European architects, so we have all different classic styles of building and I try to make a different routes to see most of them (we have sea port - European cruise visitors can stay for 3 days without visa, perhaps soon this limit will be raised)

A general thing in Russia: if something doesnt affect many people, then most likely it will be self regulated, not regulated by law.
Because we dont have many cyclists and we have a few incidents, cyclists don't receive any attention from the police.
And also because of this, car owners are not made to provide safe distances to cyclists, but if you signal yourself to motorists, they will give you some space.
The most dangerous maneuver is crossing the street with pedestrians (without getting off of the bike).
Cyclists are allowed to use both sidewalk and the road (while respecting other people), but it is a bad idea to mix sidewalks and roads (with frequent changes).

Bicycle lighting, some comments

We discussed B&M's braketec taillamp and some headlamps, and here are some comments from emails:

Why I think braketec may be useful:
While riding in the city (without bike paths) we do a lot of acceleration/deacceleration. If you have another bicycle following you - he will quickly learn your signal. So, you can both safely continue your ride and your follower don't need to worry. It is not always easy to increase distance, because of regular traffic light stops.

For the same reason it may be useful for evening group rides.

WHS: I suppose this is possible, with the wide streets and longer roads than in fairly cramped conditions in cities in NL, there is more speed, also because cyclists that you will encounter are more likely enthusiasts who ride faster than average cyclists here in NL. But, I've never needed it in NL, and I still feel you can see speed changes at least as quickly from the actual changing of distance with a cyclist in front of you. I'm curious whether the brake lamp will work in St.Petersburg as per the above view.

Further comments:

There will be 2018 FIFA World Cup in St.Petersburg/Moscow, so for the next 2 years our city will be improving facilities for tourists, like hiring more people who speak English and by placing more signs in English on the streets... (that is not very critical, if you can use smart phone maps) [ WHS: Such as Osmand, Locus, Oruxmaps. See my bike computer/navigation system page ]. But what is more important, there will be more options to get here, and more easily, after this event... For travelling with the bike, cruises usually have low fares, and there are also FlySAS and Aeroflot who dont charge for bike baggage. It is possible to get here by bike via the EuroVelo 13 (EV13) route, but I haven't tried this course yet.

Practical matters on visiting St.Petersburg:

- Students are the only types of people who will likely be able to speak English (ca. 40-50% of them), of the people you encounter on the street.
- Everything is cheap compared to Europe/Moscow. It's easy to locate public bathrooms. Tap water is not safe to drink (anywhere) [ WHS: As in Ukraine, boil it or take a water purifier with you or buy bottled water... ]
- It make more sense to get here in Summer because of the weather... and to meet beautiful girls who don't need to hide in raincoats [ WHS: LOL! ]

To email me go to the email page